Fear and Loathing at the People's Republik (best.gathering.ever.)

WilliamPitt

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Sat Nov-01-03 06:43 PM
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Fear and Loathing at the People's Republik (best.gathering.ever.)

Edited on Sat Nov-01-03 06:55 PM by WilliamPitt

My watch read 1:06pm as I pulled into the 30 minute meter spot on Massachusetts Avenue. This would later prove pivotal; every 25 minutes, I was required to flee the bar and feed the 30 minute meter. It was helpful, because it allowed me to check my brain in the relative silence of Cambridge, and make sure that what was happening in the People's Republik was...well...actually happening.

I entered the gloom of the pub to find matcom and a couple other DUers quietly sipping their beers. A few more DUers showed up in the next half hour. We shot the shit, warmed up, insulted people we didn't like, and were getting ready to have a regular good time. I ordered my second pint and bellied up to the bar.

Hovering on the other side of the room was this older gentleman in a suit. He was maybe 60, nattily dressed, and demonstrably as Irish as the day is long. He caught wind of the political bent to our conversation and threw himself right into the middle of things.

"Hey," he said, pounding the bar. "Hey. Hey! Everyone listen to me. Shaddap! Everyone listen to me!"

We all turned.

"Isn't George W. Bush a great President?" he said.

The DUers let loose a low-voiced collective, "Oh Jesus, here we go."

Except for matcom, who lunged onto the top of his barstool and screamed, "Yeah he's a fuckin war hero! Did'ja see his flight suit? Didja see his package? He's a fuckin war hero!" while grabbing his nuts and flapping them at the older gent. Seriously.

Said older gent was unfazed.

"George W. Bush is a great president," he continued. "He asks for $87 billion to repair a country he blew to shit to get their oil. I can walk a mile in any direction from this spot right here AND FIND PEOPLE WITH NO JOBS AND NO HEALTH CARE AND NO HOME, AND THAT FUCKING ASSHOLE THINKS HE CAN ASK FOR $87 BILLION FOR IRAQ???!!!???" while pounding his fist on the bar and turning an amazing shade of crimson.

And the crowd went wild. Thus began the night.

Lt. Detective John ****** was a New York cop who was in Boston after delivering a rape suspect back here. He had a plane to catch at 8pm. That didn't stop him. This man could have out-boozed a platoon of Marines or a herd of buffalo. My favorite moment happened early. We - me, matcom, John The Cop were out having a butt on the street. He's telling his story, and feigning embarrassment that he was out drinking.

"What the fuck," I said, "are you doing out drinking at a communist bar? What are you, Detective Stalin?" I thought he was going to put me through the window.

Before the night was over, he had:

* Braced matcom against the wall like a suspect to demonstrate how one collars a criminal, and gave matcom the anal frisking of his young life. I mean spread-eagle cold X splat against the wall;

* Bellowed about how John F. Kennedy had been ready to get America out of Vietnam, and if he hadn't gotten killed, John ****** wouldn't have lost half his face in the war;

* Roared about the best Senator in the country, Hillary Clinton;

* Paid a homeless woman down the block $10 just to hear her story;

* Wept about his wife, who died nine months earlier;

* Did at least three strip-teases for the ladies.

The man was a dynamo, and kept the entire bar reeling in laughter. Like Batman, however, he disappeared as soon as he arrived. Woosh, and he was gone.

I open the floor now for further anecdotes from eyewitnesses about Lt. Detective John *******, cop (and die-hard Red Sox fan) from New York.

I have to fall down now.