This Week in Douchebaggery:

Wow. The obnoxious behavior of certain drunks never ceases to both amuse and sadden me.

1. Friday night ETB was playing BD Riley's.

At one point while our merch person Beth was walking the crowd with email signup sheet and CDs, 2 guys went up to the merch table (set up by my side of the small corner stage) and were looking at our stuff but also playing with our little Gumby figurine. We have several weird knicknacks on our table, sort of like merch mascots. Gumby was given to us by a friend in Boston while on tour last summer and has been with us ever since.

So in between songs one of the guys, an Englishman, starts asking me questions.

Him: "Do you like Oasis?"

Me (perplexed): "Uh, do I look like I like Oasis?"

Him: "Well, I guess not, heh! What DO you like?"

Me: "Led Zeppelin"

Him (slightly offended): "Oh, well, uh, I'm from England and..."

Anyway. After this exchange I see his friend plonk his finished pint glass on top of our CDs, grab Gumby and walk out the door.

Since I was using my wireless unit, I went out the door after him. But had already lost him in the crowd, 6th Street was blocked off and I hadn't bothered to remember what his shirt looked like. Went back inside and asked Englishman, "HEY! Where'd your friend go?!?" He replied, "Uh, that wasn't my friend."

Well shit.

And it wasn't so much losing Gumby in such a manner, tho Lord knows we've had some good times partying with him, but just the overall level of disrespect.

Say you are in your office at work. Now picture a drunk comes in while you are on a business call, puts his pint glass down on your folders, grabs your stapler and walks out.



2. ETB Monday residency at Friends.

Being this was a Monday and National Holiday turnout was good. Set going well, fun show.

While we are playing, I see a drunk guy stagger in. He stands and looks into our tip bucket, then weaves to the bar for a beer. Then he comes and plops himself down on the stairs on the front of the stage.

Now sitting there isn't the problem. It's the reason you are sitting there: posing for a pic, cool. having a blast and taking a seat there to really feel the music, cool. plopping your ass down because the stairs are as good as any bar stool and not even realizing a band is playing, not so much.

We all looked at eack other mid song, shrugged, and shook our heads. We go into a walkaround, and guy eventually gets up. At one point I make my way back onto stage and Rob gets my attention: "Hey, Loranda (our merch person that night) just stopped that guy from messing with the tip bucket." Well shit.

I hop offstage and ask Loranda about it (mid-song). She said he grabbed a dollar out but dropped it when she stopped him. Then he made his way to the back of the bar. So I told the door guys about it and gave a description of him, asked them to please escort him out.

But skinny drunk guy saved them the trouble, soon as I told the doorstaff the scoop he reappeared outside, and came up to me as I stood playing bass on the sidewalk.

As I went to remove the cigarette out of my mouth so I could tell him how I truly felt about him, he attempted to grab it from my mouth. I slapped his hand away and looked him dead in the drunken eye:

"Get the fuck out of here. If you ever try to steal from us again we will beat the shit out of you."

He stood blinking stupidly when the 2 doorstaff put a hand on each of his shoulders and told him to get on his bike and ride.

I mean literally. His bike was against the building by the door. One of the door guys had to pound on the seat with his fist to get it back to the right angle. Then skinny drunk guy went pedaling off into the night.



So yeah. Shit like this makes it necessary to watch a few episodes of Cosmos to restore some of my lost faith in human potential.