A wink and a slap.

This is a story that I’ve told countless number of times in person, usually over a few pints of Guinness. I’ve mentioned parts of this story before in different places online, but I’ve never told the complete story. I was “inspired”, so to speak, to write the whole story after reading Christine’s blog. Her blog is titled “The Misadventures and Misfortunes of Meeting Mr. Right” and a link can be found in my blogroll.

I’m 21 at the time, in the Navy and stationed in Orlando, Florida. (Florida? Foreshadowing in the first sentence? You bet!). I had this buddy whose wife was, rightfully so, convince that I was a bad influence on her husband. She was convinced that I was dragging her husband out to bars, strip clubs and other various places that sailors have been known to frequent. In her mind, I was going to show him that a whole wide and wonderful world of women existed outside the confines of their marriage and she had this plan to stop it. Her plan was to find a girlfriend for me.

Normally, I’m not opposed to blind dates. For the most part, they aren’t so bad. At times they are a lot of fun. However, from time to time, they turn out to be some of the most interesting nights of my life, but not for any “good” reason. They turn out to be stories like this one.

My buddies wife calls and says that she has, “The perfect girl” for me. In her words, “Tommy, she’s smart, funny, has one of those dry senses of humor you like so much, great eyes, nice rack and is one of the nicest women I know. She’s exactly the type of woman that any guy would be lucky to have. She’s a saint who also knows how to have a good time”. Remember that part. I agree to the date and give her a call the next day.

I called Sara (BTW, that’s not her real name. I use Sara for the names of a lot of women in things that I write just because it’s easy to type) and set up a date for the upcoming weekend. The plan was to go to a bar named “Chillers” in Orlando, sit out on the front patio and just get to know each other. No big whoop right? Just a meet and greet to see if any form of a spark was there. The date was set, we agreed to meet each other there and off I went on my normal, day to day business.

So, on the night of the date, I’m walking up to the bar about five minutes before the agreed upon time. About 15 feet or so before the entrance of the bar, I hear, clear as a bell, “Tommmm-eh! Over here! I’m right here!”. There was Sara, standing up, drink in hand, empties on the table, waving her hand back and forth, left boob hanging out.

WTF!

I walk up to the bouncer and show my I.D. The bouncer looks at me and asks, “So, you’re Tommy right?”. “Why?” I ask. His response, “Dude, she’s been here for an hour pounding down drinks on the Tick-Tock countdown. She keeps on asking me to let her know when you show up. It’s fucking annoying the hell out of me. We’re about ready to kick her out.” I ask him to hold onto that thought for a moment and I’ll go see what’s going on with her. The bouncer seems cool with that, mostly because she was going to be my problem from now on.

I walk up to where Sara was sitting and was just planning on introducing myself as normal; firm handshake and a simple greeting. Sara beat me to the punch and gave me one of those drunken hugs that have just a bit more contact than what’s appropriate within the first few seconds of meeting someone. We separate and I, as politely as I could, suggest to her that she may want to fix her top. She says, “Oh, this fucking thing happens all of the time. I knew I should of worn a fucking bra” with the casualness of chit chat about the weather. It’s almost as if that sort of thing happened all of the time to her.

We sit down and start the normal, first date kind of conversation. Just a bunch of blah blah about where we were from, what we did and things of that nature. Just your normal boring “We have nothing better to talk about” conversation that is the typical beginning of most blind dates. However, I couldn’t really make out what Sara was saying due to the heavy amount of slurring but I think that her job involved some sort of “dancing” activities.

The waitress comes up and asks if I would like a drink. I just order a beer and the waitress winks and says, “coming right up”. That little wink was the catalysts for the rest of the story.

Sara apparently took offense to the waitress giving me a bit of a wink. It honestly wasn’t anything flirty. Just something that cocktail servers do to seem friendly and therefore, increase their tips. Not a big deal right? Well, Sara responded to this simple little gesture with a loud and sloppy, “He’s on a date with me…BITCH!”.

WTF?

That combined with the previous hours worth of dealing with Sara was enough for the manager, who had been watching this whole thing, to make the decision to bounce her out of the bar. I can see why he made this decision. Here was a woman, pounding down drinks for an hour, boob hanging out, swearing like a longshoreman and now, accosting the staff. That and some schmuck (me) was there now to deal with her. I would have kicked her out a long time ago if I were him.

So, the manager comes over and gives up the standard, “I’m going to have to ask you folks to leave…right now”. I had been there for about 10 minutes and was more than ready to leave. So I stand up and say, “Come on Sara, I’ll drive you home”. Trust me, there was nothing more to me saying that than just wanting to make sure she didn’t kill someone on her way home. Nothing more, nothing less. Sara, didn’t like being asked to leave and let the manager, and everyone in the greater Orlando area, know it.

“Fuck you buddy! I’m not going to leave. My boyfriend (?) has a drink coming to him and we ain’t gonna leave until he gets it!”. I look at the manager and he just looks at me as if we had a certain unspoken agreement. We both knew this wasn’t my fault, but I was going to be the one to get her out of there. I try to convince Sara that I was fine with not getting the beer and that it was, indeed, time to leave. Sara, responded to my plea by slapping the manager.

WTF!

Now, this particular bar we were at was in the place called Church Street in Orlando. It was a street that was closed down to traffic and lined from one end to another with bars and nightclubs. It was your basic entertainment district with your basic entertainment district police presence. One part of that police presence saw Sara bitch slap the manager and did what any cop would do. He laughed and then walked over to us along with his partner.

“Is there a problem here?” the cop asks. The manager, trying very hard to maintain his composure and dignity, recounted the story for the cops from the time Sara got there, to the slap. The good part was that he basically told the police that I had just arrived and really had no part in this. Oh, and Sara’s boob was once again, hanging out.

The cop just looked at me and asked if was willing and able to take her home. The manager didn’t want to press charges against her and all would be forgotten if I could just get her the hell out of there. Now, I understand that I had no responsibility in this matter. I didn’t owe anybody anything. I did however, feel that it was my job to get Sara home safe and sound. Not only for her benefit, but for the safety of the general public as well. I told the cops that I could take care of it and he, and the manager seemed fine with the agreed upon decision. Sara, on the other hand, had a different plan.

The cop, turned to answer a call on his radio. One of the ones that have a little speaker attached to his shoulder where they just tilt their heads to talk into. As soon as the cop turned to answer the call, Sara took that opportunity to slap the cop. Now, this wasn’t just some little, elbow first and then hand, kinda slaps. This was a full on, “bitch better have my money”, back handed pimp slap right into the cop’s kisser.

WTF!

What happened next was a furry of arms and hands with the net result of the cop’s partner having Sara pinned down on a table, face first. As most of you know, if you’ve been drinking for an hour straight, sudden movements aren’t exactly the best idea. Well, Sara’s body reacted in the natural way and she released about half of the booze content in her belly back out into the wild. Seeing as how she was pinned down, face first, on a table, the resulting splatter and, well, let’s just say that it was interesting. The first cop, who remained extremely calm during this whole incident, gets a hold of Sara’s drivers license and calls the incident in.

A call came back over the radio that Sara had some sort of an outstanding bench warrant out against her. What the warrant was for is beyond me. I wasn’t able to make it out over the cops radio. If I had to make an educated guess, I would say that it was probably something alcohol related. I’d actually be willing to bet cold hard cash on that.

The cops swoop Sara up, read her her rights and take her away leaving only the vomit and a whole bunch of stunned onlookers, behind. I tried to apologize to the manager for what happened. I explained to him the entire story from my buddy’s wife on and that this whole thing was, for me, a very bad blind date. When I told the manager that this was indeed a blind date, he just about fell over laughing. Apparently, he had been on a few bad dates himself and invited me into the bar saying, “Man, we both need a drink”. How cool was he? Way cool.

Oh, and one more thing. Remember that waitress who gave me that wink? We dated up until I got transfered from Orlando. So the blind date didn’t turn out to be so bad after all. HA!