A Guide to Public Drunkenness in Ottawa: Volume 2
By Adam Slight
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Over a month ago I wrote a Guide to Public Drunkenness in Ottawa in hopes of refining Ottawa’s otherwise sailor-like drunken conduct. From what I can tell, you didn’t take my advice, because you still insist on spilling your sloppy guts all over our fine city streets. Well St. Patrick’s Day is coming up, and this time I’m serious about giving you the etiquette you need to go massacre your brain-cells in a couth and respectable manner. Before you camp out in line at the Heart and Crown so you can start drinking at 10 am, make sure you take a look at my Guide to Public Drunkenness in Ottawa: Volume 2.
Leave the Drama for the Opera:
As a general rule of thumb, you shouldn’t be drinking if you have
”stuff” going on. While it may seem like a good idea to have close friends nearby after you’ve had a fight with your boyfriend/girlfriend, or your cat has just passed away, or your prof totally failed you because they hate you–just be wary. Once the booze starts flowing, the emotions might start flying. When your stew boils over, and you’re outside of Pub 101 screaming and swearing at your significant other, or crying on the curb, think about your friends—not necessarily your close friends (after all, its their job to consol you and lecture your boyfriend for being such a dickhead)—but think of your poor acquaintances who just came to have a good time, and now have to awkwardly stand around with you waiting for a cab or risk getting chewed out later.
It might have just been better to blow your steam at the gym or by eating a McCain deep dish with KFC to make yourself feel better.
Be the Good Kids on the Bus:
We’ve all experienced that sober scenario on the bus when some kids in the back have had their first few beers and can’t help but announce it to the world. Maybe you’re going to visit a friend downtown or have dinner plans. You’re happily anticipating a pleasant evening and your spirits are high. Nothing induces the urge to turn up your earphones more than the finger-nails-on-chalk-board incessant announcement of “I’m so wasted!!” heard at the back of the bus. Then her boyfriend yells at the bus driver to “SPEED UP!!” while his friend cracks open a beer that he pulled from his backpack.
You don’t want to be these people.
If you’ve been on the 95 Baseline at 3am on a Saturday, then you know that the above scenario is like enjoying a stiff brandy in the smoking room at Downton Abbey compared to this lawless blood-orgy. You’ll see horrors dance before your eyes, people lighting up bongs in the back, and green under-agers puking out the windows.
Again. Show yourself some respect. You can do better than this. If not, maybe just take a cab, or go back to kindergarten.
You’re Either Irish or You’re Not:
You may have heard the old proverb “Everybody is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day.” It is false.
Only Irish people are Irish on St. Patrick’s Day. French people are still French, Chinese people are still Chinese, and Polish people are still Polish. And Canadian people are still Canadian.
See what I did there?
If a Bouncer Takes your ID, don’t Call the Cops
I understand: Waiting in line to get into a bar is huge feat of endurance that deserves the end reward of paying for cover, coat-check, and overpriced alcohol. St. Patrick’s Day will present extra potent situations to prove your line-waiting prowess.
At the end of the line, you must face The Gatekeeper, the bouncer, in a procedure that somehow resembles passing through the checkpoint of a DMZ. Some make it through, and others just aren’t so lucky.
If you’re 18, and the bouncer takes your ID away from you and refuses you entry, please admit defeat and go home for a year.
If you’re 19, and the bouncer takes your ID away from you and refuses you entry, please admit defeat, go home, and apply for a new driver’s license (and grow a beard or something for the picture).
This is all you can do. The bouncer is not going to give it back to you, even if you are in the right, and the cops are going to laugh at you if you ask them to get it back for you. This is just a reality.
Whatever you do, don’t spend the rest of your evening pursuing an alcohol-fueled conquest in hopes of retrieving your lost ID. You may feel like you are pursuing a noble cause fighting the Man for the people, but you just look like someone who is desperately searching for a missing child, only, a million times more selfish and foolish.
Keep your dignity in-tact this St. Patrick’s Day.
Oh Yeah. Don’t Walk into Window Panes
Actually, please walk into window panes—Especially if you’re at Tila Tequila. If I got a dollar every time somebody at Tila Tequila didn’t recognize the difference between passable air and polished glass, and smashed their face in an attempt to exit the bar, I’d be rich enough to pass a law that decreed that all clubs and bars must be made of glass.
Seriously, this is my favourite thing.
If you’re ever bored one weekend night:
Just go chill outside of Tila Tequila and place bets on which bar-stars will pass the “Real Door/Fake Door” test, and which will fail in a humiliating display of clean glass and intoxicated self-absorption.
