PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

Gotta watch taking pix. It can get you in trouble. Lots of people take issue with their personal property being photographed.

I have a friend who does urban environment photography....as well as old and/or abandoned structures pix. I love old buildings/homes/structures so he often invites me to tag along. When ever possible he makes every attempt to ask permission before he shoots anything.

He's found over the years that getting permission or at least a blessing from someone nets him better results compared to just shooting something without asking....which sometimes results in undesirable situations.

Obviously it's not always possible to do so. But he tries when he can.

 

My shift last night, which lasted more than 13 hours, consisted of the following:

-Running errands (1 liquor run, 3 or 4 change runs, 2 ice runs, and walking my boss's dog)
-Helping the other barbacks stock beer
-Emptying garbage cans and putting new liners in them.
-Monitoring the situation in the men's bathroom (cleaning and restocking as needed)
-Being an extra set of eyes and ears for the bouncers (even though we had 11 bouncers working, they still couldn't see everything)
-Spending almost an hour guarding a staircase to an employees-only area, acting as what I call a static bouncer, at the request of one of the real bouncers
-Directing drunk patrons to the appropriate bathroom

After almost 14 hours, my boss told me to clock out, but said there would be what was basically a pre-Thanksgiving meal for the employees, and I was welcome as long as I stuck around and helped clean up.

Before taxes, my on-the-the book earnings just for last night will be over $130! After I clocked out, my boss called me into her office, said that I'd done a good job and "absolutely killed it," and handed me a crisp new $50 bill (I honestly was not expecting a cash tipout that night, because I didn't do any work behind the bar that night). That's almost $190 for just one day! I also made over $60 on Monday and and over $70 on Tuesday, which amounts to over $300! Did I mention I'll probably be working another 10-12 hours tomorrow? Not only that, I'll probably get a nice little cash tipout as well.

I got through my Thanksgiving Eve shift on about 7 hours of sleep the previous night, and 6 Monsters, plus a late lunch and an even later dinner.

The bouncers were instructed to stop letting people in at about 1:30am, and by 1:45am-2am, all customers had been been vacated. I helped clean up and take out the garbage, and I also helped the patio bartenders tally the night's earnings and sort out the cash tips.

After all was done, we all hung out upstairs talking shit, and pigging out on turkey and pizza. One of the bouncers brought in some cigars, and I ended up smoking a cigar with some of the bouncers and one of our sound guys who had acting as yet another static bouncer that night. I did smoke about half of a stogie, but aside from Matt's eggnog like 10 hours earlier, I did not consume any alcohol.

 

Did you read my early posts where the random people in the black Passat were "shadowing" me while I was taking pics of the boarded-up K-Mart?

 

Yeah.

It just looks fishy to some people. It can look like you're scouting out something to do something like theft, burglary, vandalism, etc later. Plus, when it comes to personal property, some people don't want their license plate or home address out on the web.

 

Our two commercial ice machines could not keep up, and I ended up making two separate runs to 7-11, purchasing a combined total of more than $180 worth of ice...

On the final change run of the night ($180 in fives), I found out the hard way that when a grocery store claims to be open 24 hours a day, it's very misleading. I ended up driving to Redner's, and found their customer service desk, and thus the safe, to be closed for the night. I'd been to Acme on the 2nd or 3rd change run and they were totally out of money. I absolutely refuse to go to Weis because the manager has a bad attitude towards giving large amounts of change to "bar employees." I called Giant, where I'd gone earlier that night and gotten change, and found that the night manager had no idea how to operate the safe. I called Wegman's and found that they did not have access to the safe. I even called my dad to see if he had $180 in fives, which of course he didn't. I don't I need to tell you that all banks are going to be closed at 10pm-11pm on a Wednesday night, but I will anyway.

I stopped by the Wawa on Main Street on my way back into town and was flat out refused any change whatsoever because it was a busy night for them too. I called the 7-11 where I'd picked up the ice earlier, and got the same response. I drove back to work, seemingly defeated but not done yet. As a last resort, I went across the street to Coach's Steak and Hoagie House, which is owned by my friend Pat. Imagine my amazement and relief when Pat told me had about $500 in fives! He happily gave me the change I needed and I told him he deserved a beer or two on the house. I should have gone to Coach's in the first place!

 

Well, I went back to the property the next day and took the remainder of the pictures I hadn't taken the previous day because the people in the Passat freaked me out. The front seat passenger in the Passat took a picture of me as they rolled past my truck, and I vowed to give them the finger if they did it again.

I don't have a problem with the real police, as in my past experience, they have always been very cool.

Near the bottom of the annoyance scale are security guards, but they're rarely a problem for me anymore. At the top of the annoyance scale are third party interlopers like the trio in the black Passat. They weren't cops or security guards. They were just customers of a nearby Dunkin Donuts who happened to see me when I pulled in. The K-Mart and the attached auto service center have been closed since early 2013, and the six or so independently-owned businesses held on for a couple years after the K-mart closed, but started closing down with the last one closing its doors this past summer. Occasionally I'll see a cop in the parking lot waiting for a speed, but the place is deserted. It's kind of a dead zone, a demilitarized zone of sorts. The only noteworthy thing is that someone has abandoned an International Scout II in the parking lot, one that could be easily restored. Nothing nefarious seems to take place there. I hate vigilante third-party interlopers. They are among the most annoying people on earth!

 

Also, there's not wanting people to take pictures of your personal property, and then there's just being batshit crazy...

The owner of that brownish gray Sonoma was the latter. He had issues that went wayyy beyond not wanting his truck photographed. I was nothing but nice to him and he kept cussing at me. At one point he tried to reach through the window of my Tacoma, which is my personal property, and make a grab for my $700 camera. I could care less if someone takes pictures of my truck. Hell, I'd be flattered, but taking pictures of and/or admiring my truck is one thing...

A man's (or woman's) home is his (or her) castle and I believe the same rule applies to the cabin of a vehicle. To quote Cooter Davenport from the Dukes of Hazzard when Sheriff Roscoe wanted to search his tow truck and he said no, "A man's cab is his castle." When you come in to my domain, you cross a line. I responded by, like I said, burying the accelerator and hauling ass before he could get close to my truck...

 

-Directing drunk patrons to the appropriate bathroom

@Plain Jane Taco , this part of last night's shift involves a drunk girl and a 'Rona...

I had it easy. My boss told me to monitor the men's room and restock supplies (soap, TP, paper towels, etc) and make sure nobody was doing something they weren't supposed to, and she said she'd take the women's room. My boss drew the short straw on that one!

Somebody dropped a particularly potent deuce in the men's room toilet, but at least he did it in the toilet. There was the usual stuff, like empty drinks left on the urinals and towels and TP on the floor, but nothing too bad. Among the not-so-usual was an empty Lager bottle in one of the urinals, but it was pretty uneventful.

At some point around 11:30pm-12am, we got particularly swamped. After getting back from my second ice run, I was chatting with another barback named Tyler, and out of the corner of my eye I noticed a young woman in what all the staffers know as the "Sonos Room." Obviously, the room where the guts of a several-thousand-dollar stereo system are located is off-limits to customers. This woman, obviously hammered, was gone as quickly as she'd appeared. I brought the situation to Tyler's attention and Tyler was very busy, so he told me I should handle it. I headed up the stairs, and she reappeared when she heard my footsteps. I very politely asked her how I could help her and told her she was in a restricted area. She saw the bar's logo on my shirt and knew I worked there, immediately apologized, and said she was looking for the restroom. She then proceeded to stumble down another set of stairs, half-drunk Corona in hand, and try the door to the room where the spare bar was located.

Remaining nice the entire night, I say "Ma'm, this is an employees-only area. You can't be up here. The ladies' room is down that next set of stairs and to the left."

She apologizes again, thanks me, and disappears...

 

After the drunk girl with the Corona disappeared, I notified our head bouncer (the de facto head of security since he's been there the longest) that I'd just escorted a drunk girl, who was looking for the bathroom, out of the back stairwell. He thanked me, but he was too preoccupied with monitoring the situation on the patio...

I went back downstairs a short time later, and another one of our veteran bouncers, a 40-year old guy named Andy, told me to stand in the very same door way that had allowed the girl with the Corona to get up to the Sonos Room. The general manager (my boss), all of the bartenders, all of the bouncers, and one of the barbacks had walkie-talkies. Andy was seated behind the hostess stand with his walkie, monitoring the lobby and getting up from his post to assist the other bouncers as needed.

I stood in the doorway, easily taking up the entire space with my sheer bulk and effectively blocking the way. I'd been wearing my Flyers pullover since I was running in and out and it was so cold by then. To make it obvious that I worked there, I pulled off my Flyer jacket so people would see the bar's logo, emblazoned in upper left corner of my black T-shirt in bright white letters. This guy named Scott whose band plays in the venue every week, and who stands in as a backup sound guy when Soundman Mike (our house sound guy) is at another gig or otherwise unable to be there, was standing directly across from me in the hallway acted as a static bouncer as well. Our job was just to stand there and make sure nobody went where they weren't supposed to go, and notify the actual bouncers if someone caused trouble. During the 45 minutes to an hour I stood there, Scott pointed out a guy to Andy who was obviously high on acid and could barely stand up. Andy and another bouncer removed him without incident.

While I standing at my post, a tall and reasonably attractive brunette came out of the ladies' room and approached me. She was drunk enough that she was in absolutely no condition to drive, but she was nowhere near as hammered as some of the other customers. She could stand and keep her balance, and as I also found out, she could talk clearly. She was one of the people I encountered that night who mistook me for a legit bouncer. Here I am, this 6-foot tall, 240-pound guy wearing a shirt with the bar's official logo on it, and I'm blocking an employees-only area. She was tipsy, and she immediately assumed "bouncer." Remember how I said that my boss drew the short straw in volunteering to monitor the ladies' room? Here's why...

This tall brunette proceeds to tell me that the women's room is disgusting. This does not surprise me in the slightest, as the women's room always gets much more trashed than the men's room on busy nights. I tell her that I'm not allowed in the women's room during peak business hours. I stock the women's room, and clean it too, all the time before we open. However, I don't go in there at all during business hours because I don't want to walk in on somebody or be walked in on myself.

The tall brunette then proceeds to tell me that someone had vomited in one of the sinks.

Trying to be ladylike, she used one of two terms; Either thrown up or vomited. I forget exactly which term she used...

Even this does not surprise me in the slightest. We, the staff, lost count of how many people puked on the premises that night. Sometimes, a bartender or barback saw it and notified the nearest bouncer, who then handled the situation appropriately. Sometimes, a bouncer was lucky enough (being semi-sarcastic) to witness a customer throwing up. 99% of the time, if you barf and get caught, you're automatically flagged and removed from the premises for the night. Unfortunately, and this goes for any bar, not just the one where I work; People throw up and none of the staff sees it. Sometimes, they are courteous enough to at least make something of an attempt to make it to a toilet...

The tall brunette tells me she can't wash her hands because someone threw up in the sink (both bathrooms have two sinks, so I find it hard to believe that both sinks had been puked in) starts rambling about how she just paid eight bucks for a drink and at that price she shouldn't have to deal with disgusting bathrooms. She then asks if there is "someone like a manager she can talk to." My boss was literally right behind her in the closed walk-in, inventorying beer, but there was no way she would hear me and I wasn't about to leave my post. If she was being rude, I probably could have gotten Andy to throw her out, but she was being quite polite and reasonable. I yelled for Andy, but he was busy and couldn't hear me. Finally, tall brunette disappears, and one of the other barbacks notifies the GM (again the GM, my boss, is a woman) of the situation in the ladies' room.

My boss finally goes in there to assess the situation, and then comes back out moments later with an indescribable look on her face. That look was all the proof I needed that it was bad. Luckily, my boss and another female employee cleaned things up so I didn't have to.

FUN FACT: My boss is literally not afraid to get her hands dirty. She is such a badass that before we hired an outside cleaning crew to do the bathrooms, she had no problem pulling on a pair of rubber gloves and cleaning the bathrooms. She even changed the urinal cakes! She also has no problem putting on an apron and helping out in the kitchen from time to time...

 

For those who don't know, I work as a barback at a bar/restaurant/music venue. I think LEOs and service industry employees have one thing in common, and this is knowledge of the biggest drinking nights of the year. Thanksgiving Eve, also known as "Blackout Wednesday," is one of these nights.

I worked more than 13 hours last yesterday, and during breaks, I would chat with the bouncers and we would watch the local cops bust drunk kids for public urination in an adjacent parking lot. It was like shooting fish in a barrel and quite entertaining to watch. At one point, one of the bouncers and I flagged down a bicycle cop and pointed out a known troublemaker and his friend who were both taking a piss next to a parked car.

Anyway, while I was doing other things, I missed an apparent public intoxication arrest. My friend who is a bouncer told me that two uniformed officers on foot patrol (who had responded to the earlier public urination incident) had casually asked a drunk girl "How it's going?" This was not an attempt to check her ID and just a legit attempt at making friendly conversation on the part of the officers, and the girl responded by telling them to either "Fuck off" or "Go fuck yourselves." My friend the bouncer told me that she ended up seemingly getting cuffed and taken to jail for cussing at the officers, but that it was more than likely an arrest for public intox and the f-bomb was just the tip of the iceberg.

So, the title of this thread is pretty my question of the night. It is against the law to swear at a cop?

 

Also, I've been working at a bar for three years now, and I've been on both sides of the bar. I don't drink that much, and when I do, I'm responsible. It still confounds me as to why more people can't be like me when I drink. The bouncers at the bar where I work once told me that if more drunks were like me, they might be out of the job. I hang out and drink with friends in the same town where I work, by the way...

On a couple of occasions while walking around town at night, I have crossed paths with local police who were on routine patrol. I have walked up to these police officers feeling more than a bit drunk, carried on a friendly conversation with them, and gone on my way without incident. How stupid can you be to tell a cop to "fuck off" when he or she is just trying to be nice?!?!

 

No it’s not illegal. It’s freedom of speech. She probably got nailed for public intoxication.

 

Either way, I still say she's pretty goddamn stupid for swearing at a cop...

 

People change when drinking and may not realize what she was doing?. If sober may not have done it.

 

I've been in the bar business for 3 years, and the shit drunk people do still amazes me everyday.

 

It may not be illegal but it certainly isn't a good idea. At the least, they can inconvenience you more so than the other way around.

 

Love your signature!

 

I was once one of them and kept the liquor company's afloat for some time so I quit 24yrs ago. Did some really dumb things, so I'm told anyway...

 

Just noticed you were in the Navy. My dad was in the Navy for years. He was a navigator on a P3 and retired in 2007 as a Captain. As the son of a Navy vet, I'd like to thank you for your service!

 

TLDR;


No