Jeff Burkhart: She who laughs first often gets laughed at, too
Was it a gaggle? I wasn’t sure. I certainly wasn’t going to look it up on my phone. I am old school, and I believe an employee should not be on their phone in front of customers. Call them what you will, but it was a group of six women in their early 30s. “Do […]
Was it a gaggle? I wasn’t sure. I certainly wasn’t going to look it up on my phone. I am old school, and I believe an employee should not be on their phone in front of customers. Call them what you will, but it was a group of six women in their early 30s.
“Do you know how to make classic cocktails?” one asked.
I was flattered that she didn’t automatically assume so because of my age. But that flattery ended a second later.
“You know, like the Cosmopolitan,” she added.
I’ve been bartending long enough to remember when the Cosmopolitan came out. It was the Aperol spritz of its day. Like the spritz, it was based on an older drink (the Kamikaze) and then freshened with newfangled ingredients. Cranberry juice, I’m looking at you.
Funny how if you read the history of the Cosmo, you’ll find origin stories dating to 1989, which is strange for a bartender like myself who remembers having to learn how to make them for my first bartending gig in 1987 at a corporate chain with more than 600 restaurants. Odd how somebody wrote an entire book based on the 1989 premise and never figured that out.
Once we got past the ordering part, the rest of this girls night out commenced. I only use the word “girls” because that is what they called themselves. If women are going to refer to themselves as girls, I’m not sure where that leaves the rest of us.
“I can’t believe she’s wearing that,” one said as soon as one her companions left and took a phone call in the lobby.
When the lobby-goer returned, there was a moment of awkward silence and looking around before the conversation moved in a different direction.
Then, the woman who had first commented on the clothing excused herself to use the restroom.
“Can you get a bigger purse?” asked the woman who had been in the lobby.
“And I think it’s a knockoff,” added another.
Ms. Knockoff Purse returned to the group only to face the same awkward silence and looking around before the conversation started again.
Another call and another woman left the group.
“It’s like watching a dying horse,” said Ms. Lobby-goer.
The other women looked at her for a second, and then most of them laughed. The one who didn’t looked at Ms. Lobby-goer quizzically.
“Her clomping around in those heels.”
Ms. Clompy returned to the group as they were still laughing, only to have them stop laughing, look around awkwardly and sit in silence.
“What’s so funny?” she asked.
“Nothing,” one replied.
“You had to be there,” added another.
Eventually, it came time for another cocktail. Ms. Clompy held up her phone, or was it Ms. Lobby-goer or Ms. Knockoff? I wasn’t sure at this point. The funny thing in our culture is how similar we all seem. A different pair of yoga pants or cargo shorts doesn’t make you different, it just makes you more of the same.
“Amaretto Sours?” I asked. “Of course, I know how to make those.”
I walked away and made six of them, which I delivered in two trips. When I set the second batch down, the women were laughing. Then, they stopped abruptly. They looked around at each other in awkward silence and then looked at me.
“We’re sorry,” Ms. Clompy said. “We were laughing at an inside joke.”
Leaving me with these thoughts.
• It’s all fun and games until the joke’s on you.
• When geese are on the ground, they are called a gaggle. If they are flying, they are a skein, team or wedge. If they are flying closely together, then they are known as a plump.
• If your group’s conversation settles on the one who has just left, rest assured they’ll talk about you when you leave, too.
• “Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about themselves and small people talk about others,” once observed business leader John C. Maxwell.
• “Where do I deposit all this money?” reportedly said Andy Cohen, founder and host of the “Real Housewives” TV franchise.
• Don’t believe everything you read.
Jeff Burkhart is the author of “Twenty Years Behind Bars: The Spirited Adventures of a Real Bartender, Vol. I and II,” the host of the Barfly Podcast on iTunes and an award-winning bartender at a local restaurant. Follow him at jeffburkhart.net and contact him at jeffbarflyIJ@outlook.com