New Year’s Eve Failure or Not?

Last night, 12/31/14 Bum & I went to a local bar for a New Year’s Eve Celebration that failed but was yet a great time.

Our daughter Megan and her husband Marc invited us (Bum & I) to join them at Classics Bar & Grill in Advance NC, right down the road from where I live. Normally we do not go out on New Year’s Eve, but thought this would be fun to do, so we agreed.

We got there at 7 pm and there were less than 20 people in the bar. The table area was nearly completely empty.

After ordering a round the waitress told us that the restaurant was going to close at 8 pm. We all laughed at what we thought was a joke, but, Nope, she was serious.

On New Year’s Eve, the only local bar, positioned in a community that is poised to explode over the next few years and they are closing early on New Year’s Eve.

This seems to be a New Years Eve Failure

While we laughed at what we considered a business failure here is what else happened:

Repeatedly one lady in the bar kept playing music on the digital jukebox. Each time she swiped her card in the credit card slot she appeared to be twerking with the jukebox.

Yeah, yeah, I know people dance in front of jukeboxes all the time. This was way different.  She appeared to be twerking on the jukebox. We were laughing so hard more than one of us snorted at the table. Later we discovered it was one of the bar owners.

When ordering another round of beer we thought about ordering a beer tower. The price was not too bad and Courtney would put our favorite beer in it. However, since the bar was closing in less than 1 hour she suggested that we not order a beer tower. We agreed. 10 minutes later the table behind us ordered one and had it delivered. We laughed thinking there was no way 4 people could drink 12 beers in less than 30 minutes. We were wrong.

An older guy walked up to our table and wished us a Happy New Year. While talking he said he had two wives and had owned two expensive homes, neither of which he still had or lived in, yet his ex-wives were very happy in “them thar homes.” He said he now lives in a hotel room.

I wished him better success in 2015. He came back later and in the chat, I told him Bum and I were still married after 37 years. He was so excited, cajoled us into standing up and hugging him. Later on, we saw him dancing with an older woman up near the jukebox. Our barmaid told us it was his mother.

At around 8:30 pm, 30 minutes past closing time I wanted another beer. Our barmaid came over to the table to check on us. I told her I wanted another beer, but I would not order one if she wanted us to leave. She looked like she wanted us to leave, but agreed that because she had work to do in the back room I could have another beer. Megan wanted another margarita too.

We joked with the barmaid about a local bar wanting to close at 8 pm on New Year’s Eve. When I asked her what she was going to do after work she said she was going to go home and cook Bang Bang Shrimp. I asked if we could come over and she said yes. I’m a smart man. Bum was there and I knew the barmaid only wanted a bigger tip. She left laughing to get my beer. She came back with my beer but forgot Megan’s drink.

We finished up laughing and cutting up with the barmaid by about 8:45 pm. We were nearly the last people out of the bar. On the way out of the bar, we saw the sign on the doors. Handwritten on yellow ledger paper, “Closing at 8 pm New Year’s Eve.”

We didn’t get a chance to close down the year in this local bar, but we closed down the local bar on New Year’s Eve.

Normally if we were told to exit a local bar at 8 pm on New Year’s Eve we would consider it a New Years’ Eve Failure. However, everything else that happened that night made it somewhat successful, ie – funny.