Last night I went to a local bar to order some take out food. This bar, at one time, was the spot to be at, and people from far and wide would come and line up around the block for hours hoping to get in. A decade and two name changes letter, this place has fallen far from its once A-list status, barely making a blip on the party-night radar. Quite frankly, if this place wasn’t well known for their delicious food, 7 night a week last call at 2 AM, and Monday night poker tournament, it would have closed down long ago. Due to some very unfortunate entertainment changes made by the newest owners (including implementing no-music Friday and Saturday nights and the elimination of things like Karaoke and Comedy Night) this once neighbourhood haven has all but lost its regular frequenters, who now (like myself) pop in seldomly, and normally only out of lack of options (if it had been earlier or any day but Sunday I would have picked up something to eat from some other restaurant. I am not a fan of fast food at the best of times, and with my current stomach issues, McDonalds and Burger King are certainly never viable options. Hence my late night visit to the pub!)

So, as we pull into the parking lot we see two of our friends, former regulars (like me) getting into their car. We give them a honk and a wave, and after staring suspiciously at us before recognition kicked in (I have a new hairstyle – I’ll be posting an updated picture on facebook later on in the day for your approval :-p) they came over to chat for a minute. After we told them we were just here to pick up some food they told us that they were leaving because:

“They’re playing that crash music in there again. ”

“Huh??” I explain, I’m sure looking as confused as I felt.

“You weren’t here last week when this happened? Oh. Well, you’ll see” my friend says with a smirk. We bid them adieu and pull into a parking spot. As we walk toward the front doors, we try to figure out exactly what kind of music we hear, but although the general pulse is perceptible, the walls and door are effectively muting the core element of the music. Is this what “crash” music sounds like, I begin to wonder to myself.

“What the f*** is crash music? Is that even what he said?” my boyfriend asks me, putting on his ‘that sounds like bullshit to me’ face. I shrug, knowing that in about 30 seconds we were about to find out.

Before walking through the open entrance doors, my ears were assaulted, literally, by a crashing, loud, consistent noise, almost as though a cacophony of construction tools were busy at work. I glance toward the stage as I step through the threshold and notice that there is a band (if you could call people who make that kind of AWFUL disorganized chaos musicians) on stage. There is a little table set up about two steps in from the door with a white sign that says ‘$13’ on it. The two girls manning the “pay station” couldn’t have been more than 17. I snort and roll my eyes as we walk past them into the main bar, glancing around at the scene around me with disdain. I had thought that the two boys we had seen at the front entrance wearing skin-tight-all-the-way-down-to-the-ankle jeans were just a couple “interesting characters” for me and my boyfriend to laugh our asses off at before moving on and pretending these super-trenders didn’t really exist.

But the entire bar is FULL of them. EVERYWHERE. Everyone in the bar looks like something out of a bad teeny-bopper rockband music video, and just about as old. WTF is going on here? Is this bar honestly full of teenagers at 10 O’Clock at night? Perusing the crowd, I notice not one has an alcoholic beverage within 20 feet of them, and my suspicions are almost confirmed. The group of wide-eyed girls who come to the bar and order coffee while nervously tittering that their ordering from a real live bartender seals the deal. Seriously? I cannot believe this is happening. And I had thought they had fallen from grace before. But this little *draws a circle in the air with finger* fiasco takes the cake. After greeting the bartender we go as far away as humanly possible from the other room and the tone-deaf band to make our order. She’s about as happy about this new development as we were. Probably worse: she had to tolerate it for the next few hours. We didn’t even order a drink. We just ordered our food and prayed our eardrums wouldn’t start bleeding before it was ready to go.

And then, for a few minutes, blissful silence. It was golden. I prayed it would last forever. It didn’t lol. The next band wasn’t quite as awful. Actually technically they sounded OK if you like that kind of music (I don’t, but if I found it tolerable you can imagine somebody else might have actually said they were good). Of course, they were trying to be really uber cool, headbanging and moshing and all that good stuff…in UNISON!!! No, are you serious? This is TOO much! I can’t take it. I just can’t. They are actually jumping up and down in unison on purpose, and then doing some weird scary thing with their head and neck that makes me think that at any moment they’re about to dislocate SOMETHING, and they wanna be all boy band like, rockin to the beat in unison. Ok. I’m done with this place. Lady, get me my food STAT or I’m leaving without it!

As we walk past that little “pay station” at the front entrance, food in hand, it occurs to me that all these people in here dressed like complete ass clowns have actually paid $13 a piece to look like morons in public. *scratching my head* I don’t get it. I just don’t. And 25 is not so old that I don’t remember what it was like to be young, to want to be hip and cool. But quite frankly, I always thought (as did my friends) that the super trendsters, the ones that ALWAYS had on the gayest looking shit because it was “all the rage in Cali (we’re not IN Cali, you jackass!! was often my reply)” were posers and follow-fashion. I wonder if that term, follow-fashion, even exists anymore. Or maybe it’s now said in a good way. Like, “don’t be yourself and have your own identity. Blend into the crowd, make sure you nothing about you is an original. Come on, after all, do you just wanna be some loser outcast, or would you rather be one of us cool follow-fashions?”.

*Sigh*

Thank God I’m not a teen in this 2K10 generation.

Am I alone on this?

And there’s a happy little story to help you start off your week. LOL

Cheers