What I knew was coming...

So last Tuesday started off like any other Tuesday might. Jaka was bartending and I was managing. We had our first shot around noon. Now, the both of us have learned (for the most part) to behave on the job, meaning not getting wasted to the point of being black out drunk on the job, this has happened on more than one occasion...sorry Rusty.

At any rate, when 5pm rolled around, and eight Bazooka Joe's in to the evening, all that was left was for the adventure to begin. One of the cooks said that if we went and picked up some Salmon from the store and he would make us dinner. Never, ever should one go to the grocery store drunk. All we needed was 3lbs of Salmon, somehow we left with almost 6lbs of Salmon and $40 bucks less to our name, that's a lot of Salmon. So we leave the store with a few other ingredients and I jump out at the berg with Jaka goes somewhere to pickup dill weed. (Yes, actual dill weed)

A couple of beers later and a few more shots, Jeff asked if I could run him home so he could shower, I said yes, but only if I get to play with the turntables again. I don't know much about turntables, but I think these are pretty sweet. It's kind of like if you've ever gone to a guitar store and they have an amp hooked up to an effects processor. You may have never picked up a guitar in your life, but play with the effects and you should like a god. Well, I'm certainly no god when it comes to turntables, but it sure is a lot of fun.

Anyway, I never actually played with the turntables that night, somehow, we started watching Big Fish, and may or may not have shed a tear or two. It's a good movie, so fuck off. Finally we leave Jeff's place only to return to an even more wasted Jaka, and still no dinner. So I feel the need not to let Jaka get too ahead of me in booze, so I play catch up.

Finally dinner arrives and it is delicious. I wish I could tell you what all was prepared for us, but I have no idea except for Salmon. After dinner, it was becoming clear to me that Jaka was becoming that "special Jaka" we all know and love to love and abuse when he's that wasted. Em was managing and I thought I would do her a favor and take Jaka for a walk. Now, I had my own motive for this, I was hoping I might run into someone that I've taken a fancy to along the walk. Funny, how the sometimes the opposite demands attention.

We make it all the way to The Blue Note and get in for free to watch some concert. By this time, I felt, that the walk had actually done him some good and he was starting to calm down and maybe sober up. Before I could even finish my bottle of beer, Jaka had downed two huge rum and cokes. At this point he really wanted to get mouthy with some of the staff and I knew it was time to go. So we left. I get him outside and he is still trying to get a reaction for someone, but it's not working. So he punches a store front window, luckily not cracking or breaking it.

As we are walking across Broadway, he says, let's go to Tellers. I could tell that it was dead, but he was insisting. As he began to turn towards Tellers, I saw her and she saw me. Ok, so I knew this was coming, I knew this was going too happen, but I didn't think so soon.

It was almost a deer in head lights short of thing. I know it didn't last but a moment, but it was that feeling where everything inside you is stumbling over the other, trying to find a way out or somewhere else to go and hide. That paralyzing fear that everything you have worked through is about to come flooding back by a simple glance.

Anyway, Jaka is still insisting that we go to Tellers, oblivious to what is going on, I yell at him and say we are not going to fucking Tellers and to come on. I think I even said that we needed to get back home (berg if you were wondering) where things are safer for everyone. After we got a little ways down 9th I explained to him why we could not go to Tellers. That was a mistake. Now, he wanted to fight. He wanted to fight him. He wanted to destroy something. This led to us almost coming to blows. I called Bob, to inform him what had just happened and to let him know I might be in jail later. I was afraid I couldn't keep Jaka under control much longer and there would be no way for me to convince anyone that I didn't have a hand in it after all the stupid threats I made months ago.

I was able to keep him walking until we made it back to the berg where I at least had more help to convince him. That was fine and all, but now I had time to think about what had just happened and what it meant. It was awhile later, spacing out at trivia, not doing a damn to help the team (which they won) that it was best that it happened this way for two reasons.

One, it was a good that I had Jaka with me, cause his actions allowed me not to react in the same way if perhaps I was alone or with someone else and we were passing by. It allowed me to have the better judgment. I might have been the idiot, the dumb ass that would actually try to hurt someone over something so pointless.

What's done is done. Is that forgiveness…um, no. I'm not sure that will ever be given. This helped reinforce that my energy is better put to use somewhere else. What's done is done, simple as that.

Two, it was better just to get it over with. I knew she was in town, I knew I would run into her at some point, but now that's over. There is a good chance that it might happened again. If it does, I will walk away all the same.

The night ended with me talking to Em after hours at the berg, slipping off the back of the chair, falling on my ass and almost hitting my head on the table, playing DJ with 80's music on the CD server while some of the girls danced around the bar and concluded with some interesting text messages which would later prove to be a lot of fun as the week played itself out.

~Thejim