Bar Game Training Wheels

Don’t be fooled. The bar scene is a dangerous place. It seems innocuous enough. People out and about that appear to be drinking socially and interacting with each other politely. But to the initiated it is a jungle. Like all jungles it has rules. Now these rules can be broken at will and often are due to alcohol impairment. Sometimes though there comes along an idea so outside the norm, or at least my norm which admittedly is all that matters to me, that an addendum to what can be expected is necessary. Think, for example, about when cell phones became ubiquitous. The game changed. We started to have instant access to each other. Whoever thought this was a good idea needs to be found and prosecuted for madness. I can barely muster enough rationalization to keep my inner voices semi-attentively engaged, let alone actual people at a moments notice. When technology changed the game, so did the social norms. Rapidly. You would think the bar game would be difficult to redefine and you would be right. The inertia of alcohol and awkward courtship has been gathering urging speed since the first caveman invented the foyer. So it has to be something cosmic and yesterday I witnessed it. A picture of a soon to be extinct lemur from a National Geographic magazine shook the pub culture terra firma. You see breaking the ice traditionally has been a poorly executed male game. We men have agonized over the right mix of beer and prepared witticisms that will allow us to avoid instant rejection. Now being married I have given this game up but I still watch how others play it for amusement. I stopped playing pick up basketball because my knees bark like an enraged labradoodle but I still like it on tv. Same concept. So my professional eye took notice when I observed a lady galavanting around this bar I was having a drink with my buddy at. Height, weight, looks, all pegged right down the middle. Normal in all respects excepting her ingenious icebreaking technique. She would take this picture of a wide eyed primate up to groups of men. Any Johnny come lately can risk rejection by one person but it takes a certain level of confidence to be the point person into a group of strangers. This lady was fearless. She would calmly show this picture and then explain how close to extinction this animal was. The men could not reject her for at least two reasons. One, men are rarely pursued and even rarer are they expected to comment on the consequences of animal husbandry for primates while intoxicated. Two, if they immediately told this lady to take a hike they would have rejected her and that babylike lemur. In effect, that picture was triggering the baby protection gene AND the social conscious gene. Nobody wants to seem like an absolute monster on the outside, no matter what their thoughts are on the inside. Something to do with peacock feathers or something. Anyway, this lady drank for free all night and left with the pick of the available litter. Impressive. Most impressive. I’m Colt Haggerty and these aren’t the droids you are looking for.