Rain.
Monday 16 July 2007
What a shitty night.
First, that fucking thunderstorm. One minute, it's about 30 fucking degrees in the shade, and I'm thinking, Jesus, I can't do this all night, and then suddenly the fucking heavens fucking well open and, I don't know, God must have been pissed or something because He's spilling his bath water all over the bloody place. Within ten minutes, we have a four-inch river running around the outside of the complex, and then the ceiling in the arcade started flooding with water.
And I mean flooding.
My bath analogy above is sound; literally, it was like somebody was emptying bath after bath of water into the main arcade, all over those lovely shiny machines and all of their electricity. The power was cut reasonably quickly (but only after Jabba barked at one of the attendants). There was water everywhere, for at least half an hour, and this picture just does not do it justice at all.
That actually looks pretty good. It was so bad that any rational person - or, you know, somebody from Health & Safety - would have closed the entire place down without a second thought. The arcade was hit really bad, but we also had serious flooding in the toilets, and several leaks in the main bar. So what did the complex manager do? Close the place down? Noooo, he waited quarter of an hour and then asked the arcade manager to turn the machines back on. Which, thank fucking God, he refused to do.
Money, money, money, a Swedish band once said. And they were right.
But, you know, as soon as the rain eased off, droves of people began to leave, and I thought to myself: result, quiet night. But what actually happened was the good-natured, decent, reasonable individuals who figured an early night made the most sense were actually replaced by some of the biggest cunts and trouble-makers I've seen in months.
First, the new owner I discussed a while back, who has been quietly simmering for a while, tonight decided to piss off everybody and their uncle, and figured it would great for his future if he repeatedly referred to bar staff and the security team as 'cunts', 'wankers' and 'tossers'. He was ejected about 11pm, but not before doing that hot-and-cold thing that power-drinkers do, where one minute they're your mate and apologising and shit, and the next telling you that if you lay one hand on them they're going to 'end you'. And stuff.
Ten minutes later, his mate-for-the-night was also escorted partially home, so pissed that he was that he couldn't go more than five steps before wildly reering to one side or the other and smashing into a fence, plant or brick wall.
Then we had all kinds of aggro with a group of lads who, as the night went on, seemed to increase in number, until at one stage some of their dads were getting involved in the group decision to 'come back later and sort us all out.' Although, as I've said before, when anybody tells you that soon they're going to 'start swinging', they never, ever do.
Then, another large group kicked off outside the main gates. So we had two to keep an eye on, and soak up the threats.
Several obvious underage drinkers with authentic-looking ID - where they get these 1988 driver's licenses from is anybody's guess - but, fucking hell, we should have been closed right after those floods, so who gives a fuck, eh?
Dozens of broken bottles and glasses - the smoking ban has plenty of upside, but forcing pissheads to congregate outside the main doors is not one of them - and for about half an hour a genuine feeling amongst all of us that this was the night where it was all going to go 'fucking mental' and somebody was probably going to end up getting seriously maimed.
I tell you this - if there was no security on tonight, or even a couple of guys less, the place would have gone down the toilet. But all I'm going to hear over the next few weeks is how there are 'too many of us' on the nights when the shit doesn't go down. When it's quiet. When nobody notices us doing our thing. Wake up, dipshits: that's the point of the fucking job.
posted by Sheamus @ 2:30 am
