Recent Entries
Bump - Friday, Aug. 24, 2007
Back Roads - Friday, May. 25, 2007
Next to Last - Monday, May. 21, 2007
My New Business - Wednesday, Mar. 21, 2007
Lessons in Stone - Tuesday, Feb. 20, 2007
Favorite Reads
unclebob
batten
jen7
weetabix
hulamoons
Kathmccall
rubyfoxx
nixtress
waterlu
sixweasels
Sunday, Mar. 03, 2002
They finally dragged me into the Breakfast club yesterday morning. Initiated me, so to speak.

Corporate partner Stu has been attending rather faithfully for some time, as has Chief Mo and a host of other aging yet delightfully pubescent lads. I was trying to locate Stu for the sake of unloading some tools and finally caught up to him via cell phone. At seven o'clock in the morning.

Stu: "Come on up to the Breakfast Club at Skipper's Bar."
OF: "You're kidding me, right?"
Stu: "Absolutely not. Just make sure you park down at the far end."

I have learned not to question certain things from the man.

Skipper's is just a short ways away, one of those sports bars set at the end of a retail strip mall. Consequently it has a huge parking lot. But as I pulled in, a commotion of cars being shuffled about was in progress in front of Skipper's, and Chief Mo himself waved me into the last parking space in front of the bar. He grinned delightedly as he held the door open and ushered me into the place.

OF: "A little early for parking lot duty isn't it?"
Mo: "Just having some harmless fun."

Seems that having a front row parking place was one of the entitlements of the female barkeeper (later described as a female Rod Stewart by one of the faithful) who normally came in at nine. We had effectively eliminated this as an option, and it didn't look like any of the patrons were in any hurry to leave. JP was tending bar, and hailed me as a long lost brother. I laid a ten-spot on the bar and asked him for a Coors Lite.

I know, I know. But it seemed less ambitious than the Bloody Mary's that the rest of them were ladling in.

I got a first hand review of the Breakfast Club Rules:

1. Beers were $2, no change given. So I bought 5 beers for the fellas and me.
2. No mention of work or wives was allowed.
3. Funny hats were de rigeur (my fav - Beijing Golf Classic)
4. Exclusivity means never having to say you're sorry.

I suspect there are Breakfast Clubs all over the country like this, but how many of them can claim to have instigated a $500 dollar hair cut? Seems that Leo had once dared the group to pony up $500 to witness the shearing of his full head of hair. In short order, a dozen of them had slapped the money on the bar and fetched a somewhat bewildered barber from a few doors down. Leo's trouble began when the cheering group demanded a full haircut.

They forever called him Bald Leo after that.

Or the time after a group fishing trip when they brought their full coolers of fish into the bar to compare size and wound up with a dozen king mackeral laid on the bar, each with smoldering cigars in mouth and a dorsal fin cradling a beer. Or when Chief Mo screwed a 2 x 4 across the Men's Room door with the owner of Skipper's ensconced inside, and calmly tended bar for the balance of the evening.

The Breakfast Club recounted the stories with relish, lovingly going over the more sordid details.

And they laughed uproariously when a spiked haired barkeeper beat a mamba number on her horn just outside the door. I didn't have to look very hard to notice her license plate might have had something to do with their hilarity.

It read B1TCHN1. Not the sort of thing that would go over very well.

Not at this Club.

previous - next 0 comments so far