Oh, the things I've seen, reader. Horrible, horrible things.
Friday night I was forced, by "friends", to drink at a country music bar. When the idea was first suggested, I reacted as any decent person would. I spit the remains of my sandwich all over the table and began shouting profanity.
"You're goddamn morons, all of you!" I yelled. "Don't you know what that music does to you? Haven't you ever heard what goes on at country music concerts? Those people urinate in garbage bags, for chrissakes!"
They assured me that the bar had proper bathrooms, and that just like most bars, I'd hardly be able to hear the music. So despite my deep hatred for twangy, sappy, predictable music, I agreed. What choice did I have? It was either go hogging at the country bar or sit at home with no one to make fun of.
The minute we entered the bar, I wished I had stayed home. It was like a living, breathing stereotype. Bartenders wore shirts with pit stains, and it seemed everyone in the bar was required to hoot and/or holler at regular intervals. I kept closing my eyes, hoping to find myself in a different nightmare when I opened them. "Give me a killer bats nightmare," I said to myself, "or one where my arms have been ripped off and tarantulas are crawling into my mouth. Anything but this."
My discomfort wasn't unfounded. Nearly every song played was at least 5-10 years old, proving my theory that country music is suffering the same sad fate as '80s heavy metal. The music was crap I remembered from high school, yet people were reacting as if it were brand new. Imagine going to a bar and hearing nothing but Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter", Bush's "Everything Zen", and 20 other songs that got tiresome decades ago. This is what country music has become.
The odd people in the bar, all young college types, only increased the bizarro world atmosphere. In country bars, overweight men are king, and their queens are thin, gorgeous women with breasts the size of volleyballs. These were not the city girls I'm used to dealing with. I've never seen a beautiful woman from the city allow an unattractive man, or any for that matter, to tell her to "Stop acting like such a cunt." I felt horrible ogling the women in this bar. It was like finding yourself attracted to a Special Olympics competitor.
As appealing as the women were, this bar was no place for me. I'm a man who makes a living with a pen. These women were interested in men who could kill a moose by eating it before it could run away. I was the only man at the bar who seemed incapable of this, and my insistence on urinating in the bathroom instead of the pockets of the bar's pool table made me even more of an outcast.
As the night continued, so did the madness. It's always interesting to see someone sing along to a song about the bible one minute, and then turn around and tell his friend's girlfriend to "Suck my dick, dumb bitch" the next. It's also interesting to see six drunk women trying to dance on a pool table at once. It's equally interesting to see a man enter the men's room, ignore the open urinal, and piss in the sink.
I think that was the same man who was singing along to the bible song. He forgot to wash his hands, which were likely covered in pee. I'll bet his girlfriend, who looked like a future Playboy centerfold, didn't mind.
When I stumbled out of the country bar around 1 am, I forced everyone to go to one of my favorite bars, a place where everything is normal. A bar where Pilsner Urquell and Guinness are in the fridge, women are slutty but don't like sex with farm animals, and men pee in the women's room because it seems more fun when they're drunk.
Those country guys can have their large-breasted hotties. I'll take the flat ones who can hold their liquor.
