Busting Chip's balls
(... payback's a bitch.)
Time for my annual Thanksgiving story. It may not seem like
a Thanksgiving story at first, but hang in there. One of our
own is in trouble.
Chip Tait, owner of Lovejoy's brew pub ($2.50 pints, every
night) has a great sense of humor. But then Chip's a friend of
mine, so a great sense of humor is pretty much mandatory if you're
going to hang with me.
Here's an example of the legendary Chip wit:
One afternoon, two surly rednecks walk into Lovejoy's and
order a couple of Budweiser's. Lovejoy's doesn't sell Budweiser,
only beer and cocktails, so the bartender talks the two 'necks
into a couple of Amstel Lights. They sit in a corner and stew,
as they drink their pussy beers. When they finish, one of the
guys approaches the bartender and asks, "Is this a gay bar?"
"You'll have to ask the owner," she says and points
to Chip at the corner of the bar.
"Hey, you. Is this here a gay bar?"
"Nope," he says. "But you boys are more than
welcome to stay."
See what he did there?
A few months ago, Chip and I hooked up in California. I was
staying in the beautiful hick town of Windsor where I was in
charge of feeding my mother morphine, and Chip was on a cross-country
tour with his wife and kid in a Winnebago. One afternoon, he
called me up.
"Yeah, I'm in California. I tried to stay in San Francisco,
but I couldn't find a place to park the trailer. I kept going
north, past Marin, then past Petaluma, Santa Rosa, and now I'm
stuck in the middle of nowhere in a place called Windsor."
"Heh. I think you're in the right place. Did you pass
the Larkfield Shopping Center on your way up the Old Redwood
Highway? Right. About a mile down the road. Cool. There's a bar
there called Eddie's. I'll meet you in 20 minutes."
Thirty minutes later, I walked into Eddie's and Chip was already
working the jukebox for all the Stevie Ray and Johnny Cash he
could milk. Eddie's about as Texan a joint as you can find in
California, so milking the jukebox for old-school country and
blues was entirely possible.
We sat down for a beer -- he had a Sierra Nevada, I think,
while I mocked him with a Budweiser -- and he told me his latest
plans. Although he owns the bar in Austin, he had moved back
to Maryland a couple of years ago to be closer to his family.
"You're right, Jasper," he said. "It was family
that brought me back, and it'll be family that sends me away
again."
His new plan was to move to Oregon and learn furniture making
in a four-month accelerated course at the Thomas Chippendale
School of Furniture. After that, he wasn't sure where he wanted
to live, but the cross-country tour was giving him some good
ideas.
"Do you think you'll ever move back to Austin?"
I asked
"I don't know. That town... Liberty Lunch is gone, the
Steamboat's gone, the city council doesn't backup the Sixth Street
entertainment district. I don't know. And on top of that, Austin's
got so many guys suffering from the Peter Pan Syndrome it's unreal.
You wouldn't believe how many 45-year-olds I've interviewed who
decided they want to become bartenders in their middle age."
"Yeah. That book changed my life. I read The Peter Pan
Syndrome and when I finished it I thought, 'Hey. Maybe I could
write a book.'"
That's what I said. Here's what I was thinking: Chip. Baby.
Sweetheart. Do you even know who the fuck you're talking to here?
I'm the king of the Peter Pan Syndrome. I was a 40-year-old doorman
at Lovejoy's, for crissakes. Meanwhile, you're planning to pack
up the family, move them from Maryland to Oregon, and then enroll
in the Chippendale school a few weeks after your 37th birthday
-- just so you can major in wood shop.
There's your Peter Pan Syndrome, pal.
The conversation turned to baseball for awhile, and since
Chip's a Cal Ripken fan he went off on a rant about upholding
the honor of the game. Baseball fans hold many traditions near
and dear, but if you're a Ripken fan you'll defend these traditions
more than most. After all, you're rooting for the most anal player
in the history of the game, the man who broke Lou Gehrig's record
for consecutive games played, the man who didn't take a fucking
day off in 16 years. What else can you possibly talk about? The
Orioles run at the pennant?
I don't think so.
"I love what Davey Lopes did," Chip said about the
Milwaukee Brewers manager. "I thought it was great when
he told Rickey Henderson during a press conference that he was
'going down' after he stole second. You just don't steal second
with a seven-run lead. But that's Henderson for you, the ultimate
hot dog."
"Yeah," I said. "The last I heard, Rickey Henderson
was still living with his mom. So he's probably already going
down."
I didn't have the heart to tell him the rest of the story.
When Davey Lopes played for the Dodgers, he stole second six
times when his team held a lead of seven runs or more. So old
Lopes is just a tad hypocritical.
We finished our beers and promised to meet again at Lovejoy's
in late September. Unfortunately, the 9/11 bombings in Manhattan
derailed my travel plans and I didn't get back to Austin until
October.
Two days ago Chip called and told me he was back in town.
The bad news? The landlords of the building where Lovejoy's sits
decided to build a new roof a couple of weeks ago. A week after
work was underway -- the unfinished roof exposed to the elements
-- torrential rains swept through Austin like a biblical plague.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that the landlord's decision
to put in a new roof at Lovejoy's caused all the rain in Texas.
But you have to entertain the possibility.
You wouldn't believe the mess. Monday night, pieces of fiberglass
insulation were stacked in a pyramid on Lovejoy's floor like
an Aggie bonfire (but more structurally sound, of course). None
of the rubble could be removed from the bar until the insurance
adjuster came to get a peak of the carnage, and Mr. Adjuster
was taking his sweet time. Tuesday night, the insurance man still
hadn't shown up to survey the scene, but he gave us permission
to remove the rubble.
So I joined the volunteers at Lovejoy's and pitched in to
clean up the joint. It's amazing what you can accomplish while
drinking beer. After the floors were hosed down and the furniture
moved back inside, we entertained ourselves with a wet slab of
concrete, freshly laid to cover a hole in the floor. Some signed
their names, some created artsy designs and others left their
palm prints to be forever immortalized. What could I possibly
do to top that?
You guessed it. A cement imprint of my penis now decorates
the Lovejoy's floor.
"Aren't you worried about the cement covering your dick?"
Jenn asked.
"Are you kidding me? Do you know how much I spend on
Viagra in a year?"
So you see, this column's a Thanksgiving story after all.
I'm thankful to have a hangout like Lovejoy's where nobody gives
a damn how old I am, what job I have (or don't) what tattoos
I wear (or won't) or where I stick my cock. And yes, everybody
knows my name.
It's Peter Pan, I tell you.
So if you live in Austin, come join me in a beer Saturday
night at the grand reopening of my own private Never-Never Land
-- Lovejoy's at 604 Neches between Sixth and Seventh streets.
And if you don't live in Austin, isn't it about time you planned
a visit?
We've got to save this club, people. We've got to. Austin's
lost entirely too much of its character during the past few years,
and Lovejoy's is one of the few authentic Austin bars left where
you can get a great beer at a great price. So come say hello
to Lisa, Chance, Kelly, Sam, Reckless, George, Leyla, Kyle, Ferret
(yes, Ferret) Jennifer and the rest of the crew. Tell 'em Jasper
sent you.
Believe me. You don't ever want to see me write this line
about Lovejoy's ($6.50 pints, every night).
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STANDARD DISCLAIMER:
This column aims to be funny. If you can read anything else into
it, you're on your own.
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