A Total Eclipse Of The Fool’s

A Total Eclipse Of The Fool’s

Prelude: I sometimes disappear down a sidestreet in Woodmere to have a drink sometimes and visit Ruby. Knowing how law enforcement works especially during a full moon always has me warning my bartenders to watch themselves and to watch out for the crowd…even regulars get stupid during a full moon.

But Friday was different, it was the night before the last Total Lunar Eclipse of 2011.

What makes this different? People do stupider shit than they would when sober. Worse, people take emotions like anger, loneliness, hate, love, lust, boldness and idiocy to levels not approached during any given normal day in the course of a normal life. Examples: Little girl claims she was kidnapped by niggers and was going to be killed unless mommy and daddy came up with six figure cash. Needless to say she was found safe and sound – no niggers.

Nigger from Greensboro, N.C. let out of court on a technicality kills a NYC Police Officer, a single dad trying to raise his four girls by himself. Nigger lives.

A 17 year old boy is found handcuffed to a bed, cops wait and his teacher shows up with an enema, ky-jelly, a whip and Viagra. Does weird shit happen in the prelude to a Total Lunar Eclipse? The following is from Ruby. After you read this you tell me if the world is different when sun, planet and moon align.

When I told Ruby of the impending lunacy, one of her regulars asked me if I was a ‘prophet’ and I told him, “no, I just know history and its going to repeat itself tonight”. I was there when the white limo pulled up, I saw the driver open the back door, I saw a woman’s head in a man’s crotch with his pant’s pulled down. I saw patrons running out into the street with open beer while locals made their way down the street from temple, it was the Sabbath.

I saw the face of the locals as they passed by the bar, they saw the limo and the patrons running to it. That is when I left. I knew what was coming next. You didn’t need to be Nostradamus to figure this out. Here is Ruby’s story of what happened next…..

This post is by Ruby!

So, to begin, my Friday night started of nicely. It was calm and that's the way I would love it to be all night but it never works out for me.

I had most of the 13 chairs in the bar filled by 10:00 and I was happy. A white, stretch limo pulled up in front of the bar (ridiculous, I should have taken a picture of this huge vehicle parked in front of the tiny bar) and a guy got out and

came into the bar. Mind you, this person was one of the old day’s crew customers and perfectly welcome, that is until he invited most of the customers in my bar to go to the city in the limo with him. Needless to say, he emptied the bar out but I still wasn't going to complain because I knew what was still to come.

It was quiet for a while after that. Friday night regulars were arriving sporadically and even though it wasn't packed as usual I was still happy with the business I had.

I remember the limo coming back with the people it left with and then the night became a blur. Some friends of friends at the bar showed up. They were all very nice, paid for their drinks, tipped me well so still no complaints on my end.

Suddenly, I see these guys hanging outside the bar but not in front. They had turned around and did the stupidest thing I've ever seen. They parked their mini-van in front of the fire house, opened the driver’s side sliding rear door and were just sitting or standing by the van. I had one of their friends go outside to tell them to move the car from in front of the fire house because, and this is a well known fact, most volunteer firemen are Nassau County cops.

A minute later who shows up? That's right, the police. Can you say "overkill"? One patrol car turned into 6 or 7 and they asked the driver of the mini-van to proceed into the parking lot across the street. No sooner than it took to put the mini-van into drive and obey the police request to drive into the lot the police turned their flashing lights on and sounded their siren, as if the driver of the van was trying to run (he wasn't).

As I watched this scene a nauseous feeling crept into my stomach, same as usual when I see the police at my bar on my shift. Fifteen minutes later a puffed up looking cop comes into the bar. He asked me if I had seen these guys (the ones they pulled over) in the bar. In all honesty I answered, "Not all of them were in the bar officer and I couldn't tell you which ones weren't".

His answer to me was this:

"Is this the way we're going with this because I'll have all your customers against the back wall for a license check. Who knows what else we'll find in this bar".

At this exact moment I knew I had to tell him what he wanted to hear just to spare the rest of the customers the total humiliation of the so called "license check". (We’ll get into that at a later date, it's not fun and never ends well).

Horrified, I told the officer I had seen the driver in the bar. (stupid cop, this was the designated driver for his group so of course I didn't see him in the bar). I lied and told him what he wanted to hear because that's what saved the rest of us.

He said, "Very good, Ruby", and exited the bar so he could try to get the driver for whatever. Feeling like a piece of crap, I apologized to the drivers' brother who was in the bar and explained why I did what I did. Thankfully and mercifully he agreed with me and told me I did the right thing by sacrificing the one for the good of the many.

I'm still alive..............go figure. It turned out that they couldn't get the driver for DWI because he wasn't drinking, they didn't find any other illegal things in his vehicle and the most they could ticket him for was parking in a "no parking" zone. Never park on the same side of the street as a fire house; it's just not a good thing to do especially if there is a bar across the street.

I must say this though, now that they couldn't get the van driver for anything they will be taking it out on me on my Friday night shift because they feel stupid. They stayed until I closed up (and I stayed till 4 a.m. on purpose). I've had a previous conversation with the police about hanging around after 4 to entrap people coming out of the bar and driving home. The smart people left their cars in the lot and took cabs home knowing that their cars were safe until the next day when they could pick them up without worrying about getting a DWI.

In closing here are a few words from bartenders all over New York: Hey Cop, Bartenders are not the enemy!!

Ruby