That was the scowling bartender yelling at me, as I took my first sip from the glass of wine that Carolyn had just bought me. That was it. She was serious. We were getting kicked out of the bar!
What could I say? All I could do was laugh, get up from my seat and walk out of there - along with about 15 other Obiters. We hastily poured our drinks in plastic cups and walked out en masse.
Now, I might have been wearing a girlish ponytail but, believe me, I, and everybody else in our party, looked - if maybe not acted - the 50 something that we all are! And yes, it was hysterical being tossed out of a bar for not having ID…
The group had dwindled somewhat from the big crowd that had gathered earlier at the Ohm Lounge in the Royal Charles Hotel for our first cocktail. This was a big night. The
Grand & Secret Order of the Obituary Cocktail was embarking on a night of bar-hopping along the St. Charles Streetcar line. It was a large, raucous crowd that queued up for the Streetcar, unfinished cocktails in hand of course, as we all piled aboard, to the quizzical looks of commuters and tourists alike. I sat next to a woman sporting a martini glass tiara, a bit bleary-eyed, after just finishing her birthday lunch at Galatoire’s Restaurant. We all know that Friday lunches at Galatoire’s so easily turn into all-day affairs, and it was now well after 6pm...
The birthday girl had heard of us Obiters, but had never seen the crowd in action until watching us climb aboard that Streetcar and, a few minutes later, honor her with a rousing rendition of ‘Happy Birthday to You’. Well, we managed to make good friends with everybody on board by the time we got off at our first stop - The Column’s Hotel - a beautiful place, where many of our crowd decided to settle in for the rest of the night.
Thus, we were far fewer in number when we departed an hour or so later for our next stop - Delachaise - and then lost more of the crowd when we departed later on for another Streetcar ride down to The Avenue Pub. This is where the absurdity really began. You can’t make this stuff up. I mentioned before, that about fifteen of us rolled in there, and were welcomed immediately by the bartender with the warm greeting, “You’ll need ID to get served in here! This is a video-poker bar”! We hooted at her joke and some of us sat down, while the others lined up to get served. We never carry ID with us around town, but we soon realized that the bartender wasn’t just flattering us or joking! She would not serve anyone - not even the really old wrinklies - without proper ID. I saw Gerry arguing with her up there, to no avail, but we finally got drinks from others in our party who did have ID and who kindly bought us our badly needed libations. But no, just as I took my first sip, she roused the entire bar when she yelled and pointed at me, “Hey, you with the Ponytail…!”
Well, we all found it just hysterical, getting thrown out of The Avenue Pub, and so remained in good humor (the prior beverages helped, of course). After all, in New Orleans, it’s perfectly legal to walk down the street with cocktails in hand (in plastic, not glass) so that’s exactly what we did, laughing at the whole thing and talking to the lawyers in the group - can bars legally throw out ‘senior citizens’ for not having ID? All our (admittedly not very sharp at that point in the evening…) legal minds could do was laugh at it some more. So we ended up over at Zea’s for a bite to eat. But those of us with plastic cups were not allowed in there either - tossed out of two bars within 10 minutes! Is that a record…?
It was obviously time to catch the Streetcar back to the French Quarter, where all is allowed - and then some. So we ate ravenously at Felipe’s Taqueria (excellent Margaritas to boot) and went home contentedly to bed.
P.S. Got an email today from somebody who was with us that night, about how everybody was meeting up at the Kirk apartment for Halloween. Apparently, after my third cocktail, I’d invited the whole gang over to watch the ‘Krewe of Boo’ parade down the street past our place! Better go buy some crackers and scrounge up a costume…
