This originally appeared in Vol. IV of Louisville Swig, December 2015
Bartenders tell us stories about customers they never want to see again.
“These two big dudes started a fight at the bar; they were yelling back and forth and the bar was packed. So I was like, ‘Oh, shit! I gotta break this up.’ I was the bouncer and the bartender — like the only person there working. It just so happened I’d just got back to work after hurting my shoulder and somebody brought me popsicles, being funny. So I went and got a popsicle and broke it in half and stood in between them like they were five-year-old boys. I put the popsicles up like, ‘Come on, let’s break it up.’ One dude grabbed it and smacked it out of my hand, but the other dude started sucking on it and everybody in the bar started cracking up and it just diffused the whole thing. So I actually broke up an adult fight with a popsicle.”
— Jon Wettig
Zanzabar owner
“It was freezing cold outside and this girl came in by herself. She was pretty drunk, and she proceeded to hit on every man in the bar, so needless to say there were a lot of women really mad at this girl. To make a long story short, she ended up being so drunk that at four in the morning, she’d lost her boots; she was barefoot. Well, one of the girls whose boyfriend had been hit on had grabbed the boots (after the drunk girl took them off) and we didn’t figure that out until after the girl left barefoot in the middle of December. But what’s funny was, it was the first year my husband and I put a tree up together and we didn’t have a tree topper. So our annual tree topper is this drunken girl’s boot.”
— Megan Hook
Outlook Inn bar manager
“I was working at (the Old Seelbach Bar) and this large wedding party let out (from the upstairs ballroom) and came in. There was this younger guy — we questioned whether or not he was 21 to begin with, but he had an ID so we served him. He had a few drinks, started getting sexual with all the female customers at the bar, so I cut him off. And he made a big stink about it and goes and tells his dad. His dad comes up to the bar talking about how much money he’s dropped (on the wedding) and he’s friends with the governor and he’s just name-dropping and being a total dick. We ended up telling them they had to leave. Then we closed the bar, but we had to leave the doors open to take trash out, and the young guy comes back in. He throws up his arms and he’s like, ‘What’s up now, bitch!’ And behind him comes his dad. And his dad convinces him to come around the bar and kick my ass. I had a 60-year-old woman bartending with me and she was on the phone, shaking, calling security. So security comes and removes them, and they end up getting kicked out of the hotel.”
— Trevor Bowles
Fontleroy’s bar manager
“I want to say it was Derby. There was a couple that came in and the guy wanted a rum runner. I explained to him that we could kind of make a version of a rum runner, but not the actual thing. But he wanted it so I made it for him. He takes a drink, looks me in the eye, takes his entirely full pint glass and dumps it on the bar while staring at me. His wife was mortified. And I looked at her and said, ‘You better get him out of here right now.’”
— Megan Hook
Outlook Inn bar manager
This originally appeared in Vol. IV of Louisville Swig, December 2015
Image: NYPL Digital Collections
