Erin Go Run

Kristen and I had every intention of making it a calm evening. She had texted me earlier in the day needing some best friend advice, and being the best friend, I gladly obligated myself to aid and console her worries and woes. After a wonderful and enriching Bible class, we walked outside in the beautiful dusk-filled parking lot, discussing the readings and the lessons from the class that were fresh in our minds. Still smelling of the Sacramental ash, and with the Holy water still damp on our foreheads, we decide to meet at Chili’s for a virgin margarita (I had to drive home). She was still worried about whether her happiness would be fulfilled, but I had no doubt that she would somehow find the light and the path back to a peaceful life.

Arriving at Chili’s, we sat at a quiet booth, where we thought we would be clear of the riff raff and the weekday drinkers. After all, we did not want our Bibles and cardigan sweaters to be destroyed by Godless sinners that don’t follow the Word of God everyday Sunday like a true Catholic (wink). There were two other tables of people, one table considerably loud for the size of the room (and for a Tuesday night in Temecula at that). Making our order, I hesitated to order the Awesome Blossom, as Kristen kindly pointed out that it contained over 2,000 calories. She must have known that I am trying to watch my figure and was there to encourage me away from the empty calories. I thought for a moment, and ordered them shyly- blushing the whole time. When the server left the table to get our order we were able to laugh together when I reassured her that some of the 2,000 calories were unsaturated fat since the onion is fried in oil (if it’s clear at room temperature, its unsaturated) which means that those calories would not necessarily show in our legs and thighs (of course, we’d have to run a marathon directly after for this to be true). Being the best friend that she is, she happily offered to help me eat the blossom. Neither of us being too extremely hungry- who would be after the fulfillment you get at church- became even more comfortable with the order knowing that we could never finish the entire Awesome Blossom; so that is even fewer calories to discount. Being a running blog, I should say that I earned the blossom calories. I had run, twice in fact, and burned well over the amount of calories which I had consumed earlier.

In the midst of our conversation, Kristen quietly whispered that one of the tables was a bit loud. Of course, there was nothing that we were able to do about it, so decided to continue on in our conversation. This got to be rather difficult as they continued to increase their volume and alcohol consumption. Occasionally the server would walk over and chat with them, causing us to insinuate a friendship among the parties.
Luckily just as we settled Kristen’s angst and enjoyed a toast to her future peace, we overheard an older woman at the loud table shouting some derogatory and inappropriate four letter words to the other table in the bar. Kristen and I looked squeamishly at each other and realized that the Sacramental ash was no longer in the air that night……

….The loud hag kept bitching at- we’ll call her Ed Hardy for her clothing choices that night- about being loud. It went back and forth, louder and louder, “You are being f***ing loud!” “Don’t f***ing look at me!” “Turn the f*** around!” “Leave the f***ing bar!” and so on and so on…..
A lot of comments were shouted back and forth about leaving the bar, being loud, being old, being fake, being, loud, and being old. Eventually, Ed Hardy girl shouted, “Listen you old b****. I could kick your ass, so why don’t you mid your own f****ing business and turn the f*** around and quiet down” which got the response, “You can just leave the bar. I am not old. C’mon, let’s take it outside, b****. Just leave the f***ing bar” etc. etc. The funniest part up to this point is when the old lady shouted that she was not old, a younger girl at the table began shouting “Mom, shut the f*** up. Stop it” HAHAHA. If that doesn’t make you feel old, lady, maybe Ed Hardy’s fake perky boobs would.

One of the bus boys had come over at this point and tried to get in the middle to break it up, but he was just a small Asian boy and quickly got knocked out of the way.  Finally, when Ed Hardy laughed and sneered her nose at the old lady, MOM- we’ll call her- stood up making her look even older with saggy boobs and varicose veins, and walked over to Ed Hardy. She had an empty pint glass in her hand full of ice and melted booze leftovers, and had she not turned her back to me I could be more detailed here, but once I got a visual, it was of two arms going up, one with the glass and the other defending her fake boobs from that glass….

… and then ice; all over our table and on our Blossom. Ed Hardy then stood up, both of them still cussing and shoving, and two glasses being dropped to the floor. “Oh, don’t you dare f***ing push me. I will knock you ass out” “Let’s take this outside” “blank blank (forget names) here’s my wallet, pay my bill, I am taking this outside with this b*****.” In shock of the cold ice, Kristen and I had pushed out stools away and stood up in astonishment of being disturbed.

By then, the manager had come over and the loud table had already began to gather their belongings (save for their now disowned mother) and left the bar. The mom still in a fit of rage kept making threats. One of Ed Hardy’s friends looked over at us with ice all over and forced us into the middle asking “weren’t they being so f***ing loud and obnoxious?!” Kristen being somewhat more confident in confrontation agreed and as we continued to try and salvage our cardigans and Awesome Blossom, somehow got pushed into the middle of the debauchery (we were pushed into it, I swear).

I am completely defenseless in these situations, except when there is competition as in a cross country race I am not afraid to use my defensive elbows. Being pushed, I somehow threw out an elbow and managed to hit the old lady in the boob or belly roll, not sure at this point, and Kristen quickly helped to defend herself by pushing- just outright pushing- someone in the mix.  Mom decided she couldn’t actually go through with a fight and left the bar, which left the Ed Hardy table, the manager, Kristen and I. They quickly got on their phones, complained about all the Ed Hardy apparel that was ruined and full of spilled booze, and tried to replay the entire night of disruptions to the manager. I didn’t see a point, as they had already paid the bill so they wouldn’t have gotten any free meals out of it. Only the gifted can talk their way out of paying for a perfectly good meal that is somehow “just not right”… Ed Hardy did remember to mention the price of her clothing and purse ($250 for the jacket, $200 for the purse) in her rant about the unprofessionalism of customer service and the fact that the girls were actually employees of the establishment; oh yeah, and that it is unacceptable to have “blue s*** spilt all over her new clothes. They basically wrapped up their complaints in the following manner: 1-they were trying to have a decent conversation 2-the table was disrupting 3-they tried numerous times to sit closer together and talk louder to hear each other 4- when that failed they “kindly” asked the other table to please quiet down so that they could enjoy their time in the bar 5- the fight…. Finally, as they left, they asked for the manager’s business card because they were going to be late for their tattoo sess…. sounds a bit exaggerated to me.

Not being able to talk our way into anything free, the nervous manager shakingly apologized to us as we paid our bill. It turns out that the loud table consisted of two employees and one of their mothers. Kristen and I hurried out to see if there was a continuation of the fight, so do not know what became of the employees.

And that was my Tuesday night in Temecula. How does this have anything to do with running? It doesn’t; but it was so f***ing exciting, I had to write about it. There are one or two running references, sorry for the digression.