Only Us...

Last night I was diligently working on some math homework that was due today. I hated that I was working. All of my friends had gone to the local Irish pub, Fionn McCool's, sticking with the Thursday tradition. Worst of all, we are heading off to be on teaching placement for three weeks, so this would be my last chance to spend some social time with everyone for a while. After I finished the fourth of my five math journals I had an in depth conversation with myself.

I said to myself "Self, you have been focusing too much on work you should really go out. You are not only the life of the party, you are the whole f'n party. Right now, you are robbing all of your friends of some quality Glen time. How can you be so selfish?"

Well it was hard to argue with that logic, so the next thing I knew, I was on my way across town to Fionn's.

I arrived to a chorus of cheers from my group of friends, sitting in our usual area. I met the group with a series of high-fives, but as I made my way around there was an extra hand to slap. It belonged to a forty-pluser named Greg. I didn't really think too much of it and sat down and told everyone about how and why I decided to come out.

After a moment, Greg got up from his seat. All of a sudden, the entire group pulls in close for a huddle. They ask if they are doing the right thing or not. They decide that they are. I am really confused.

Apparently, this Greg fellow, saw one of my friends at the bar and decided to randomly buy her a pitcher of beer. He then proceeded to sit over with our group and kept buying pitchers all night long.

So, my spidey-senses began to tingle a little bit as I heard this story. But none the less, I went to the bar, grabbed a glass and poured myself a glass.

As the night went on, he kept buying us more and more beer. He did not divulge much information about himself, only that he was in North Bay for business, and that he had a bad day, but would not say why. Whenever we asked him about what he did for a living, he just casually joked it off. Also, he was not wearing a wedding ring, so take that for what you will.

At one point, Phil, one of the guys in my group insisted that he would get the next pitcher of beer. Greg was insistent on getting it himself. The two then raced to the bar. Phil came back to our table empty handed and wide eyed. He told us that Greg had a stack of $100 bills in his wallet. This guy was loaded.

All of a sudden, people didn't feel so bad about taking his beer.

As a side note, it was at about this point that the group of us went up to help the band sing "Home for a Rest", despite nobody really knowing the words.

The night went on, and the beer continued to flow, and words continued to slur. We attracted a large group of other Education students eager to give the free flowing river of beer a place to meander.

As Greg kept getting up to either buy some more beer, or talk to some other people, he left his coat with us. At various moments, certain people in our section contemplated walking off with it, but thought the better of it.

The drunker everyone got, the more my spidey-senses tingled. I had a bad feeling about where this was all going.

Since I was the Designated Driver, I decided to round up my car load of people (me plus three more) and get out of there. Another load of three from my group decided to posse out too. I have to all but pry a few certain people away from the bar in order to get going. We finally get out of the bar and I breath a sigh of relief, however, I relaxed too soon.

We get out into the parking lot and who should we see? Give yourself a pat on the back if you guessed Greg. Just in case some total stranger carrying thousands of dollars buying a ton of beer for a group of (mostly female) twenty-somethings wasn't weird enough for you, here is where it gets better.

He tells us that he has a plane at the airport and wants to know if we want to go and party in New York.

I'll give you a second to read that line again and soak it in.

In their drunken state, some people seem to think that this is a great idea. At this moment, I take some executive action. I figure my role as Designated Driver is not enough, I needed to take on the role of Designated Decider. As tempting as it is, I think the better of this crazy idea. I wrestled my friends away from this temptation and we hop in the car and drive off relieved.

Now I've spent the past twenty odd hours thinking about this Greg character and I have a couple of theories about him.

The most obvious one to me, is that he is a hit man. Don't believe me? It really makes the most sense, he was in town on business (the mob brings in outsiders to do the dirty work), he was having a bad day (because he had already whacked someone), and he had a mad pile of cash (I don't think that hit men pay taxes). For very similar reasons, there is the argument that he is either a drug dealer or a pimp. But I like hit man better, far more daring.

Also, I got thinking, and maybe he worked for some really dirty porno distributor, and this was their version of the Bang Bus. He was trying to entice some to all of us to do something very naughty so that he could get it on tape and sell it.

There is also a chance that he is some lonely dot.com millionaire who was having a really bad day and we cheered him up for a long time. Until we shot down his New York idea.

Either way, I will spend a good portion of the rest of my life wondering about Greg and his exact story. If shows up at a bar near you, try and find out for me.

Until next time,


G