096 – A Magical Place to Get Drunk

Where the living, the dead, the fictional, and the mythical meet to booze.

I need you to understand just what kind of bar this is. Everyone is invited. Everyone famous that is – historical figures, porn stars, artists, athletes, dictators, actors, rappers, serial killers, and billionaires come here to unwind. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve done… which is exactly why it’s everyone’s favorite place to go.

I could go on and on about the kind of clientele this place attracts, but maybe it’s easier if we just take a look around. It’s a busy enough night.

Elvis has just beaten Genghis Kahn in shuffleboard. Oprah and several of the Spice Girls are cheering for Elvis, who is quaffing his hair and grinning at everyone.

DMX and Shakespeare are having a rap battle that is slowly devolving into a roast. Richard Dawkins is getting shoved into a locker by Jesus’s disciples. A few immortals are playing Russian Roulette with Kurt Cobain. 

In the lounge area Harriet Tubman is listening to Elon Musk explain the many advantages of his Hyperloop. She has given up trying to explain the underground railroad to him. It’s clear Elon considers it a threat to his above ground transportation system.

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At the main bar, Don Quixote plops himself down on a stool. He looks like Father Time at a bad time and is dressed in ill-fitting and minimally protective knight’s armor. He leans over the bar, poking various liquor bottles along the back wall with his oversized lance.

Squished in next to him at the bar is Sisyphus, heavy with exhaustion. He is filthy, scathed, blistered, and sun battered, sitting uncomfortably on a giant boulder rather than a stool. His head hovers a few inches from the bar, he might be sleeping.

Fred Savage runs over to tend to them from behind the bar, he’s grinning like an absolute idiot – a Savage staple. He pushes the lance away from the liquor bottles so they won’t tip over.

FS (Fred Savage): What’ll it be, gentlemen?

DQ (Don Quixote, not the Dairy Queen, who is by the karaoke machine with The Artist Formerly Known as Prince): I’ll have your head for touching my lance!

S (Sisyphus): LOTS of WHISKEY.

DQ: Yes, for me as well, I’m parched from my travels.

FS: Oh, what line of work are you in?

DQ: I vanquish the unvanquishable, conquer the unconquerable. I dance with dragons and fight off princesses; all to keep my men happy and well fed.

FS: What men?

DQ: My armada, garrisoned over yonder, by the pinball machine.

(Don Quixote points to a lone Sancho Panza, unimpressive and paunchy, pushing the top scoop of his ice cream cone onto the floor with his tongue.)

DQ: Soon, we may have to lay siege to this fine place. My troops grow antsy without battle.

FS: You know that reminds me a lot of–

S: Get. The. Whiskey.

(Don Quixote turns to acknowledge Sisyphus who is double, or maybe five times his size. He knocks on the boulder as if it’s a door.)

DQ: And what line of work are you in, good sir? We look to be of about equal stature, I can only assume you are also a man of noble pursuits.

S: I push a boulder up a hill.

DQ: Ah! Wonderful, and how is that going?

S (slapping the boulder): Not well.

DQ: I’d think it would be much easier to push it down a hill.

S: You don’t say.

DQ: Oh, but I do!

FS: Two shots of whiskey, gentlemen.

S: The hell is this?

FS: It’s whiskey.

S (using all his strength to knock over the tiny shot): I asked for a lot of whiskey.

FS: That’s a standard sized shot. I can get you a double if you’d like.

(Sisyphus straightens up slightly to reveal his massive stature.)

S: Do I look like a standard drinker? I am Atlas running on an incline. My life is hell. Bring me the rest of the bottle.  

DQ: And what the hell is THIS??

(Don Quixote backs away from the shot in fear. Sancho Panza loses another scoop of his ice cream over by the Dance Dance Revolution.)

FS: What’s wrong with yours?

(Don Quixote’s eyes widen. He is stuttering and pointing at his shot glass with tremendous trepidation, he is hallucinating an enormous and terrifying maelstrom swirling out from the shot glass in front of him.)

DQ: This is massive, unsafe, and unwieldy! Why, if I were any less sure-footed, I might fall in and drown! What sort of bartender –

FS: Well, if I’m being honest, I’m not actually a bartender, I’m just acting as one. See, I’m really Fred Savage from-

(Sisyphus grabs Fred Savage’s head and slams it down on the counter. Then, passing out from exhaustion, Sisyphus lets his own head slam down on the counter. Fred Savage, stumbling, bleeding, starts emptying a bottle of whiskey into a tumbler for Sisyphus.)

(Don Quixote cautiously but heroically lowers his head down towards his shot glass. Suddenly he plunges into it. With his nose fully submerged in the tiny shot glass, Don Quixote flails around wildly, helplessly; drowning. Sancho Panza waddles over to pull Don Quixote up out of the shot glass, like he’s done 100 times before.)

DQ (gasping for air): I do not need your help, Sancho Panza!

(Don Quixote thrusts himself back into the shot glass, while Sancho Panza loses his last scoop of ice cream to the floor.)

(Sisyphus struggles to lift the whiskey to his mouth and shakes most of the liquid out onto the bar with his trembling hands. It becomes clear that Sisyphus will never get the whiskey to his lips.)

S: Who am I? Tantalus?!

(Fred Savage starts wiping up the whiskey all around Sisyphus. They’re both bleeding profusely from their head wounds. Don Quixote is passed out on the bar. Sancho Panza totters over to resuscitate him.)

Don Cheadle (walking by): Jesus Christ.

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At the other end of the bar, James Bond (agent 007 for Britain’s MI6) and Jesus Christ (of Nazareth), who just heard his name but is used to it, both wave down the bartender.

007: A vesper martini, shaken not stirred.

FS (to Jesus): And for you, sir?

JC: Water is fine.

007: Hah, a water? You have some reason to keep your wits about you?

JC (receiving water and zapping it into wine): No, I just prefer my brand to theirs.

007: Wine's not much different from water if you ask me.

JC: Well, too bad no one was asking.

007: I guess it does go well with the dress.

JC: It's a robe.

007: Forgive me, it looks like a dress.

JC: You are forgiven.

007 (sliding his gun on the table): You know, I think I'm a bit beyond forgiveness for what I've done. It’s… been a rough day.

JC (heaving his wooden cross onto the bar with a crash): Tell me again about your rough day.

007: I don’t think you realize who you’re talking to.

JC: Oh, I think it’s you who’s failing to look upon me and know me.

007: I will bury you, friend.

JC (rolling up his sleeves): I’ll rise, buddy.

FS: Woah, woah. Let’s settle down fellas. We’re all friends here. How about another martini? Another water? On the house.

Now mind you, this is what’s happening on a Monday night. Come back on a weekend and this bar will have your head spinning faster than that girl’s from The Exorcist. In fact, she does burlesque here on Thursdays. Thursdays are generally pretty slow.