...I can be a judgmental person...

I was out with some people for my friend's birthday almost two weeks ago (yes yes yes I know this wasn't TODAY but I only learned this about myself TODAY so it still counts k?). We went to an Irish pub, and I do mean a real Irish pub. Ignoring all of the generic St. Patrick's Day swag that was tacked to the walls and behind the bar, this place felt authentic. It was dark, it was dank and the bartender looked and sounded like Colin Farrell, all of which are HUGE checkmarks under "authentic" for me. Beyond that, they had probably around 20 beers on tap (including Guiness and Magners naturally). After a short amount of time socializing, I heard the ever too familiar sound of a violin tuning. I looked behind me and found that a trio of musicians (two violins and one acoustic guitar) and sneakily situated themselves in a corner booth and were preparing to play (score one for Irish musical ninjas). Tuning complete, the bar was filled with one upbeat, jaunty jig after another. And yes, despite the fact that I had been drinking (what else do you do at a bar???) I actually enjoyed the music and the atmosphere that this touch added to the bar.

Good beer in my stomach and great music in my ears, I was having a great time. I was meeting new people and chatting about the most random of random topics and floundering in merriment and joy. The night was going well when suddenly, out of the corner of my eye but the flash of bleached blonde hair and sequined black dresses. I turn to take in the sight of a pair of girls, dressed for a spot far trendier than this. Let me take you through my thought process at this point.

Oh god it's a couple of club chicks. Don't they know that this is an Irish pub? And not that kind of "hey this is Boston so it should probably be an Irish themed pub, but the Irish part of this won't actually extend any further than the cheap Celtic Knot logo we have on our sign" kind of pub? In fact, what exactly are they doing here? There's no DJ, no patron on the rocks, nobody is making it rain, walking it out, or getting jiggy with it (though I do now recognize the irony of typing the word "jiggy" given the type of music that was being played...but I'll leave it in anyways). There is no DJ to tell to "turn it up", no people to tell to "take it off" so please tell me, exactly where do you think you are and what do you think you are doing here?!

I promptly began basking in my smug satisfaction at having judged them so hard, they would have wished they never came in MY Irish pub to be judged so hard by me. Of course I never said anything out loud TO them...that's just rude. Nah I totally tweeted about dat shit though. Because that will show them who's boss! Well eventually these antics subsided and I went back to my drinks and my friends.

So why am I writing about this now? Well because I, Eric, today came to a horrible realization about all of this. That entire interaction, that I described above, could likely be summed up by the phrase "I was into this place before it was cool". That's right, that encounter was my first, horrible, shaky step down the dark, evil, twisted road of hipsterdom. This encounter at the bar was a test for me, my duel with Darth Vader in the swamps of Dagobah as it were, and like our blond hero, I failed miserably. I took, nay, leapt down the wrong path, the dark path of hatred and anger. It will all be fine though. Though I may have strayed momentarily from the path of the righteous, I know that I will come away unscathed. Do you know how I know? Because of two reasons.

1) I fucking hate PBR
2) Skinny jeans are NOT flattering towards my waifish, girly figure.

...And that's what I learned today.