Around 1995, I used to be a doorman on the Upper East side.  I was still new to New York City and didn’t have many friends.  One of my coworkers at the job was Hongo Oso, the super’s son.  He was about my age and eventually we found we had a few things in common.  We both enjoyed making music and hip hop and the girls you could find at clubs.  It was the beginning of an adventurous time of my life.

The good nights to go out in the city were Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Thursday.  Friday and Saturday were never good because the clubs would be so full with ridiculous bridge and tunnel assholes.  Tuesday also was never good, just because it wasn’t.  We usually went out once a week, or twice, if there was something good going on.  We enjoyed the action and the scene and meeting girls and the challenge that goes along with meeting them.  Since there was so much time to do research about the different parties every week, in our long drawn out boring day, we always found the best parties with the most beautiful girls and many times with celebrities.

I remember one of the first times we went out, we went to a venue called Rebar.  At the time, I was probably 25, and didn’t make enough money to drink down the bar.  So, I would usually try to buy beer or liquor and drink it before I entered the club.  This allowed me to maximize my money and still have fun.  I remember, I was wearing white baggy khaki pants with logger boots, because that was the style.  Although I remember it was cold and I don’t know why I was wearing white pants other than I probably didn’t know the rule about white pants in the winter at that age.

The deli across the street was selling St. Ides malt liquor and I bought a 40 oz.  I didn’t like the taste.  St. Ides tasted sickly sweet and I never enjoyed drinking it.  There wasn’t much choice.  This deli was closing or just didn’t have anything else.  I paid $2 or $3 and took my 40 in the paper bag and took off across the street to meet Hongo about a block away from the club.

Oso didn’t drink.  So he watched as I chugged the beer as fast as I could.  He was probably smoking a Newport.  In those days, he always smoked Newport.  I think I smoked Newport too.  It probably took me 10 minutes to drink it.  Then I laid the empty bottle in a doorway and we headed to the line for the club.

We made it inside, without any problems at the door.  Inside the club, it was dark, smoky, and loud.  In those days, everyone smoked in the club.  There was no problem with that, and we smoked also.

My normal routine, was to get a rum and coke, because I was already nice from drinking the 40 outside.  I probably had three before I suddenly felt that I had to take an explosive shit.  Though I tried to hold it, there was no way I would be able to for long.  I went downstairs to where the bathrooms were located and waited in line.  A few minutes past, and I got into the men’s room to see that the floor was covered in 3 inches of water.  There was a platform where the toilets for located and the only toilet with a stall had an inch of shit water surrounding it.  The toilet itself, was overflowing with disgusting shit piss soup, and I was wearing my white pants.

The logger boots, which cost me about $225 which was this huge investment for me, had a tall heel, that’s thankfully stood higher than the disgusting water.  I carefully lowered my white pants, as I hovered over the stew, and carefully unloaded my contribution.  Although I was feeling pretty nice, I somehow did it.  I was sure I was going to leave the bathroom with a huge brown stain on my white pants for the entire club’s entertainment.  Thankfully this was not my fate.

I don’t remember the end of the night, but we did go to Rebar for quite a while.  The doorman of the club was a huge black African guy named Thiam.  When I say huge, I mean like 7 foot tall.  In fact, it seemed there were lots of 7 foot tall black guys there.  I was one of the only white guys, or the only, and Hongo was one of a couple Puerto Ricans.  But, we had found the best hip hop party in the city at the time.