It’s 2am in Austin on a Friday night. Lights are on and all you hear is “We’re closed!” or “If you don’t work here, make your way towards the door” which basically means “get the hell out of here, I’ve been at your service all night. Now I need to clean this place up so I can finally go home“. That is totally understandable. The law stipulates that no more alcohol can be sold after 2am. That’s why most bars/clubs close at the time. But as we all know the night is not over yet.

So what happens at 2am is, I think, the most interesting part of the night. Because bars and clubs are basically throwing a bunch of intoxicated people out on the street at the same time. Especially in a city like Austin where nightlife stretches for miles across the downtown area, we’re talking hundreds, if not thousands of people, dumped onto the streets. It’s as if the bars sucked them all in, clean and sober, digested them for a few hours, absorbing their looks, self-esteem, manners, and money and then rejected them like left-overs. The result is just a bunch of disoriented people who are desperately clinging to something up until the last minute that will allow them to prolong their nighttime adventure. And here are just a few examples.

First, I believe it is an instinctive habit for everybody to pull their phone out as they stand outside the bar that basically that drained them from any form of respect for anybody. That’s usually when you hear conversations that begin with a “where you at?“, or a “what’s the deal?” or “where’s the after-party?” or “let’s go eat“. Either that or they see them walking by frantically typing text messages hoping that the recipient will at least acknowledge them with a reply. Then you turn this way and you see people exchanging phone numbers. Maybe there’s a lunch or a coffee date being planned. But chances are they’ll probably dial that number as a last resort the following night around the same time they exchanged them tonight. Worst case scenario, you partake in the quite common activity known as drunk dialing. Oh yeah. We’ve all been guilty of that. Remember, we left our sense of respect and our manners in the bar and we just want to extend the night no matter the cost. Even if it means waking up the next day thinking “what the hell was I thinking last night?” or look who’s next to you and wonder “Why did hook up with my best friend’s girl?” or look at your call history and wonder “Why did I call my ex-boyfriend at 3am?” Or you simply scroll down the Facebook Newsfeed or the Twitter timeline to see what your friends are up to. Because if they’re still checking in, updating their Facebook status or tweeting at this late hour, there’s a slight chance you’ll get involved with them in one way or another. So you decide to tweet back, comment on and/or like their status hoping for a response. The night is still young and social media is a great way to keep it that way for a little bit longer.

Then you turn the other way and you see a group of girls, probably a girl’s night out, and apparently one of them of has gone missing. How do you know this? Well, they’re all pacing in front of the bar they were just in and they’re all on their phones trying to get a hold of their missing friend. Maybe she left with some dude. Maybe she’s already at the car. Maybe she just wanted to grab some food. Maybe she reunited with a friend. The bottom line is that she didn’t notify her friends and was absent at the 2am roll call. We all know Power Rangers always roll together. They hold each other’s hair when one needs to drop a cake (i.e. puke) in the alley. They pull each other out of awkward conversations with random guys. They carry their drunk friend who can’t walk anymore. They hold each other’s shoes because their feet hurt and would rather catch hepatitis. Well, they all came in the same car so when it’s time to go, it IS time to go.

Then, one block away, you see a couple fight. That’s always fun to witness because you know noone will try to step in and play Dr. Phil at this time, maybe Jerry Springer. The girl is in tears against the wall or walking away from her apologetic boyfriend. That is also a common thing to witness. When you mix alcohol with emotions, the result may not always be drunken sex but a lot of arguing over the most trivial things. “Why did you dance with that bitch?“, “Why do you ignore me in public?” are good arguments but the boyfriend doesn’t really want get into that conversation in his drunken state. Or the other way around when the guy berates his girl with questions like “Who the hell was that guy?“, “Did you have sex with him before?“. It seems like insecurities tend to come out of people around 2am and again, we’ve all been there.

Another way to extend the night consists in going to the local food trailers to eat. If you’re not in a hurry to go home and iHOP/Kerbey Lane/Magnolia take too long, getting pizza at the Roppolo’s, a burger at Shorty’s, Korean BBQ, or any of our late night eateries on wheels sounds like a good idea (Check out B The BEAT’s list of late night food joints). Not only does it help you sober up but it allows you meet people. You ordered the same thing that this girl ordered! What a coincidence! And more importantly, what a great ice-breaker for a conversation. Prices are reasonable so if the bar hasn’t sucked in all your money, you may have enough left to enjoy a $4 slice of pizza. Because let’s face it, nobody wants to cook at 2am.

Last but not least, fights also break out at 2am. They may have started earlier but too much testosterone and pussylessness can drive drunk guys crazy and create this urge to beat the crap out of someone because they disrespected them in one way or another. From bumping into each other (in)volunteraly to calling each other names, some guys need a pretext to vent and let go of pent up frustration and anger. Notice that when a fight breaks out, people rarely try to stop it. Why? Because it’s entertaining! It’s like watching NASCAR and, deep inside, hoping that a car crashes or watching a viral video on YouTube of someone getting hurt. So if a dude talks a lot of shit, takes off his shirt, thought he could take on some other dude (and his buddies) all at once and ends up on the concrete facing the sky, people around will probably stop eating, texting, drunk dialing or whatever they were doing to witness this. We’re just built like that.

All of this usually occurs within 45 minutes. After that the streets are pretty much empty, covered with pizza crusts, paper plates, puke and other types of waste left behind by wasted people. Well, the streets are not quite empty. Homeless people who blended in the crowd and witnessed the craziness in the streets now resurface. Cleanup trucks brush up the street. Cops are making arrests all over the area. Tow-trucks take away cars parked illegally. I think of this whole “going out” process as a theater production. The scene always takes place downtown. The pre-production crew (i.e. bartenders, security staff, DJs, valets, parking lot attendants) set up the stage. The thing is we are the actors and the audience at the same time as we get into all kinds of shenanigans for about 4 hours for the others to see. Then we hit up the concession stands or roam around looking for autographs in the form of phone numbers or Facebook profiles and after-parties until its time to go home. Finally, the post-production crew (cops, tow-trucks, and street-sweepers) clean up the stage for the following performance.

See y’all at the next show!

What did I miss? Comment below…

P.S.: I didn’t talk about after-hours club. I’ll address it in another post.

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