Door List

I’m back on the sidewalk checking licenses and passports again. I haven’t done this for a while because I’ve been posted as a “floater.” A floater is a bouncer without a set, specific place to stand. As a floater, I just sort of hang out wherever I feel like hanging out and try to kill time as best I can by picking out random bouncers and conversing with them until such conversations run beyond the point of utility. When that happens, I simply move on to the next guy and start the process again. So it goes until I go home.

Here is a list of door issues. I thought of these while making my big door comeback this past weekend. This list will contain some good advice that you’re welcome to take. If you take my advice, you’ll have an easier time of it at the club. If you don’t take my advice, you’re just like the rest of them.

1. Put your fucking cigarettes out before you get to the door. If this is too difficult for you, you can at least avoid offering the doorman your ID with the hand in which you’re holding a lit cigarette. Don’t blow smoke on him, and don’t hold your cigarette under his nose while he reads your license.

2. Wait your turn. If you see that a doorman is occupied, don’t incessantly tap him on the shoulder while he’s taking care of something other than your problem. If he’s talking to someone, wait for him to finish and then jump in with whatever piece of important club business it is that can’t seem to wait. When a doorman is being shouted at by more then two people at a time, it pisses him off and he listens to approximately none of you.

3. When you hand the doorman your license, stand still and wait for him to read it. Don’t walk past him and expect him to turn around and hand it to you when you’re already behind him. I fucking despise this. When I read an ID, I hand it back directly in front of me. If you’re not there to take it, I’ll simply drop it on the ground.

4. Don’t ask the doorman to use his flashlight to help you find your ID in your pocketbook. You’ve been in line for half an hour. This task should’ve been accomplished already. This is why you’ve been in line for a half hour.

5. Understand the process. Pay attention. If you see everyone else in line showing me an ID, don’t walk up to me and wave a comp pass or flyer in my face. This means that I have to ask you for your ID, which means that everyone in line behind you has to wait for you to fish it out of your wallet. This is why you’ve been in line for a half hour.

6. Stop dropping names. If you’re on the list, you’re on the list. If you’re not, you’re not, and there’s nothing I can do to help you avoid paying. If the person whose name you’re dropping wanted you to get in without paying, he’d have put you on his or her list. Above all, stop asking to speak to the owner of the club. He’s a busy man who’s probably not even on the property. If he is, he likely has better things to do than coming down and overruling me every time some random dickhead swears he’s a long lost cousin. Also, it’s safe to assume that most doormen have been in the business for several years. If they don’t know the name you’re dropping, the name you’re dropping is worthless.

7. Stop asking me if I need a mortgage. Every Guido “does mortgages,” and I leave work every night with at least a half-dozen mortgage brokers’ business cards. This is the bullshit cold-calling, boiler-room, pyramid scam job of the twenty-first century, and it takes flight every single night at the door of clubs all over the New York area.

8. If it’s raining, and you’re holding an umbrella, don’t expect me to smile at you if you hit me in the head with it while I’m checking your ID. Have some courtesy and raise the fucking thing high enough to clear everyone around you.

9. Don’t surprise me with numbers. If you want to get six people in, tell me you want to get six people in. Don’t give me the impression that you’re handing me a fifty for two comps, then give the high sign to four more people waiting down the sidewalk. I’m not letting them in unless you pay for them, too, regardless of how guilty you’ll try to make me feel for accepting your money.

10. Don’t be an “overapologist.” If you’ve fucked up somehow, and you owe me some sort of club apology, say you’re sorry once and let things be. If I accept your apology, please don’t continue apologizing. And, once again, please stop touching me – especially after you’ve done something for which you need to apologize. Nightclubs are living proof that it’s possible to cancel out an apology by apologizing too much.

“Yo, my bad. I apologize, yo.”

“It’s okay. I accept your apology.”

“Nah, man…I’m really sorry. No disrespect.”

“None taken. It’s okay.”

“Yo, you don’ unnerstan’. I apologize on my kids, yo.”

“Please just die.”

And remember, your apology would only be meaningful if I cared enough to remember you.