Pat’s Bar Brawl

There weren’t any bloody noses or broken bones, but there were plenty of wide-eyed spectators when Pat found himself and a friend the target of a wicked bar room attack.

Item one in this recipe for disaster was our return to our New Zealand “home” – Wanaka – where we’d worked for four summer months. We’d left a sleepy, all-ages tourist town and returned to find hardly a face over thirty. The town was teeming with grungy, young ski bums. Our fun Tuesday poker night was overrun by this new group, leaving me speechless all the way to the final table (woot woot!).

Item two is a weekly karaoke session the following evening at one of the happening bars. We’d been invited to quiz night at the pub where I’d worked, so we started there. After some mean trivia, our team lost in the tie-breaker for not knowing how many floors were in the Empire State building (do you?). Damn! Then we were off to belt out various 80’s hits and dance the night away.

Item three is a short, stocky, blonde Welshman. Allegedly, he was in the royal marines and is a door man at another bar in town. He definitely got told off by our bar manager friend Ryan at closing time. Most of the riff-raff had shuffled out the door when I saw Ryan’s arm flying through the air. His hand landed with a resounding crack about half an inch from the beer on the countertop in front of Blondie and he yelled, “I told you to QUIT DRINKING!” Blondie had done enough imbibing to be relatively unphased by this new development. A few minutes later he followed us out the door to the last social venue open in town.

Item four is a mystery ingredient that is still unknown to me. Apparently, on the walk over, someone brought up Pat’s military background, perhaps in the face of Blondie’s antagonism. Blondie accused the group of lying, whereupon our friend Martin interjected in his formal British, “Well, actually, he was [in the military].” Now, for anyone who doesn’t know Patrick, allow me to profile this gentle giant. At six foot seven inches tall with medium build and a fierce brow ridge, the poor man is a magnet for aggressors looking to prove something. He is also a master of diffusing tension and anger (probably the reason our relationship contains minimum drama despite my often fiery personality). While he is trained as a boxer and in hand-to-hand combat, his preference is to never use these skills.

One can only guess what tripped Blondie’s ‘freak-out’ wire, but it happened like this. A group of six of us were at one end of the bar. Blondie was kickin’ it solo at the other end. Presumably, Martin’s insistence about Pat’s military service made him Blondie’s bullseye. Suddenly, Blondie came charging across the room and shoved Martin so hard that his body took out three chairs, a table, and two drinks in the fall. Pat became Martin’s instant body guard and tried to end it quickly by ‘placing’ Blondie on the floor. Oops. Blondie came up swinging, so Pat ‘isolated the threat’ by getting Blondie in a headlock. At this point everyone is yelling, two other beefy young dudes have joined in the fray, a young woman is shouting at Pat to let Blondie go, and Blondie is using his body to drag Pat around in a circle knocking over plenty of furniture in the process. Somewhere in the midst of the full-volume roar, Pat agreed to relinquish his hold on Blondie if the two men would get him outside without anyone else getting hurt. Oh what a night!

Other fantastic Wanaka moments: seeing all our friends! In addition to the latter, friend-filled antics, we had a fun night chatting with the crew at Pat’s old job. We got to spend quality time with our awesome friends Peter and Donna who are moving from Wanaka in ten days. And now we’re off to visit Emily, Chris & co.!

Goodbye, Wanaka. It’s been splendid!