The different looks

So I chatted with Eddie and the evacuation was the bomb threat not the fire. We used to get a lot of bomb threats when Feathers was young. After a while even the police department ignored them…LOL…imagine ignoring a bomb threat. They stopped once caller ID was invented. Gosh when I started hanging at the bar there weren’t even telephone answering machines never mind VCR’s. I remember it was so chic to have an answering service. We were all actors back then and needed to provide a way for our agents to get in touch with us. “Let’s do lunch. Call my service and leave a good day. Ta-ta.” I would call my service and they would tell me, “Your mom called”, Twenty five dollars a month so that I didn’t miss a call from my mother. I think everyone was an actor back then come to think of it. Being an “actor” legitimized being in the service industry. People would say to us, “What else do you do besides bartend?” As if being a bartender wasn’t enough!
But I am getting ahead of myself, besides the bomb threats we used to have the college initiations. They once threw a naked straight guy, or he had underwear, into the bar. There is the yearly scavenger hunt where they had to get something to prove they were in a gay bar. We used to have matches with “Feathers” on them. I miss those matches. OMG…They were good trick cards. Guys would write their phone numbers on the match covers…They were fun days unless you had a mom who washed your pants without checking the pockets and washed the matchbook and Mr. Right out of my live in the rinse cycle!
Talk about times changing. I remember how excited everyone was when Feathers got a black light. Just a black light on the dance floor made everyone go “AHHHH”. Good ole Eddie, He was so great at trying to get us up-dated on a shoestring budget. He would drive miles to save money on lights and the newest gadgets. All those bar parties and traveling around for discount decorations. I remember the fabric store in Belleville was the best find. Eddie made the whole dance floor look like a circus top! And had clowns and poodles jumping through hoops, it was outrageous! There was also the 13th bar anniversary where he had all “bad luck” charms mixed with good, hanging from the dance floor, a ladder, stuffed black cats, rabbit foots, horse shoes. The “Under the Sea” was another great one! Eddie took chicken wire and sculpted an octopus that hovered over the dance floor. Downstairs there was a makeshift water pond with guppies floating in it. The highlight of the evening was my lobster races. We had the contestants and the goal was to get your lobster over the finish line and win a $10.00 bar tab. No one told me that lobsters die in tap water. Those little crustaceans must have put up a fight- their claws were clipped to each other. We ended up having the race by tying the contestant’s feet together and they had to carry their lobster across the finish line. We used to do a lot of silly games like that, “White Castle Burger Eat Off?” (How many they can eat in two minutes), “Bobbing for Goldfish” (who ever could catch the most goldfish with their mouths), Hula hoops, Hula skirts, my favorite was “How Many Fags Can You Fit In A Refrigerator Box” . We had an empty refrigerator box and we kept stuffing people into it until it popped over…the count was eleven. They were fun times and everyone would come out seven days a week. You were afraid you would miss something if you weren’t there.
Monday nights were a Bible night to be out. I cannot imagine how many parents were kept on life support so their sons could go out to Feathers on Monday night. It was the first and only dollar night at the time. No other club dared to copy us. We were originals and clubs wished they had our following and reputation. We were young and pretty and all had dynamic personalities. The club was spotless. I think the old manager had OCD. We had to clean the glasses and silver behind the bar. There was a cleaning routine every night! Twice a year we had to go into the bar and spring clean. It was those days that we tried to add a little freshness to the place. It didn’t always work out the way we planned it. I remember Dominick sponge painting the walls on the dance floor sea form and white! Eddie has his errors also, like the pumpkin paint down the staircase. The worst was Hank and the glitter! We had a cleaning guy back then, Glen. Glen was a nice guy but had the UGLIEST DOG! This dog looked like a science experiment gone wrong! He had one rule NO GLITTER! Hank didn’t pay attention. He had us paint the walls on the dance floor and then throw glitter on it, bottles and bottles of glitter. That night I watched as all the glitter left the bar on the customer’s backs. And they always came back…
Till tomorrow- be kind!