The doorman's blog

Give it up

2011-04-15T11:00:00.000-07:00

One busy Saturday night, we've got quite a few groups in from out of town, stag do's and hen do's mixing in with the locals. There's a little friction inside and we fly in to find a customer on his backside, a little splattered after being smacked up side the head. The DJ tells us that the violent gent we're after is conveniently dressed as spiderman. This allows the team to split, some with the dazed and confused and a couple with me. The gent covered head to toe in a lycra web-slinger outfit, with shaped foam body sculpted panels, is not hard to find.
On approaching him after a whole 8 seconds looking for him, he raises both arms aggressively and tries to take a fighting stance. He finds a doorman on each arm, his torso parallel to the floor and route to the door shortening and clearing rapidly. As he meets the night air, we ease off and his arms come back under his control, he tries to shrug himself out of our never tender embrace. This leads to him propelling himself away from us with all four limbs. Forgetting he's horizontal and without a limb left he falls flat onto his face and padded chest.
Here a gent, who's given up on the dancing and is waiting in the cool for his partner to get her coat, advises very politely that spidey should cool off. The result of the spider human interaction told him rather aggressively to "Fuck off Old Timer". The gent was a little affronted and again politely invited him to chill out. The webbed wonder turned and went to give another mouthful of verbal abuse to the gent. Not unsurprisingly, the gent didn't wait for it to escalate and slotted him a tight fast left jab. Spider man again fell to the floor on his less padded arse.That made us giggle and the gent took his ladies arm and wandered on into the night.
Our super un-hero seems a little aggrieved, but as we retake our stance on the doorway and continue the business of the night, he stands outside the barriers and keeps slinging abuse at us.
The masked marvel wonder was not done however. His anger and tirade against all and sundry continued. The police arrived as they typically do in the small hours and watch his abuse slinging antics for thirty seconds before getting out of the van en-masse and advising him to quit. A mouthful of verbal abuse of the bluest nature led to him being nicked. He didn't go quietly and was once again getting his use out of the foam padding before the cuffs came on and the only thing left for him to climb was the cage in the back of the van. He must have been as shit at climbing as he was at keeping out of trouble, we kept on hearing him falling again and again in that six foot box at the back.

One in a

2011-03-28T13:45:00.000-07:00

Hundreds of people come through the door on a normal night. Some venues I've worked at could do 3-4k punter turnover in 4 hours with only half a dozen staff. Most of these will be fine, they'll buy drinks, not steal them, they'll dance and chat and help build a good atmosphere, not lurk, leer and poison a good atmosphere. Depending upon the venue, therewill be a mix of the good and the bad. The challenge is knowing how to tell them apart, how to assess the broad range of folks coming in and identifying the problems. If we need 1000 people in but to do that we'll have to let in 100 bad, there will be more trouble in the venue and more need for doorstaff than if we let only 900 in and they all have a good night without witnessing fights and having to overly watch their bags and drinks we may see all of them back. This can be missed by a manager with a 5 figure sales target for the night but less bother, more fun, longer stays, more spend per head, lower staff numbers, all help hit those targets. There is no secret trick to picking good from bad, watch people, judge people, listen for accents, speech patterns, what they're wearing, how they're wearing it, how they carry themselves, how they communicate internally amongst their group, between strangers and with you. Don't sit and weigh these as you might a hand in poker with half the cards known, get a feel for who you want in and make your calls accordingly. You'll never get it all right, you'll never be able to see the future, you just work with what you do and don't get too obsessed with the one who you're not sure about, don't miss the 10 really bad ones while you're thinking.

The End

2011-03-03T12:54:00.000-08:00

Well folks, I'm going to step back from writing a weekly update. It seems from my stats that this blogs readership is tapering off. The numbers are dropping and I can only imagine the day of the moderate, text only, everyman blog has passed, in favour of fast to digest tweets and more content rich material which I don't have the time to assemble on a weekly basis.
I imagine I have some loyal followers and to you, warm and heartfelt thanks. Occasional postings will emerge when I feel compelled to pass on an anecdote or a rant but the attempts at week by week, weekly postings are coming to an end.

Swapping a C into punters

2011-02-24T11:49:00.001-08:00

If you do a public facing job, over time you'll slowly grow to despise them. You might move to intolerance of them, but slowly they'll get under your skin and you'll hate them. There will always be nice ones, ones that make you smile and have hope there are still decent corners of humanity left out there. Unfortunately these are the rare islands of sanity in a world of self absorbed, self centred, retarded filth that make up most of the drinking public. I know that decent people don't go out and avoid pubs with doorstaff, the sad fact that idiots seem to occupy all the space not filled with even moderately nice people is depressing. I've learnt that even though I hate them, I still enjoy the work. You can look beyond the customers and the sticky floored smelly venue to the act of doing the job well, earning respect and maintaining professionalism. That provides sufficient reward to deal with the punters, with an C or not, and not just give it all up as a bad job.

Invincible

2011-02-08T13:31:00.001-08:00

I am still amazed by the ability of folks, most often men it has to be said, who in drink appear to become invincible. With a sufficient number of over-strength lagers inside them, they can seemingly do amazing feats of strength, stupidity and self abuse which would leave most sober folks, exhausted, broken or befuddled.
I have seen grown men piggy back two others, at the same time, up a steep rain soaked street. This was done, to some applause, from a taxi queue which he had decided would be too long hence he became the one man hansom cab.
I have seen and heard a gent rip a door from it's hinges with his fingertips after convincing himself the door opened inwards at the hinge side. This involved wrenching 6 screws, three each plate, from their positions deep in a brick wall. The offender and offended door emerged into the rest of the toilet area, with a load crash, to find a troop of doorstaff ready to escort him from the venue and escort the door to a store room until the night was over.
I've seen a gentleman, for surely he was one, punch an outside wall, repeatedly, until the plaster was off the brickwork, his hand was a squishy mess and we were waiting on two varieties of blue light taxi to arrive. He then gave us the finger, picked up his bottle of beer, with the busted hand, took a swill of beer, poured some blood and beer down his chin and sallied off into the night.
Oh for the mornings after.

Shut it!

2011-02-02T12:50:00.000-08:00

Standing in the doorway, refusing entry to a family gaggle of chav, I really just wish they'd accept reality. That reality being, the entire group, cousins, sisters, uncles and aunts are not coming in. Too much bad hair dye, very visible brands and sparkly things on both boys and girls.
What they do, is make a lot of noise. Some of it is aimed at me and my colleagues, for being unreasonable, 'dickheads', 'useless jobsworths' an similar stream of entertaining nonsense. Some of it is aimed at the previous lot for arguing the toss and getting them all refused. Some are trying to get an understanding as to what the heck is going on, has gone and will be going on. With 20 nasal whining and complaining voices talking across me I really do wish we'd have a decent shout, inside or out and we could leave these muppets to it.

Bargain Boozing

2011-01-19T11:29:00.000-08:00

I'm not an academic expert in the price elasticity of demand for over strength alcohol in those with alcohol related problems. I'm not publishing papers in the Lancet. I do however deal with a large number of people who have problems with alcohol and an even larger number of people who don't. In the course of my work I've encountered some people who's relationship with alcohol has led to their own death or those of others. I've seen folks slowly destroy their physical and mental health with drink. I've commented here before on the minimum alcohol price and my support for a sensible minimum. It's affect on me and my line of work would only be positive. The use of licenced front-line doorstaff is almost exclusively on licensed premises serving non-minimum price drinks to those with or without the money to pay for it.
What concerns me about the recent moves on minimum alcohol unit prices is two fold. The level it is set at is ridiculously low. The inability to retail at below the current taxation level doesn't set a sensible bar to problem drinkers. To be so low on funds, even benefit derived funds, to not be able to pickle yourself daily, is not stopped.
The second worry is that this will be brought in, then over time, once the general public has accepted the idea of a minimum, this minimum being the tax minimum, the tax will rise. The minimum price will go up, the problems with cheap drink will fall, the price will rise again. All the time the tax on all drinks will rise and the many punters, daily, weekly, monthly or occasional, will be paying with every drink. This will hurt hard the vast majority who drink without problem and the minimum unit pricing, will hurt everyone.

The Quiet Time

2011-01-10T11:44:00.001-08:00

With the elf filled fun of christmas and the frankly violently drunken new years out of the way we find ourselves in the cold, quiet nights of January. The tightness of wallets after the excesses of presents, food and festivities leaves very few having big nights out. The few we do get heading our way are often those on weekly pay or benefits and are not big fans of prudence. The nights are cold, wet and sometimes snowy, streets are quiet, venues are quiet. All in all not an inspiring mix for a mid-week night on the razz.
Early finishes seem to be the fashion of the season, some even before I start.

Food Review

2011-01-04T16:14:00.000-08:00

At the end of a shift the hot fast food options are limited. I'm not gonna be bothered with a pot noodle at 5am and it's just a little too early for the greasy spoon by the bus depot to have the hot plate frying. This leaves me with a few select takeaways to indulge my hunger. Pizza's, chicken, kebabs and burgers. I have sampled all of their various delights and I feel I should relate a couple of my findings.
The cheap and cheery late night pizza places often don't use real cheese, more a cheese substitute involving some lovely fish protein. Not particularly noticeable when inebriated but very appreciable when sober and eating this in a brightly lit kitchen back at home. Cheesy chips often fall foul of this too.
Garlic sauce is not for every day. Savoury and enticing to even the most resilient pallets. The garlic carrier may vary between mayo, yogurt or some satanic middle ground between the two. There may be green stuff included, mint, coriander, anonymous green. The garlic can boost your immune system, reduce your attractiveness to women. Day in day out it does however seem to penetrate your blood stream, in a hot sweaty club this is not the way to go.
Too many carb's just before bedtime, even if it takes you to 7am to get your head down, sit around and give you a gut. Good to fuel you up early doors, bad to lay down on. For this I avoid the battered chicken, the garlic breads and the like.
The decision then lies between the burgers and the kebabs. The solution for me is the chef's special burger, the dirty hybrid of cheese burger and kebab. One or two beefburgers, by this time of the night reheated on the griddle, not typically cooked from fresh, processed cheese slices, bringing the cow derived content to about half the event. Then doner kebab meat, lamb based grilled fun with high fat, salt and taste content. Top it with salad, onion, chili, garlic, tommyK or otherwise and enjoy in a sesame seed bun. Highly calorific fuel to makeup for the hours spent sweating, dashing about a busy club and wrestling drunkards.

Once a year wankers

2010-12-20T04:49:00.000-08:00

This time of year, any day of the week, you get people out drinking and socialising who don't usually do this. They don't regularly come into town and work their way around the bars and clubs of town. They don't regularly start drinking at lunchtime and try to keep playing 'til 4am.
They don't interact with other drunk people, bar staff or doorstaff. These folk can end up getting into rows in taxi queues, not thinking that the shivering line of folks is trying to do exactly what they want to do. They fall in the street and knock their teeth out and wonder why they get advice on getting a taxi to A&E and not an ambulance.
They ask barstaff, busy and tired, for things they don't stock and then get abusive when they can't comprehend that not every bar is the same. They can be arrogant and disrespectful when dealing with all the many working folk they meet. For taxi-drivers and takeaway workers, they annoy and irritate, for me and my colleagues they present an entertaining challenge. These folk aren't regulars, their once a year money will not make or break the venues we work for. They often won't remember anything in detail and they don't have a clue what level of behaviour is expected of them. This allows us to have all sorts of fun and games. There will be some wives and husbands getting confused, befuddled, inebriated and part frozen other halves coming home in the wee small hours. I hope I can be the cause of as many of these as possible, after all it is christmas, and I've got to spread the cheer.

Pseudonym

2010-12-13T14:54:00.000-08:00

When at work, I don't feel the need to give out my name to everyone I encounter. Quite often this is just to retain a little distance, sometimes it is to pretend to be more amiable than you actually want to be when dealing with horrors. Sometimes it's just to get a serious wind up going. I'm typically Bob, sometimes Max, or Frank. There's little need for consistency as the typical customer doesn't remember daft details like the doorman at their 5th venue of the night's name.
It's also advisable to let the others on your team know your fake name and handy to know if they're using one. You can always pretend, that when Daz at the front door, going by the name James, has sent a punter looking for Frank, being me, that he's not working tonight, James must have gotten confused, I'm Bob, short for Robert but everyone calls me Bob. Yeah, I'm not the full shilling but it does alleviate some of the boredom.

Put it away

2010-12-06T10:53:00.000-08:00

Now doormen have a very bad reputation when it comes to their monogamy and their morality. The phrase 'round these parts being door whores, which is also how their dance partners are known. For some ladies a musclebound gent with a modicum of self control, a wage and little free time is a winner. For a large number of doormen, this is enough of a reason to practice the most essential bodily function. For a few of them it can become habitual.
There are a few classic colleagues who have had to make themselves scarce when their Tuesday girl makes an appearance on their Thursday night and mrs Thursday is not in the picture but is in the club. Doorman ducks out and only does flybys on the respective parties before being fortunately called away to finish the night at another venue. Another married colleague of mine juggled several others to his wife by the simple ruse of saying the venue finished two hours later than it did giving him time to indulge himself before being missed. These are but a few of the shenanigans the emotionally simplistic gents of my profession get up to.
Not a good trend in my colleagues and not a universal one it has to be said.
On a whole utility calculus I'm not entirely sure a good door whore doesn't provide more happiness than a monogamous one.

I See

2010-11-25T11:58:00.000-08:00

Yes, it's cold.
No you can't have my coat, my hat, my gloves, my boots.

Yes, it's cold out.
No, I had noticed, I've been standing in it for two, three maybe four hours.

Yes, it's icy.
No, they haven't gritted it, they might be gritting bus routes and thoroughfares.

Yes, it's slippy.
I've been watching folk fall over all night.

Yes, it's cold.
It's bloody winter, you'd be stunned if it wasn't at 3 in the morning.

Fronting Up

2010-11-18T12:57:00.000-08:00

Some encounters you have, you know fairly bloody quickly you've not got the firepower.
When you've got a lad with you who's pulled his back, another inside, working straight through after a 12 hour static site shift and 3 hours sleep preceding and a new lad, keeping the smoking area tidy at about the extreme of his capability and skill keeping the smokers outside and the drinks in.
When a large group of lively gentlemen who clearly enjoy some extra-dietary supplements and are thoroughly in drink decide a visit to the venue you're at will make their night complete. 7 big ones, 1 older one and 2 young ones make up the group. In a line-up by body weight or bicep I'd have weighed in seventh or eighth out of the lot of us.
"Sorry gents, not tonight" goes the initial approach aimed at the first pair to make it within easy hearing range of the door.
This doesn't slow them and they end up well inside my personal space before they clock that the words were meant for them and I'm not shifting myself out of the way.
The rest of the group stumble to a stop and I continue with a slightly more padded explanation.
"Alright gents, we don't do large groups, we don't do only lads and a few of you have had one to many to get in. Try somewhere else tonight gents."
"You're fucking joking mate. We're of in after some totty."
"No Gents, you're not coming in, we're not the place for you tonight"
First bit of real confrontation, a very assertive negative statement with a dissuading tone after.
The trick is then to gauge the response, without the numbers or the bulk, it's time to get clever. Give them time to hang themselves. There strength in numbers and confidence is also their weakness. They all think it's worth their effort to have a verbal go.
"You're a dickhead." "Get real" "Are you going to stop us?" "Fuck off you knobhead"
By this point you've identified the three or four gobby ones, the three who could be persuaded and the three who will want to keep out of it right until their blood's up.
Just hold the position, keep silent, keep watching, ready to spring if needed. Don't rise and respond, don't manoeuvre to get a better place. If you move to take an upper hand, they'll see it and if they want to just blast past. If you do nothing, they have to get angry or physical against a passive enemy. Not an overt fists up, screaming, red faced opponent, but a mute, immobile, passive obstacle. Most gents don't get it, can't manage to get angry without some escalation. Give it a ridiculous amount of time and they'll fail to find a way in.
Not always going to work, very low effort solution when it does.
Takes some serious patience but better than dancing back to back with your colleague as you keep your guard up and wait for the boys in blue.

Drama

2010-11-09T13:06:00.000-08:00

There are some people who always bring a drama with them. They've normally got an overactive gob and are always blameless for any of the activity. There will have been insults, slights, historic misbehaviour, outfit choices, venue choices and of course potential partner choices all joining the list of affronts. Never in the wrong, always in my ear. Not going to win me round by the more you talk, the more you achieve approach to arguing, I tend to lean the other way. The more you gab on, ranting shite, the less I'm willing to do.

Slow

2010-10-30T14:44:00.000-07:00

Not in a politically correct Jeremy Clarkson apology way, there really are a lot of very special people out there. Some are made special by consuming alcohol, others by consuming drugs. Some however are just normally missing a few cards in their pack. They all provide the business with custom, their money is the same as everyone else's, their problems also seem to be everyone else's.
As doorstaff we have to communicate with the punters, sometimes in a hurry, sometimes with all the time and patience in the world. More often than you would credit it takes all the time and patience we have. The concept that access to a venue is not a right. Simple premise, it's not yours, you don't own it, it's not a public institution, there is no "rights" issue with being rejected.
The simple ones seem to struggle with this concept. The idea should be common to just about anybody whose lived in the world. The special folk don't get it, even when explained in words of one syllable, very slowly. This can infuriate some staff, my response is generally to laugh, whether it's with the other doorstaff on by myself. I care about humanity, if I let the mentally deficient get me down I'd really struggle to keep meeting them every night.

Boo Hoo

2010-10-27T12:57:00.000-07:00

Are you upset at me?
I've been sworn at, swung at, spat at, lied about and threatened. I get paid to stand on a door to a place that advertises itself as luxurious, sexual, laden with promise and a state to be desired. I get to tell people that this is not for them, by dint of life's many varied journeys, their personal journey doesn't include the inside of the venue. I get to see the disappointment and the many alternative reactions to this. Most reactions are negative, some of them get directed at me. Some of it fairly so.
I don't play fair, I don't give folk a fair chance. I don't treat each individual on their potential. I make broad judgements, I discriminate. I get to define a select set of excluded folk, I don't care that it's not fair. I get paid by the management, I get paid to make decisions good for the business. That's why I make the decisions I do, at least that's what I like to think.
I don't dislike people in general, just the specific ones in front of me.

SIA goodbye

2010-10-14T11:21:00.000-07:00

It seems the doormans bane the SIA, the Security Industry Authority, is on the big list of QUANGO's listed for a "phased transition into a new regulatory regime".
Will this mean higher efficiency?
Will this mean higher data security, not un-vetted un-documented migrants doing data entry and handling ID, credit card & bank details?
Will it mean higher quality of service, not process times so long cheques sent have expired and applications drift for months once they have been made 'priority'?
Will it mean better value for money, not £200+ for a shiny card, a partial CRB check and a poorly maintained database entry?
Will it mean accountable assessments of cases affecting livelihoods and families, or will it be summary judgements made by anonymous individuals with no visibility of evidence or opportunity for rebuttal?
Will it mean membership relates to repr?esentation in a positive meaningful way, or will it just be us paying in to keep annonymous unelected committees sitting and their tea trays full
All I can say is I wait and see. I can only say doing a noticeably worse job would surely have to be an act of deliberate collective failure.

Not up to it

2010-10-11T10:33:00.000-07:00

Some nights you're full of cold, carrying a niggling muscle injury or sprain, not had enough of the right sleep or otherwise off colour. Doing my job, there are not a lot of options for ducking out of a shift and when you're there and signed in there really shouldn't be any way to shirk off the heavy stuff. You can't sit around when a fights kicked off, people are being restrained and emotions are running high. You can hang about the door and direct traffic, hold up the incoming, hold out the ejected, speed out the departing and try not to get too wound up.
On the whole you just have to get through it. You ask for an early night, you opt for the roles with a lower likelihood of being first on scene, and hope you don't end up running around every night. What you do is feel like shit all night and hope you can get your head down and get some proper rest. Other than that, I just try and be my normal cheerful, forgiving, open-minded, charitable self. Sorry, that should have read be my normal surly, judgemental, opinioned and harsh minded self.

Spanked

2010-10-04T13:14:00.000-07:00

I was working one night in a dirty little chav hole of a venue. It was midweek and we only had a limited number of customers hanging on into the end of the night. There were a few stragglers from a girlie birthday party, mini skirts, hair badly extended, hoop earrings and tits, midriff, arse and legs out. One group they interacted with was 3 dodgy looking lads in horizontal stripes and variously shaved heads, looking like they'd been out celebrating either a prison release or a no-win no fee payout. These three gents went over and struck up a rapport with the girls. After a round of drinks, the girls decided to put on a bit of a show. The lads were sat 'round a table and the girls got onto the edge of the dancefloor and started gyrating against the railings. This show caught a few peoples attentions and the girls lapped it up. The glorious finale was when one of them shoved her arse towards one of the gents and he provided an open handed slap to the cheek which nearly took her feet off the floor. I was expecting her to get irate, maybe get a bit sheepish, no, she giggled, gyrated up and down a few more times then asked him for more before bending over for another smack.
I left them to this only to find her complaining as the lights went up and I began to shuffle everyone out. She bitched to me that he'd slapped her. I said, I'd seen it but that giggling and asking for more wasn't a very mixed signal. She left it there an staggered on into the night with one cheek with a full purple handprint over the nearly completely uncovered buttock. It didn't seem to bother her too much as she kept warm on the way out with his hand over her not throbbing hot buttock.

Full ahead

2010-09-21T12:49:00.000-07:00

I've been privy to a number of opening nights over the years. They all have their own charms, from super clubs where you're in a team of 20+ to the relaunch of a flagging pub in the charmless end of town. There are a couple of things they all have in common though.
There will inevitably be jobs not done. The timescale of a launch is planned well in advance and all of the contractors are assigned their tasks. Initiations are sent out for the day and the PR machines spring into action. This means that when the inevitable delays, errors and cancellations occur there will always be tasks left undone. Most don't impact the fun for the majority of folks, most don't really have an impact on my work. Some, like the intruder alarms triggering all night, do have an impact but in a 'show must go on' type of way, we work 'round it and get it all running smoothly.
There is always a ludicrous guest list. The press, the local scene, the music, wine or ale specialists that they want to impress and even the contractors. This eclectic mix is inevitably supplemented by the staff, past present and future. All of these have partners and friends. This doesn't even include the VIPs, celebrities and investors who turn up to party. This as well as the high tide flood of punters stirred into curiosity by the promotions and PR drive.
Then we have the failures, things that were working 5 minutes ago stop working, things that didn't do that, suddenly do. This is just normal in a venue of any size, how you react to it usually takes teamwork and experience, not something you've necessarily got when those doors swing open for the first time. What you do then is think fast and solve it, lie, cheat, beg borrow and steal to make it through with the least amount of disruption to the smooth, polished facade your presenting.
The over-riding thing that is common to all of these events is the disappointment. All of the promoters, planners and stakeholders try hard. They commit a large amount of time, money and effort to making it as big as possible. They plan and hope for it to be as big as they can possibly imagine. They anticipate all of their marketing hitting the target, the weather being great, the cup tie not involving the local team, the competitors missing a trick. This doesn't come off and despite the cocaine smiles and sleep deprivation, they are all disappointed. I make it to the end of another shift, maybe stressful, maybe energetic but as long as I make it through and don't make too many mistakes I go away satisfied.

minimum unit price

2010-09-12T07:08:00.000-07:00

The recently proposed minimum prices on a unit of alcohol will only have a positive effect on our trade.
The minimum price is inevitably so low only the most ludicrous drinks offer will be affected. The trebles for singles and drink all you can nights. These will not impact in a bad way on our trade.
No club, bar or pub will be suffering. We may see a few more, folks coming in, we may see a lot more folk coming in direct from home and already battered. We may even see folks starting their night earlier and enjoying a variety of bars on their way round to the clubs. We'll maybe see less young underclass strutting the streets with bottles and cans of super cheap super strong lager.
We may even see the habitual street drinkers and 'homeless' sober once in a while, or at least forced to confront some aspects of their behaviour.
The very cheapest of alcohol is not of benefit to anyone. I'm sure the supermarkets will survive one thing not going in their favour.

Absinthe I

2010-09-12T05:23:00.000-07:00

This evil green poison makes for some very messed up folks.
An afternoon of sipping the green fairy can lead to such entertaining adventures as setting fire to your sleeves on a candle. This can happen to anyone leaning over the table to pour the wine or retrieve a distant condiment. Normally sniffing, screaming, flapping, flailing and agitation ensue with some patting blowing and general disruption. Occasionally, there are the smooth, who just smother it without getting fussed and carry on a little singed.
One gent on absinthe just watched. His shirt caught alight, at the cuff, I noticed as the whole of his sweater was alight like a garden torch. He seemed most interested in the interplay of flesh, fabric and flames. A quick tackle with a one armed full body hug dealt with the flames. a large jug of ice water held the arm until the blue light taxi arrived. A long gentle persuasion led him to getting the treatment he required and us bidding him good bye for the evening. The smell of burning arm hair stayed with us all night.

Ooops

2010-09-01T14:13:00.000-07:00

up side the head.
Our lovely students fill the place with their drunken cheer. They're enticed in with all sorts of cheap drink related frivolity. One historic favourite was the tequila line. The DJ would wait until the dancers were flagging a little and the bars were lulled before they all switched to water.
He would summon the dj's assistant to get the two tequila bottles with speedpours. The oops up side you head tune gets on the PA and the floor fills with lines of drunken fools sitting in rows with their backs between each others spread legs. The rows would lean forward in sync, touch the floor on one side, touch the floor on the other then take both hands to their heads and lean back. This bizarre seated synchronised wiggling to a tune of little merit only survives on the promise of strong booze. The dj's assistant works his way up and down the lines pouring tequila straight into willing mouths. Not a great deal but enough to help and get them moving - perhaps back to the bar after they've worked their way up off the floor.
This had become a time honoured tradition, which in night club terms means it had lasted longer than 1 year. The best results we had from this were those so distracted by the slim, shifting line of tequila and their attempts to get their mouths under every last drop that they lean forward as the line they're sitting in reaches the end of their backstroke. The result, clashes of heads, spitting of tequila into hair and eyes of relative strangers and general hilarity for all those standing watching. Even the sober, bored looking ones sweating in a tie and jacket.

Getting Old

2010-08-25T13:38:00.000-07:00

My usual routine of building up muscle and training it down is coming to an end.
I've reached an age where I've realised the image of an oversize, lump of muscle is neither positive or of benefit to me. I am after a visit to the doctor judged by the blind scale of BMI to be clinically obese. I've always been active, I'm on my feet and walking, running upstairs, wrestling people all of the time I'm at work. I trainn hard cardio and high rep weights and have a muscular physique. The dumb assessment that my mass exceeds a safe limit for my height is not something I take too seriously.
It does flag up that I'm an outlier. That what I've been doing over the years with my build has placed me in the extreme of the distribution and as I get older this will only be getting more apparent. It's time to slim down, up the fitness and do with technique what I've been doing with body weight. I'm not going to be disappearing anytime soon, hiding behind lampposts or being confused for a marathon runner will not be me. I think I'm just aiming to turn some of the overdeveloped musculature into a more conventional broad shouldered sporty build.
We'll see how this goes down at work. I'll still have a face like a bag of spanners and all the lessons I've learned so far but being smaller will reduce my physical presence. Will this lead to more grief or less grief?

Fat Chance

2010-08-12T11:47:00.000-07:00

On a student night a good while ago, the place was rammed, the drinks were on offer and heading down fast. The whole place was full, the aircon was wheezing it's best but still not doing much against the heaving mass of sweaty folks dancing. I had battled my way through the floor, moving step by step, watching and listening. Also getting in as many photos as possible. Even the most crowded student space will find 6' to take a photo in. That gives me a perfect gap to 6' further along my route. I get after some time to the gents on the upper floor. This is usually a little less busy, a prime location to see the lesser spotted the white powder snorter.
This busy student night, these kind of checks are very necessary. I find the toilet lobby empty, I find the sinks and urinal devoid of inhabitant, I find the cubicle in use. Actually I find the cubicle not in use, now it contains a large sleeping gent. Sweaty, breathing like a racehorse with a cold and entirely unconscious.
I radio for assistance, we're going to need it. On the arrival of a colleague who possesses what we've come to term dumb strength we can begin the operation. Talking, shouting, shaking, ear pinching, sternum rubbing have no effect. Time to grab an armpit each, and haul hard. Up he comes, several acres of soft while flesh extra on a frame to match mine. Step by step we dance him out of first the cubicle then the toilets. As we leave the toilets it strikes us that getting 30 seconds of time on the main stairs is not going to be possible with the place this crowded. Time for the nearest fire door. All good getting there, even students shift when two staff are wrestling a whale. We get to the fire door then we realise the next challenge, this is not going to be wide enough for us to stay one on each side. I have the misfortune of trying to keep mr drunks fat head and fatter upper body from slapping into the concrete stairs while the other gent goes down first and steers the lower half down without tangling or picking up momentum. 3 steps down I'm fully tight, 3 steps further and the burn begins, only 12 more to go, by 12 my arms, legs and back are starting to tremble, on landing I unceremoniously dump the lump on my colleague who dances him to the door which I pop open. With one breath of fresh air and all the jolting about, this fool wakes, assesses his location, stuffed in the armpit of a beast, then starts to get shirty. Big girls blousey. After shutting the door we brief the front door team and head in for some fluids and a chance to breathe.

In the trough

2010-07-30T12:00:00.000-07:00

No-one enjoys the gents toilets in nightclubs. I've worked in attendant toilets and they're cleaner, fresher and almost tolerable but still not a place to spend your evening. Most places, most of the time they're grotty. The smell of cleaning fluid fades fast once the sweaty pissing masses start to trickle through the door and trickle over the floor. It is the unfortunate soul who, while mixing the fine balance of splash soaked linoleum and slight alcohol hydration imbalance, slips on the well signed wet floor and lands in the trough. Hand slipped, elbow slipped, shoulder flank and hip in the vile mix of nightlclub effluent.
warm I discover the scene a few minutes after the event. I walk in to a foul smelling room to find a gent, naked from the waist up, jeans wet over one hip, hanging his dripping shirt under the lukeasthmatic effort of a hand dryer. Not a pretty sight and not a pretty smell either but at least he didn't take much looking after, once he'd got his shirt dry enough he wasn't going to freeze he slunk off homeward. I can only imagine he reasoned the piss stained outfit would impair his efforts with the ladies for the night. I can only say I think he over-estimated the quality of the ladies in the venue.

Summer Getaway

2010-07-27T13:06:00.000-07:00

The school holidays have descended upon this little town again. The impact upon the drinking age folks is limited. The last day for A-level students has been and gone and they won't emerge in force 'til results day in a few weeks. The 13-17yr olds that aren't yet old enough to legally drink still enjoy the few venues that don't notice or care. They all seeem to think that getting into a nightclub mid-week will be cool. They all think it'll be fun and grwon up. Little do they know that it's mainly the sad, chavvy and the odd bunch of students that fill out the quiet weeknights of summer.
It is fun to watch their insistent efforts to enter what you know to be a dire quiet night. But it's a night club and it's got to be cool, hasn't it?

I think the alternative, of running to an overpriced overcrowded summer party island and dancing 'til the sum comes up with spirits unmeasured and sunburnt flesh for entertainment for a week of saturday nights, has less appeal to me. At least the more that do that, the less I have to see of them.

Fallout

2010-07-19T13:03:00.000-07:00

This post is not, you'll be relieved to read, a reference to the sometimes breathtaking faith larger bodied ladies have in their minimal underwear.
No this a post about the route shit takes to get to me. When a customer has a shit day and decides to meet his mates for a drink, the stress, poorly understood emotions and poorly expressed anger come my way.
underlings, who pass it out to the bar staff. These When a manager gets a roasting for shit profit and loss figures, they pass down the shit to theirbarstaff, give shit to the customers and I end up clearing it up when they make their frustrations known.
When the management of the door-company get a bollocking from the club company for not meeting the service level agreement, my boss gives me shit for keeping a slack door.
None of these is me bringing my shit to work, I don't do that as there's more than enough shit from other people to go 'round.

Running Around

2010-07-10T02:25:00.000-07:00

I'm not happy being led on wild goose chases, even less happy doing it in a hot busy nightclub with the usual workload of drunken numpties to deal with.
The goose chase begins with me ejecting a customer the week before, too drunk, unsteady on his feet, time to go home without any issue about getting back in another night. That was until he ranted and raved at us on the front door, calling us a large number of abusive things, none of which were massively original. This ended when the local constabulary came by and after a whole 5 seconds of observation, hopped out the mini-van and had words to the effect of "go home, now!".
This worked and we decided in his wake that when he returned the next weekend, something we were certain about, he'd be excluded for a couple of nights to establish the point.
The following weekend, we see the punter walking past early doors, on his way to hit a few warm up venues with high velocity vertical drinking and large discounts. We clock his outfit for the evening and make a mental note to block his efforts later on.
I pop inside for a wander round, a glass of soda water and trip to the loo. I return to front door and the new lad on the team, oblivious to the discussions last week and earlier in the night, says to be aware we've just let in X many local chavs. I ask if one was 18-20, 5'7" to 5'9", brown spiked hair in Y brand shirt and Z brand shoes. He says yes.
Here, I could send him back in to dig him out but he'd be in a shit situation and have to about face from letting him in only 2 minutes ago. I wander in and start my search, every seating and standing area, the smoking crowd, the dancefloors, the gents toilets, systematically sweeping through. This is a busy night, it's hot, I spot a dozen folk to put on my mental watch list. Get called over by the barstaff, get all the usual action of a night. I get my sweep interrupted and have to go back and start again.
After half an hour of wandering about inside, I'm sweating, grumpy and figure it for a bad job. One punter sneaking by is gonna happen every now and again, I don't take it personally, I'll just have to up the rest of my game and attempt to nudge the line for order over anarchy a little in my favour.
Getting back to the cooler air of the door, I send the young one back in and cool off a little. Who do I then see staggering up the street towards the door. The punter I'd been searching for. Not his fault, no need to be nasty, but he did get knocked back and told to cool off.
The new lad, he got a roasting, but sod it, he'll learn.

Home time

2010-06-26T04:41:00.001-07:00

I work anti-social hours. That's obviously anti-social for me, highly social for just about everyone else.
When I finish a shift, I've been on my feet for between 4 and 17 hours depending upon the day, the venue and the number of venues I've worked. No real sitting down during this time, often a little adrenaline, some physical exertion and a whole load of standing around talking shit.
When I get done I'm often tired, hungry and fairly awake. I don't caffeinate particularly, I don't do the red-bull, energy shots or stay awake drinks, when I do get home from work I don't want anything getting in the way of my beauty sleep.
I often fancy a high calorie, high protein, high flavour, high fat, high salt snack to stave off hunger 'til the morning. I am thus drawn to the late night fast food venues nearest to the venue. I know the really popular one, that'll be full of all the scum I've been battling on and off all shift.
I go to the other one, quieter, still capable and less dickhead filled.
I'm known there by name, if I'm coming late, I've got the man's number to get my order in.
Most of the time, it's very quiet by the time I'm getting there, taxi, drivers, barstaff, dancers and other doorstaff make up most of the custom. I don't get on with all of them but it's friendly, sober and necessary. Most of the drunken few who stumble in don't really pay much notice. They want food and their or others beds. Frankly that's really what I'm after and wrapped and ready to go, I take my heartstopper home to enjoy, out of my boots, feet up in front of some pre-recorded televisual tedium. Arteries won't thank me for it but at least it stops me losing weight.

Eye bleach again

2010-06-14T12:14:00.000-07:00

The middle of a steady night and a female aged between 30 and 50 approaches the front door with other female company. She's out on a big night, fancy dress, a real head to toe mess.
We'll start with the patent leatherette gladiator heels with shiny shiny goldie looking bits. Moving up we have distressed fishnets straining against flabby calves and thighs to I'm sure leave an orange bag look to the skin underneath. These wobbling nets of flesh are topped with far too short, far too tight shiny shiny PVC hot pants. The effort of the night having ripped the fishnets just at the top of the thigh so a large hole springs up showing without hatching the smudgy tattoo disappearing under her shorts. The feat of engineering holding the taut PVC together is surpassed only by the boned black low cut corset with the shiny shiny goldie sequins.
This leads us to the mass of wobbling breast, pressed up and flattened until abutting the chin. It too wobbly and topped with two over-ripe red stained trout pout lips which appeared like they were both asymmetric in wonderfully different ways.
Fake lashes thrown into relief by shiny shiny metallic eyeliner from lashes to the eyebrows halfway up the forehead.
As we carry on up, we encounter wiry, plastic hair extensions giving a huge volume to the rats nest of hairspray and backcombing. The scalp showing pale at the roots against the swirling mess of random strands going every which way.
The entire tapestry of bad choices was overlaid onto a fake spray tan so dark, she looked like a fully dessicated leathery embalmed mummy. Even down to the clumping of the sepia tones into wrinkles of the compressed and deformed bosom.
She came in and made her way to the reception desk. I made the mistake of looking into the club to see her group pay in. There after the horror of the front I see a fish-net hungry bum , chewing a pair of tiny PVC shorts into her crack and freeing a flash of white sanitary towel to weave itself through the tights.
More eyeball bleach required for all involved.

Starting Out

2010-06-06T07:26:00.000-07:00

I've had a few questions about being new to the doors so here are a few gems of distilled wisdom for a new starter.
You can be big and sturdy or small and fast but you must be able to keep your head.
Don't get emotionally involved with the things you come across. Some punters will have traumatic tales, insults will be slung at you, fists will be slung at you. They don't know you, they likely never will. Let it wash past, you react to what you want to react to, don't get wound up. If a punter or a colleague can press your buttons you've given them control of the situation.
Don't be a perfectionist, just get it right and get it to stick.
There are way too many grey areas, too much haze of misinformation and miscommunication to get it perfect. You'll make mistakes, actions will have unintended consequences, situations will change and you won't have control. Accept it, learn the lessons & don't linger on it.
Enjoy the work, it's not glamorous or appealing but if you want to keep at it, enjoy it.
It's a people job, you work in teams, you'll meet a huge number of people. Make an effort to be friendly and you can have really fun nights of it and enjoy coming back. If you're cold and stony, you'll find the reception you get is cold and stony and is that something you're going to enjoy heading back in the next night. There can be all sorts of fun to be had, be a part of it.
It's not for everyone.
It's an odd job, bad hours, no respect, a half arsed management and some shifty characters in every direction. If it doesn't suit you, get out, don't be a bad doorman who doesn't want to be doing it. There's no medal for sticking it out, just accept it and move on.
These 4 should get you through most of it but getting badged and getting started is the beginning of a long steep learning curve.

Oi, No!

2010-05-20T10:17:00.000-07:00

One night, busy-ish, the usual blend of little men trying to be bigger, big men with little girls and older ladies looking for thrills. Not a great deal of class to them but not real scum, not expecting too much crazy shit to be happening. I go on a little wander 'round the venue and discover in a fairly high through-put corridor a couple having some heated emotional exchanges. Not tears and pleading but angry stances, air fairly blue from points shouted over each other on both sides.
Not bad for amateur improv dramatics but not what we want in a nightclub. I interrupt, or at least place myself in both of their personal space, and declare it's time they took the argument outside. Neither of them acknowledges the comment verbally but both start moving towards the main door, still screaming over each other. I follow from a little distance and let my colleagues at the door know we're on our way but not in any hurry. No jackets to collect, no friends to say goodbye to, the slow procession to the door continues. I've not been paying too much attention to the type of conversation they've been continuing at full volume.
Just as they reach the door the aggravated lass says something akin to "You're just like Jake" to the aggravated lad. He very explosively snaps and lunges for her. The pair are a pace from the front door pair, I'm a pace behind him, shout out 'Oi No'. One colleague grabs the girl from behind and draws her clear of the oncoming flail of fists. The other lad grabs the nearest arm and tries to pull him out the door. His pull coincides with my surge in momentum and the lad is slingshot into the street. He topples off balance, my colleague sensibly keeps hold and he is slingshot into the wall beside the front door. He splats into the poster promoting another night of discount alcohol and loud music. He then kind of deflates and slumps to the floor. The lass is released and heads across the doorway, looking concerned for her lads state. Looking concerned, she bends down to him, spits on his face, kicks his sprawled legs and struts off smoothly towards the taxi rank. We had a little chuckle to ourselves and waited for the fallen little soldier to raise himself up and make his way on.

Old haunt

2010-05-11T11:25:00.000-07:00

I revisited a venue I've not been at for a few years. I used to work there a few years ago, fairly non stop. It's a six night a week doorwork venue. I used to do all six of them with a couple of other lads, only to have the team padded on the hectic nights. This worked well, we knew the venue, we knew the customers, the staff and the barred list.
It was a pleasant, middle of the night venue most of the time. Punters fuelling up but not staying long, not much to appeal to the illicitly chemically enhanced, well observed toilets and alert staff kept the barred list refreshed. I'd like to think we reached a critical mass of drug users, sellers and fools barred so it became bad business to spend valuable time trying to sell to folks who weren't interested.
I revisited for a couple of hectic shifts, being the padding this time. It seems that a good deal of the work we'd done is still there, most customers have fun, drink and move on. What did seem to have changed was the staff, bar and floor, were not on the ball. I'd not worked there in a while and things inevitably change and their purpose shifts. The staff were less clued up on serving drunks, less aware of broken glass, spilled drinks and dirty tables. I'm sure minimum wage has gone up a good old chunk since I was last there. Still got to find a couple shagging in the loo and a couple of lads with summer colds so all's right in the world. That really does say a great deal about how twisted my view of the world and my role in it has become.

Feeling it

2010-05-04T10:53:00.000-07:00

The first few good weekends of the summer have arrived. The sunshine of a week last saturday and then the bank holiday pay day weekend brought the first busy nights since the new year. The sunshine, the open beer gardens, the lack of confinement to sweaty, smelly interiors has seen folks out longer, drinking hard for longer days.
For business, it's finally good news, more customers, out for longer, more money spent, lower wage percentages and better profits all round.
For me it means, more muppets to knock back, all day drinkers are not all night winners from a letting in point of view.
More all day all night drinkers, fall asleep more, throw up and fall asleep more, fall over more and get in more drunken brawls.
This all means I've been running around and carrying drunken folks a lot more than I had been recently. I've been feeling old when I get off shift. Time to quit the bulk training, shift to speed, stamina and cv training again. Normally I get ahead of this but this year it's gotten ahead of me, must be old age kicking in, either that or I'm just getting slow.

Really don't

2010-04-26T10:06:00.000-07:00

Now I say hello to all sorts of folks, young and old, male and female, pretty and rough. For just about all of those folks, I try and greet them with an "evening" sometimes followed up with an "how you doing?" or an "y'alright?". Not brilliant or witty but sincere on the most part and a good way of establishing some social contact which can stand me in good stead for later in the evening.
If I know the punter, either as a friend, or a regular, they might get a handshake or a "how's it going?". I'm not one of life's great conversationalists when I'm working, at least not within earshot of the punters.
What I really don't want is punters, female or male, hugging, frotting or mounting me as a form of greeting. I've worked gay night enough that this happens from men and women, even at 'straight' venues. It's not my style, it's not very professional looking and quite frankly I'm embarrassed by this ridiculous show. If out socially, this might be acceptable, but even then it'd be unlikely. The running jumping, hugging hump is not an acceptable greeting to any person at work unless you're a disney animal or a cup winning footballer. I'm neither.

Hard Questions

2010-04-21T11:02:00.000-07:00

I'm not often asked too many hard questions by the punters. They're normally too drunk or inane to interest me. Every now and again wisdom does fall from the mouths of babes. The usual complement of mentally impaired through alcohol does occasionally include a moment of clarity and insight. Sometimes these cannot be answered with a short concise response or a shrug.
The observation that we can't let you on to the street with your drinks at exactly the point a pair of habitual tramps drag each other and their large bottle of cider around the waiting police vehicle is one of those. No easy answers, just an internal anger at the stupidity of the implementation of some laws and an answer which even as I was saying it sounded more hollow than a robbed out easter egg.

Full speed ahead

2010-04-12T13:04:00.000-07:00

Flying into an energetic situation from the front door you kind of hope that it's either a big one, worth the running in from the door or an easy one that someone panicked on and the whole thing is well under control on arrival.
If it's all over apart from the walking to the door, you get to slam the brakes on full, you get a 2 second briefing shouted over the sound system while you find suitable bits to hold the separated parties by as you spin them around and head for the nearest exit.
If you get lucky and it's a blurry carnage of limbs, glass and anger you can use a little bit of physics to your advantage. A large body moving at speed can transfer momentum very effectively. By identifying you first target and your ideal ricochet. With good fortune, good balance and enough space you can splat one forward faster than they think they can move. A little work on the rebound and you end up wrapped around another one before either sees you coming. That's what you want to happen as you start pegging it in from the door.
More typically, you fly in to a find a partially controlled scuffle. No idea what's gone on, no idea who's still fighting, fighting back, holding back or just holding on to their mates. All the lovely momentum is poured away squeezing through a busy club to a poorly accessible corner. Grabbing the nearest limbs and trying to assert control from there is not a winner but it's often the best you get. Add in the few you missed in the round up trying to get in a cheap one as you've both of their enemies arms or try and bottle you as you carry their splattered mate out. Every now and then you get option one, only once in a blue moon do you get the second. Far too bloody often its the third one, all the run, none of the fun.

Oi Copper!

2010-03-29T12:53:00.001-07:00

One of the innovations that has come into the door supervisor role over my career has been the provision of stewards or 'street marshalls' for the vicinity of the premises. These are almost invariably doorstaff. Not well paid or appreciated ones but normally badged and bored. Standing by a taxi-rank or a busy street crossing is not really the highlight of the night. If a smoker however, a short shift in the cold of the night used to be a convenient way of both cooling off and lowering the stress level a little.
Wearing a very bright, big high vis, with the high vis hood up as it was throwing it down I could imagine from a distance that I might be mistaken for a plod. Que a local gentleman of questionable social and intellectual skill, on a bicycle. He went past on the pavement on the other side of the road for the Nth time while I watched over drunken fools trying to work their way home via the limited supply of hackney carriages available on a wet midweek night.
He zips past, tosses a can over into the soggy queue on this side of the street and as he nears the corner, yells out, "Oi Copper, Fuck off!".
This was nothing exceptional except that as he'd paused to misdirect this insult two high vis, hat protected officers emerged around the corner and witnessed both acts of disorderly behaviour. I think by the time they'd finished having an extended word with this select individual he'd wish he'd F'd off instead.

New look

2010-03-29T12:18:00.000-07:00

I've clocked up a few comments about the old layout, pale colours on black being hard to read. Time to change it to a more neutral look. I'll slowly try and attempt to get the 230 previous posts into a colour scheme that now works on a light background. I hope this gives a less McCullough-effect distorted viewing event.

Games we Play

2010-03-25T11:42:00.000-07:00

Now this trade is 99% boredom, on some nights it's 100% boredom. Even the most energetic shifts are only at best 75% activity. Standing around, wandering about, watching drunk people is most of the job and not too energetic or stimulating.
We therefore develop a few games. One of which is the gentle tug on a colleagues shirt while subtly indicating to a group of ladies. The phrase associated with this tug is universally known as "don't fancy yours much". The objective of the game is to tug and suggest the worst looking or worst matched person possible. This is not a sexist game, all sexes, persuasions and ages can play. The same rules apply. No one gets hurt, unless they know about the game already.
When standing at a doorway with passing punters a baseball/volleyball style signing system can be used to great effect to silently rate and comment upon the passing sights.
Giving hope to chavs is one of those little pleasures that can fill an otherwise quiet night. I'll have decided from a long distance that they're not coming in. They'll saunter up, I'll ask for ID, they'll have some, in a back pocket somewhere, I'll inspect it. With luck it'll be theirs. I'll move on to dress code and make sure that all their polo-shirts have collars turned down, that all their socks are dark and their shoes aren't scruffy trainers. Then we'll move on to admission fees and the need to put all their many jackets, scarves, hoodies etc into cloakroom. Just when they think it's all kushty to get in, I suddenly remember they're still barred for another 2 weeks and they can come back then if they so desire. Gives me whole minutes of amusement, every single time.

Night off

2010-03-15T16:53:00.000-07:00

Standing in the back of a club, after the bars had finally shut, I'm watching the last desperate attempts to pull from the foolish and unsuccessful.
I have to stand blocking off a doorway to a room that was by that time in the night closed to punters. A lady who has otherwise failed to find a new warm bed for the night approaches me. She's 22-26 years old, brunette, reasonably dressed, reasonably attractive, relatively sober. This rings alarm bells. At this time of the night it's only the inebriated and the odd left.
Nubile, attractive and coherent immediately rings alarm bells.
"So when do you get done?"
"Not 'til the last ones gone home, I've had a drink and a burger, then a long walk home"
"Oh, that's a pity, when's your night off?"
That's an unusual strategy, most of the business is about immediate gratification, most punters don't think past the next drink, the next dance, the next pull. The idea of a strategy that extends beyond the next couple of days is beyond most of the clientele.
"Sorry love, I'm not off 'til Thursday, then I've got some drinking, sleeping and quality TV time to catch up on."
"Oh well that is a real pity. I was hoping you'd take me out and show me the town."
I'm still very sober, very cynical and quite tired.
"Well love, you've made it to 3 in the morning in this town's premium venue, there's little of this town left for you to see and none of that I'd want to drink in. You'll not be seeing me on Thursday."
"Pity, Oh well."
At which juncture, she heads straight out the main door and heads off into the night. I don't need a flag waving to tell me she was flirting, I also don't need a banner waved to tell me that she was serious. I was tired, sober and I don't bring my work home, or onto my night off. There's only one night off a week and I will spend my time drinking with friends, not baby-sitting a nut job while maintaining my night the wrong side of sober for my sole night off.

Solo

2010-03-01T12:19:00.000-08:00

Been doing some old fashioned single man shifts at a city centre venue. Not a community local, just a traditional old fashioned venue tailored to real drinkers of real ale, fine wines and a large collection of premium spirits.
Much like the venue, the doorwork is traditional, no large team to back up your call. No town-wide radio to hear the good gossip from, to get an early heads up on the groups and individuals rolling round town causing mayhem. Just relying on wits, experience and confidence in my ability not to get it too wrong too often. If you get it wrong, it's you to blame, if you get it right, it's just another night.
Good old fashioned fun to be had by all, except those on the wrong side of my judgement, then it's good old fashioned sobriety.

Off colour

2010-02-21T11:52:00.001-08:00

We had a little problem with a semi-regular gentlemen customer at a popular destination in the town centre. We see him in passing most weekends, see him in most months and see him like this very rarely.
He seems to have some inherent communication issues, though not severe enough to stop him having a small group of consistent friends. He has socialised with this group for several years and he appears a core member of it through the numerable cast changes. He does however have some issues and these are exacerbated by drink.
He doesn't seem to read group dynamics, he can't seem to see who's associated with whom and where the lines of familiarity are drawn.
He will interrupt conversations to put his unrelated interjection over the top of it. He will be overtly friendly with groups of strangers who just happen to be unlucky enough to be walking down the street at the same time he is. These might line him up for some abuse and intimidation but these are all strangers and generally used to dealing politely with the socially inept you encounter on a night. What his most troubling issue is when he is angered or confronted by one person he can transfer this anger onto another group or person who haven't been involved.
He often gets into arguments, on the street and inside venues but is normally sober enough, or more accurately not too drunk, to let these accelerate. He backs down, his friends wade in or we guide him away. He's not particularly aggressive, he's not large or intimidating, he just gets baffled by group dynamics and boundaries.
When he's had a skinful however, he doesn't know when to back down, he doesn't know when he's in danger, he doesn't seem to clock when his mates are not around.
All of this adds up to us finding ourselves dragging him out and landing him on the street. We don't bar him as this only happens once a year, he and his group are normally a fun, big spending group which reflect the target audience of the venue well. Some folk just shouldn't celebrate their birthdays it seems.

Lost n' Found

2010-02-08T13:47:00.001-08:00

The list of things found in the deepest darkest corners of the nightclubs as you're clearing out the place is only bettered by the list of things found out in the unconcealed open.
The little triangular blue pills to help gentlemen turn up on the bar. The spent hamster mattress has shown up in a previous post. The bags/lines/wraps of coke that accumulate on the seats, tables and corners of the dancefloor are an all too common sight under a bright torch light. The bizarre however is by its very nature rare. The purse, lost on the main dancefloor, reported to us hours before, turns up at kicking out time, still full of cash, phone and keys. That was a massively unexpected event.
We do give folks the occasional surprise when we find their bank cards, digital cameras or the bits of the phones that disappear into the poorly lit gloom every time a handset is dropped. I carry a torch for that very reason. Well that reason and the fact that naughty stuff glows very white under a blue end of spectrum LED.
The lady who asked us to find her lost handbag was a little shocked that when we found a black faux leather clutch bag and decided to check for her ID, phone or some unique identifier before handing it over. Even more shocked were we when next to her ID, a very good photo, was a little clear bag half full of white powder. That customer doorman relationship turned on a sixpence at that point.

Ruff and tumble

2010-02-01T10:38:00.001-08:00

The student masses have descended again and after a few pointless exchanges of words with closed ears, well spoken idiots I was put in mind of a incident a long while ago. In a multilevel venue with a kind of balcony overlooking the stairs I encountered a considerably inebriated young scholar in his sporting outfit. Separated from the rest of his herd he had clearly been left too long at the watering hole where he was singing loudly and making the king of sounds only half a silver drawer in your mouth from an early age can produce. He was swaying gently in the still air and I was afraid that in the interval it would take me to reach him across the very busy floor of the club he would have swayed too far and broken the slight string of sobriety pinning him upright.
I was right to be worried. As I was just beyond arm's reach and closing fast he went down. Well he nearly went down, he had one hand holding strong to the balcony rail while his other 3 limbs rubberised and then appeared to be electrified as his drink stalled reflex nerves tried to right him.
Luckily his one good hand held 'til I got within grasping distance and then I did just that. I grasped at his shoulders to find I was holding only jacket. I grasped at his middle and got only a handful of shirt. With a more assertive pinning of the lad to the rail I got control of his torso. The four distributed limbs were by now firing wildly, half to try and regain balance, half trying to fend me and my control off. This went ok 'til the lower two started resisting me and the upper two started resisting gravity. I got massively unbalanced, tangled and entwined in this whirling ball of limbs. Down we both went. I struggled free and hauled myself up. He was fairly well just thrashing about. Lively, energetic but massively unfocused. As I wasn't heading back to the mat with this one just yet I grabbed an arm, lifted it high and began dragging him back to his feet. This time, they came back under him in a more positive fashion. The one restrained wrist became two and he was successfully frog-marched out, his legs still retaining the amphibian limbed bounce of his earlier efforts. Not a glorious episode but for all those watching and at least one of those involved quite a funny one. Even when sitting across the road, about to be arrested for D & D he still managed to get beautifully plummy "far" and "can't" sound into his final "fuck off you filth cunt" line.

Gold Watch

2010-01-17T04:10:00.000-08:00

I've been reminiscing recently on why I've been watching drunk people do naughty stuff for the last decade. I got into the game as a student money earner, it fitted round my studies, it was less work, more money and seemed like more fun than barwork. The money is good, enough to keep me from debt and I'm still at it despite a trip to the southern hemisphere, a graduation and the start of a professional career.
The night job has persisted through all these activities. Now the far side of 30 with a mrs, a car and a real job I'm still doing it in a long black coat on the weekends. The game has changed a massive amount with only one little thing in our favour. The seemingly unaccountable SIA have made their inconsistent civil, not customer, service approach to the licensing bureaucracy both frustrating and pointless. The no-win/no-fee activities of the ambulance chasers have turned the masses into responsibility free walking lawsuits and businesses have responded by just being massively cautious to the extent they stop jobs being done and fun being had. The responsibility free generation has spawned an underclass of drinking chav who fear no one, shout, argue and fight anyone with no sense of control, proportion or sense. The police to me have gradually shifted from practical folk to practical folk with boxes to tick and targets to hit and careers dependent upon these. The days of pills, acid and weed are gone in favour of coke, ket and drink spiking drugs. The students are still drinking though with fees ands loans now the ones with the money to party seem to have daddy's money and not a wide and diverse social mix.
A lot of the initial fun of folding people up and sending them on their way has dissipated. The thrills of confrontations needing skill, wit and teamwork are all still there and provide me with the reasons to keep coming back and getting better at the job, every night, every venue, every person poses a new challenge.

Snow Joke

2010-01-10T14:20:00.000-08:00

Apparently the whole of the nation has ground to a halt with the recent stiff white precipitation. I've still been going to work, still been standing there in the cold and still seeing the horizontally striped and stupid stumble by. It seems most of the sensible folks have stayed away, we've had some very quiet nights inside and some very entertaining nights outside. Watching things in short shorts and shoes they can't walk in on the best of days going arse over tit time and again on the gentle slope covered in hard packed ice and slush. The tell tale marks of salted grit stains on jackets and knees have been all to present. All very entertaining and not one wanna be punter has yet thought it wise to throw snowballs at us. I mainly think this could be luck but a small bit may be the frozen faces of thunder we all seem to have adopted just at the thought of it. The promo staff still find it fun, when they've come back from another fruitless lap of the city centre, to pelt us but we do get our revenge. Like snowballs, it's always best served cold.

Happy new Year

2010-01-01T05:09:00.000-08:00

The good folk at the venue last night were drinking, dancing and being merry. Other than a few dropped and broken glasses all was civilised. I has some concerns certain groups were going a bit to heavy and would be unlikely to make the midnight so a couple of harsh looks and some well timed words and they were back on form until auld lang syne. The drunken tomfoolery began after midnight but with most folks happy, well fed and watered it all began to thin out and we didn't have too many issues. A couple of hours after midnight it was time to send the nodding offs home and then we encountered the absence of taxis, the irritating 'waiting for ringback' and the cold snowfilled night which even I felt a bit harsh to send people out into after 5 to 6 hours of expensive merry making. The joys of a ticket only event with a well targeted marketing strategy and a huge barstaff to give speedy, well tipped service. All in all this left very few folks dissatisfied although I've not yet had to get energetic in 2010 so I'm a little disappointed.

Not Too...

2009-12-28T05:02:00.000-08:00

Hectic. This past week had very early starts for me, midday even. This is not what I'm used to. I usually get time to watch the sun set, grab a reasonable dinner & then get into my boots and long coat.
The office christmas lunches that start at midday and roll on 'til only the lonely survive have passed. I've been watching them pass, occasionally letting some in if they looked awake but not too lively.
By the time I got to the nightclubs most folks had run out of stamina. With the mad friday offset by a nearly full week after and not too many folks having a lot to spend it's not been cracking. With boxing day only getting the dregs who really can't tolerate 48hrs in their own or their families company it has been quiet. Time to pull my socks up and keep sharp for all this abstinence from clubbing can only be a portent of a busy new years eve. All the pent up socialising will have to emerge and culminate in not snogging the one they want but getting a sympathy snog 1 minute into the new year before texting the world and crashing the phone networks so we can't use the non-emergency number for the boys in blue. Hopefully we'll have the numbers to handle the expected crowds though with trade having been quiet I can only imagine we'll be running on a skeleton staff and still get bollocked when we can't be everywhere at once.

Cynical, Me?

2009-12-19T05:03:00.000-08:00

Now I've been accused of being cynical. I am, I don't believe the nonsense bullshit of why I have to let anyone in to see their mother, brother, sister, cousin, mate, wife or husband.
I don't believe the "I'm connected, I'm gonna get you killed" spiel. I don't believe the "I didn't wanna come here anyway, it's shit" approach to rejection. I don't give a seconds credence to the "really, I'm 19, I forgot to bring my ID" appeals. I couldn't give a fig if it "wasn't me, I aint done anything man, you're well tight" when ejected for misdemeanours witnessed and ID'd by sober, reliable staff.
I do trust some people. Generally not punters unless their confessing in the adrenaline comedown. I trust my colleagues, not all of them, not at first but I do trust them. I trust them to back me up unless I'm over the line. To stop naughty people bottling me on the back of the head, to be shoulder to shoulder holding the line against verbal and physical abuse of all kinds.
I don't trust them with women, money or anything fragile but that's to be expected.
I trust a few friends, only within their limits but, I trust them to keep things to themselves, to keep me in mind at certain times, to keep me informed of relevant things.
I trust my boss, his job is to get enough bodies with enough experience in to get the job done well enough to get paid and not loose the contract. I'd trust him to do this, but like me, he'll have no loyalty when it comes to sending me on my way if the wind changes and I don't fit the bill.
I do what I can to be the best doorman for the role required. To do that I don't trust anyone I don't have to and yes I am a cynical bugger. I don't have to be but it suits me well.

Tinsel & Baubles

2009-12-14T06:21:00.000-08:00

The need for festive themed frolicking never ceases to bore me. The usual tedium of repetitive commercial dance music and large pop from the last decade is offset against the 20 pieces of Christmas themed crap. This change from the norm would be welcomed were it not for the fact that the 20 famous Christmas songs have been unchanging for at least the last 10 years. Maybe to qualify they need to have matured, like a bad malt, for a minimum period to concrete their Christmas credentials and in doing so they rule out their play outside of the brief festive season.
This tired mix is the soundtrack to the sad parties of sozzled folks seeking some warm company on the cold nights ahead. Apparently sitting at home watching Christmas specials with a bottle of wine and a lot of cured meat products is enhanced by having someone to do this with.
These jolly souls think the addition of tinsel or white fur trim will overcome their dreary personalities and defective personal habits and allow them to meet the partner of their dreams. This may occasionally happen but for the vast majority, however filled with Christmas cheer they'll be back in again on the hunt by new years eve.

Capillary Action

2009-12-07T12:16:00.000-08:00

I must have stood on some broken glass. Not this weekend I think but one night over the last couple of weeks I have. A piece of this has clearly stuck in the sole of my boot, buried in the deeper tread left around the side by the ball of my foot. Over time this stubborn little shard has worked it's way deeper until it poked a tiny tip through to the soft absorbent sole.
This little piece of street or nightclub detritus didn't stab me with it's evil filthy point. It just let a tiny amount of water into the soft absorbent sole by the side of my foot. I felt this little chill intrusion into my otherwise cosy warm world of toes. This lead me to investigate. I spotted the angular pyramid of glass and with a clip from my key it departs my company. The flat slice it has made in my boot however continues to pump water into my foot for the remaining hours of the night. I am more than my typical little grumpy self as the night goes on and I'm bizarrely asymmetric in my cold. I had a hot foot, a cold foot and a really shit stomp-squelch-stomp home.

Christmas Parting

2009-12-04T11:21:00.000-08:00

The time is upon us for the first of the office parties. The restaurants buzz with large groups ordering off reduced menus with turkey and stuffing all over place.
The bars fill with groups of unseasoned seasonal drinkers who associate together on their nights out because they have the fortune to work in the same office. This wonderful fortune sees the sad and single middle-aged men, the back to work mothers and the young and dynamic executives in waiting party hardened drinkers. This all leads to some very poorly folk being dragged from bar to bar as the self implied party leaders drag the rag tag bunch from one under-performing bar to the next. The flirting and dirty jokes kept under wraps in the drab offices are brought on by drink into a tense mess of hugs, tears and hissy fits.
All the more entertaining when the cock of the drinking walk leads his pissed up merry dance towards the club I've been standing outside of. By this stage its only the foolhardy left, all the others have legged it in favour of partners and warm homes. The group gets refused due to the majority being far too far gone after hours of drink in unfamiliar bellies.
There are some goodbyes, some get losts and some superbly timed vomit getting the bosses best winter boots and tights covered in red-wine, turkey and stuffing repeats.

Puddles

2009-11-23T13:26:00.000-08:00

Following from last weeks post I'm reminded of an incident that happened somewhere far more public.
I was working in a then busy nightclub. The place had floor to ceiling tinted glass walls that separated the VIP area from the main club. This allowed a much lower volume, options for private parties and a bit of anonymous people watching. The darkened windows however mislead one individual who had filled his bladder with beery evil.
He found a darkened corner in the crowded bar and thinking he was obstructed from every prying eye, undid his jeans and whipped his little fella out to water the corner. I was checking in with the bar-staff in the VIP and spotted the lads efforts out of the corner of my eye.
I checked his outfit and with a quick assistance call on the radio shot off out of the VIP, round the crowded bar and trying to track him down. I imagined he'd have finished his business by the time I'd gotten round the crowd to him. To my surprise and that of a colleague who'd joined me part way round he was still mid business.
I approached him from behind, tapped him on the shoulder and advised him to stop. He spun about, still mid flow and I tracked around keeping just back off his right shoulder. My colleague got his boots wet.
The pissing punter laughed at this and gave a little wiggle to finish the job. With his business concluded we told him to depart swiftly. He thought this most unfair. Now we know what had just been in his hands, some of it was on my friends boots, most of it was soaking into the hard wearing carpet. When he reached out to touch us, we both in sync knocked his hands away. He tried again, this time with fists. Probably cleaner but still not ones we fancied touching us. With some footwork he ended pressed up against the still wet glass with one of us on each shoulder. He really didn't get that it was time to give up so with an upper arm each, we escorted him to the nearest door. This did mean however going past the busy bar. Somewhere in the process he'd not re buttoned his jeans, as he kicked and stumbled in his futile efforts he did achieve the added humiliation of having first his arse, then his entire lower half down to his ankles on show. Strangely he didn't ask us to let him go to recover it, just kept struggling and thrashing out. Having spent his urine our patience he was deposited into the cold of the night where at least his member would appreciate the excuse. We departed before I think he'd even realised he was naked, he did realise he was angry but with only a locked firedoor while he shrank a little more.

Eyeball bleach

2009-11-16T12:28:00.000-08:00

There are some things you just never need to see.
Getting an assist call to the ladies toilets is rarely a winner. Well that is unless it's to interrupt some cramped, dirty, sleazy romantic moment.
The usual is however when a female staff member, door bar or management, has found one unconscious. After announcing my entrance loudly and entering accompanied and slowly I enter and encounter the issue.
Now some ladies wake up, shake off their stupor, straighten themselves up and make their way out without problem. They're not usually the ones I get called to assist with.
I get the deeply unconscious. The ones covered in vomit. The one-shod wobblers. The piss soaked ones. The ones who've shit themselves. The larger ones wedged under the bowl. These all require patience, respect of modesty and a strong stomach.
When the only thing the female doorstaff spots is a pair of shoe soles sticking out from under the door, I get a call. This could be white powder sniffing so my colleague meets me at the door and describes the situation. We enter together, still no change in the situation. She pops the lock with her bolt sliding tool. The door opens inwards so she firmly opens it and bounces it off a buttock. A large naked buttock. This causes to slumpfurther the kneeling, firmly unconscious, knickers 'round knees, arse in the air, loo-roll stuck to thigh, face on the seat, vomit strewn, hair in the bowl partied out lady. My colleague hoicks down her belt/dress to cover most of here bare rear, grabs the back of her hair and tries to rouse her. This has limited effect. She's not enough strength in her arms to lift herself off the bowl and not enough control of her legs to get them under her heft in the restricted space.
Neither I nor my smaller footed workmate could get past her. Neither of us wanted to particularly get our hands, shirts, trousers and shoes dirty trying a clumsy lift. With a lot of shoving, pulling and twisting we got her sitting next to the bowl. From there we could get on either side, lift her with a hand each in her sweaty arm-pits. Once upright she began to recover and after washing her hands, face and cleavage clear of obvious chunks of vom and establishing control again over her shoes she was good to go. Slowly and carefully out the ladies room, out the nearest exit, down a short flight of steps and into the fresh air. We left her under the distant observation of the front door team and went back in to thoroughly scrub with soap, water and as much alcohol rub as we can get out of the staff-room dispenser. I still felt like I stank all the rest of the shift and way home. Put me right off my special burger.
According to the front door team, she sobered up, stole a few slices of pizza from a passer by and then jumped the taxi queue and was gone into the night.
The image as the door opened is however is not something I'll ever be able to get out of my mind without some strong mind bleach.

Too Late

2009-11-11T13:35:00.000-08:00

I'm always amazed how many folk bow to a faceless invisible authority. The Milgram experiment showed the extent of this but every night I work I can see the effects.
If I refuse someone for being barred, too drunk, inappropriately dressed or even for the club being too full, I can expect grief. When I say they can't come in because it's a student night and they aren't students, they'll often give me grief.
What is surprising is that when I tell a group they can't come in because the licence on the premises says so, they don't give me grief. The licencing laws say I can't admit drunks, that never stops them whining on. It seems the impression of a faceless authority, under which we all apparently toil, is sufficient to suppress the whining and aggravation that usually accompanies a refusal.
This 'too late to let in' reasoning doesn't mention the fact we'll be serving for another 45 minutes or more or the fact we'll be banging out tunes for nearly an hour and a half. More than enough time to find the love of your drunken night and get more than a pair of drinks down your throat.
It doesn't seem to matter, if the authority behind the scenes says no, people accept it. Even drunk and potentially troublesome people accept it. Once in a blue moon the authorities will be on the premises. Even everyday they'd be very unlikely to notice one or two late entering punters but the mere suggestion that this faceless, usually limbless body says no is enough.
Not surprisingly the excuse is used as soon as we're towards the dregs of the night to dispense with unwanteds. Very effective if a little naughty but riding the coat-tails of the all powerful disembodied power sometimes makes up for some of the convoluted, arcane, pointless things in the law that grind with me.

Earlier every Year

2009-11-03T12:24:00.001-08:00

It's happening already. Normally reserved 'til the snowy and frozen months of winter, this autumn, before bonfire night, before the start of November even. Some hilarious drinker has asked if they can borrow/have/steal my hat.
This was the first night I felt I had to wear it. It was cool and one hell of a wind was blowing through town. I've been wearing the big coat, gloves and hats for many years. My head gets cold due to my follicularly challenged male pattern absence of hairdo. I wear a hat, a simple, unbranded, knitted black hat.
Every year I'm asked time and again by punters both drunk and sober if they can take this essential part of my kit. The answer is the same as my answer to drunken ladies who suggest I swap my comfy boots for their painfully impractical tiny, pointy, high heeled hell shoes.
"NO!"
This year it's just too early and I'll be hearing it for four or five months to come. Oh well, at least I'm warm, so far.

Hungry Bum

2009-10-27T15:06:00.000-07:00

The cold weather has not prevented the lovely local ladies wearing very little.
The motif of the season seems to be sequins, a splash of neon and leggings. If not in leggings then it's tights, bright patterned or fishnet. The fashion faux pas' this season seem to be showing the band at the top of the tights beneath skirts or shorts and leggings that cling to every curve.
It's been cameltoes and mooseknuckles in all the long nights.
The shiny pattern leggings bring only two things to mind, box rot and two seals wrestling on a beach.
On ladies who don't know their size or just don't care you can see their hungry bums eat their leggings until I can see their every intimate contour highlighted in shiny black or silver. Not a good look for any night out.
On a rare occasion I have to give out the "badly packed sausage of the evening" to a lady who combines all manner of wardrobe malfunctions. From the dark roots under straightened straw like blonde hair. Heavy tan with shiny light coloured lips looking like a bad negative. The neon asymmetric top with grey bra over the naked shoulder. The top coming too short on the torso with a pale white dunlap over the top of the sequined shorts. The hungry bum eating the hot pants into a scrunched up sequined thong and leaving the thick band at the top of the tights bisecting a showing buttock before the rest of the fishnet glory looking like a highly patterned garrote leading down to the high heeled high ankled, platform boot. These take the small well painted toenails and make them look like pigs trotters.
A worthy winner of the badly packed sausage of the night award. Messy and serially minging for a lady who last season scrubbed up rather than scrubbered up. "Saucer of milk to the front door"

Blindingly useless

2009-10-12T12:42:00.000-07:00

This relates to something that happened a good while back but has needed a little distance and patience before posting.

One evening, on the door of a very busy bar, myself and 2 colleagues refused a gent. He was intoxicated and on refusal became very aggressive. He took on a fighting stance, I'd say amateur boxing not mixed marshal arts or anything that might kick. He swore a fair bit and then lunged in with a jab. Aimed at the doorman in the middle, not me in this instance. The lad on the far side shoved him off course, he missed the lad in the middle and I bounced him back out into the centre and away from the doorstep. My mate who'd been swung at was a little irate, the gent took another lunge at him. My colleague struck him, open handed, in the top of the chest. The drunk did a complete reverse in direction and fell backwards, onto his arse.
He got up and swore a whole load more, made some lovely threats and then on spying two high vis wearing members of the police accused us in a very loud tone of beating him up. The police invited him over the road and heard how he'd been punched, kicked and thrown onto the floor.
All of this had been done by my colleague, "yes officers, the one in the centre with the blond hair".
All of that is fairly common in this line of work. What's not is one of the officers, a sergeant, walking over, establishing the blond ones name and then arresting him. He called for a back up unit to whisk my colleague away. They did not ask to hear our evidence, they did not ask to see the ample CCTV. They did not ask if we were busy, they did not ask if this doorstaff's presence was necessary or more importantly if their absence invalidated any insurance or fire safety controls. They did not ask to see the doorman's licence and thus have full access to his criminal record and address details.
They lifted him off the door and went back to take a more formal statement from the drunk to support the allegation of assault. The chap in the van was more than a little pissed off, I was more than a little pissed off. The manager was more than a little pissed off. When the manager approached and asked if they would like to see the CCTV, he was told to go away. When he asked if he could expect the chap back that evening to finish the job he was paying him for he got told to go away or get nicked too.
The end of this story is long and pointless. The doorman was eventually charged, having not taken a caution. The case went to court, the CPS provided no case, he was cleared of the charges. The action against the officer for wrongful arrest was settled. All of this taking over 12 months.

All of it could have taken less than 12 minutes if he's asked to see the tape, 12 seconds if he'd have checked the badge, written down the details after checking the photo matched. He'd still be there at the end of the night, even if he vanished the club would have some contact with him, even if they weren't cooperating the SIA hold enough identifying evidence to get an arrest warrant. No need to pull him in on the say of a violent aggressive drunk.
If my colleague had hit him without restraint, without good grounds for fear of injury, without regard for the possible risks then perhaps a more front foot approach would be required from the boys in blue.

This is atypical, most officers we meet are professional, competent and pragmatic. Some are not.

Slow Working

2009-09-28T12:11:00.000-07:00

I've had a very slow weekend. One lass with an ID that really wasn't hers. One lass lost her handbag and then we found it again. One lad rejected for being far too stoned. One lass emptying her stomach contents on the front step and again just along the street. Smelly but tedious.
I tend not to grumble too much when its non stop, when its non start I'm just gonna stay a grumbling grumpy man with too much time to dwell upon the unachieved, the unattempted and the unattainable.

smelly buggers

2009-09-15T12:05:00.000-07:00

After reading this from an amusing cabbie I can only sympathise. I get to play with a lot of sweaty hot punters and it is sometimes horrific. A little niff every now and then is expected but some folk could populate an entire nightclub with the stench demons lingering about their bodies. Being stuck in a closed cab with them is not something I fancy at all.

Please sir, can I come in?

2009-09-12T09:58:00.000-07:00

Every other night we get a punter coming back tail between legs asking if they can come in yet. Usually after they've been kicked out the night or week previously. They ask if they are barred and what can they do to get let back in? If they turn up soberish, if they talk to us and don't try to sneak in, if they admit they were at fault, all these things help. If they think they can argue, swear and threaten us into letting them in they may find even a small infringement means a long time not getting in.
The kind of things that get help folks get back in is if they walked out without difficulty the previous time and didn't linger at front door. If what they were doing was out of character in terms of their drunkenness, a rare domestic or getting caught up in the side of a scuffle.
All these things will help a customer get back in earlier.
Longer periods out of the towns 'best' club get allocated to habitual fools. Those too drunk, falling asleep, having domestics time and again.
If the punter was very aggressive with the doorsatff we'll remember their face for a very long time. Similarly if they've stolen or damaged something or threatened or assaulted one of the other staff. If its smacking another punter then we'll see if they walk off and don't be dick. Some folks are pushed into a bad situation and welcome the doorstaff hauling them out. We're not too harsh unless they're going on and not coming off the boil when the situation is over. Staying on the boil is usually a sign of problems best left outside a crowded nightclub for a few years.
When a punter takes the chance to talk to the manager and explain himself he's usually going to get a shorter barring. That's not because the manager is soft, it's because he doesn't have to deal with them when they're a dick again.
What you really don't want to do is stagger down the street in a worse state than when you were kicked out, get talking to the manager who's outside, get into an argument with him and headbutt him in the face. This leads to getting folded up and detained 'til the police turn up, the cctv leads you to a quick caution and a rather obvious life ban. Turning up meek and sober next week is not going to help on that one.

Moving on

2009-09-10T11:54:00.000-07:00

I've been doing this job for a while. From my student days in 1999 to date. I've had 5 different licenses to do exactly the same job. I've worked on so many premises I can only remember the names of the good ones and the truly terrible ones.
I can only think of a few venues that have kept the original name and none that have kept the original licensee or manager. There are a few doorstaff and barstaff who've been doing this as long as I have, I know them from drinking with them, working with them or throwing them out.
Every now and then I encounter a friend from the early days. They may have moved onto other things, settled down with a wife and kids, gotten a real day job.
If I see them socially we catch up and chat shit about old times until we run out of shit we're both interested in and realise that was the reason we didn't stay friends.
If I see these folks while I'm at work they usually look sheepish and nod a hello but don't hang around for a catch up. To be fair I usually do the same, I say hi and wait for the penny to drop but I'm not expecting much more, I'm there working and usually have my head in a very different place to them. I don't but they think I've gone nowhere and am likely going nowhere. This doesn't bother me, I've made my choices and learnt my lessons, I know my limits and where I thrive.
Am I quitting the door? Not just yet.
Am I moving on to different things on the side as well? I always have been, I always will.
Will I write about them? Not just yet.

'Roiders

2009-09-01T14:05:00.000-07:00

There is a certain type of bloke who is very keen on looking a certain way. An excessive amount of gym time. An excessive monitoring of dietary fat, protein and carb levels. An idiotic amount of time under the sunbeds. The careful choice of slim fitting small waisted jeans and the baffling choice of skinny fitting bright tops. The short cropped hair held in place with excessive amounts of product. The select use of large tribal tattoos across the major muscle groups.
This combined with a chemically enhanced metabolism and low alcohol tolerance leads to some very entertaining nights on the town. The customary other halves are by routine, small, young, curvy, dressed to attract attention and play the submissive role superbly. They totter around in the wake of their alpha males and bask in their matching tans.
I had myself a laugh when I encountered a prime example in another walk of life. In a more conventional meeting during the day at some firms offices who should I encounter but a complete with dyed hair 'roider trying to do his day job. I had to laugh when he did that alpha male assessment thing and pulled his poise straight in challenge. He quickly gave up when he realised his boss and my boss were both there too and his position in the food chain was very far from alpha male in that context.

You don't wanna

2009-08-24T12:30:00.000-07:00

do it like that.
The manager takes a short holiday, his first in about 18 months. His assistant steps up to run the club she knows almost as well as her boss does. Just to keep the ship afloat another manager from in the area is drafted in for the weekend to add extra bodies to the management on the busier nights.
He's young, doesn't know the club, its punters or its staff.
He spots one of the doorlads, standing by one of the bars "flirting" with the pretty barmaid. He's heading that way and decides to interject that "both of them could do with doing some work."
Not ideal, but this he retells to me at the front door almost as if I should fly in there, slap some sense into my colleague and bring him into line.
He clearly wants to establish the pecking order, he may be tiny, inexperienced and out of his depth but he's management and that places him well above doorstaff.
He doesn't know my colleague and more to get out of his path than head in 'bollocks-on-forehead' to speak to my colleague I head up the stairs and track down my 'lazy' doorman.
He explains he's mildly miffed at the new shiny pillock but isn't going to get out of line. I ask what he was nattering about. All but one of us there know she's not the sort to take an interest in balding oversized doormen.
He explains that he thought this gent had been kicked out last week and as she was the nearest staff that night wondered if it was him or not. Fair conversation to have, not worth a bollocking or even a tut-tut. I looked over and I thought it looked like the same gent too.
I wandered over, asked him if it was, he said no, I gave him the benefit of the doubt.
Turned out it wasn't as his double turned up later on, pickled and not very polite.
As my colleague said, the temporary new manager may be a shiny pillock but it isn't worth getting out of line. Sanity and maturity will return.
I took the easy route by wandering in, I took the smart route by getting both sides. I don't mind being seen as something I'm not by those for whom I do not care. I'm man enough to know at least that much.

Friends and Mirrors

2009-08-18T12:35:00.000-07:00

There seem to be two things missing in the lives of ladies in this town.
It's not opportunity to better themselves, two universities and a number or colleges of higher and further education.
It's not the retail experiences, we've streets of high street brands, shopping centres in and out of town.
It's not work opportunities, a string of national and multinational firms call this city home and some smaller government offices too giving the options of filling purses in many legitimate means.
We've got hostelries of every kind to entertain all kinds. There are opportunities for company of varied sorts, men, women and things uncertain.
What two goods the ladies of this town lack are friends and mirrors.
Mirrors would help avoid the dirty foundation line around the chin, the hair style that stops at the fringe. They would stop the clashing of colours and patterns, the short and lumpy tops, short and skirts that show bits best left hidden.
Friends would or should comment on all of the potential disasters above in such a way as to prevent a recurrence without diminishing the confidence of their perpetrator.
All it would take is friends and mirrors, a lot better than fake tan, fake hair and no concept of just how stupid they look.

Legging it

2009-08-16T09:11:00.000-07:00

When a alarm calls goes out over the radio, we all come running, you leave one at the front door, maybe one on the cash desk but the rest of you get there as fast as you can. Sometimes you end up legging it in from one situation that might be kicking off to one that is only to be running back the first one one it has.
Shit happens, you live with it. All through the shift, from open to close you could get an alarm call. You get there as fast as you can, you do as much as you can and then you get back to doing whatever you were doing before that.
Some nights you find you're running up two flights of stairs, dodging past the slowly ascending and descending groups to get there at full tilt. You'll have to grapple sweaty, chemically altered, smelly chavs escort them in various states of agreement to the street only to turn back for a gently tour of the premises to be half a step into the building when the next call goes out. Nowt you can do but leg it.
End of the shift and I'm wondering if I really need to wear these comfy, heavy boots, the tie and long sleeve shirt and the kilo of radio every night.
Some shifts I'd prefer track shoes and a quick dry vest, not professional but far better suited to running around than the cheap black suit and boots.

Falling Fast

2009-08-06T11:11:00.000-07:00

Trade is down. There are an awful lot less bodies through the doors. There are an awful lot less punter hours in a venue. There are a lot less pounds going over the bar. There is a lot less trouble going off inside. There are a lot less doorstaff being given hours. There are a lot less barstaff running around a lot less serving a lot less drinks to a much emptier bar.
From my end it's getting tedious. From a wider perspective are the pubs and clubs about to lose a key generation?
I worry that if the current set of young ones aged 17 to 19 go out drinking in quiet bars and clubs, with only the dirty fixed income benefits recipients for company only a certain style of person will carry this on into their earning years. I worry that the drink at home and share a taxi in gaggles of girls or boys get locked into that pattern and don't make the transition to spending when the time changes.
I know spending money in clubs and bars is unnecessary, its luxury spend and when jobs are short, money is tight it can be cut back. If they've already gotten into the habit of blowing fun money on big nights out then if the venues are still there when the fun money comes back so will they.
If they haven't then teasing them in after they've established a pattern will be tough. Thankfully
I only deal with the punters trying to come in, or going out. Getting them to come and play isn't my problem.

What line

2009-07-21T10:41:00.000-07:00

"You're well out of order!"
"He ain't done nothing."
"Fuck off man, Leave him alone."

Not bloody likely. He may not be the greatest threat I've ever seen, in fact he may not even be the greatest threat I'll see this evening. Some of the barstaff probably pose a greater threat and that's only because I let one rip in the staff room earlier.
He is however rather drunk and feeling a little too inhibited has decided it great fun to pinch girls, ladies and pigs in makeups back sides as they move past the end of the bar he and his tribe have occupied. I've watched him for a few minutes and he's grabbed a handful of arse from 15 or so girls. Some have turned and faced him, called him a cock or worse and moved on. Others have just jumped, reddened and shot back to their friends swiftly. He's been grinning like he's won the lottery throughout.
I wander over, aware that he's in with a gaggle of lads. I've got at least one pair of friendly eyes on me from my team mate. I approach all smiles and open posture. I get his attention with a slow hand on his upper arm. I make eye contact and tell him "It's time to go home."
He stares blankly, smile starting to falter. "I think you've had enough now sir, time to go home"
More blank staring, "The doors over there sir, time to get through it"
His eyes wander past me, no doubt another potential victim has drifted by out of range this time due to my presence.
Staring straight into his face, when his eyes return to mine I say for the final time. "Sir, you've had enough. Time to go home. Lets go now." I place my arm around his back, still keeping a fairly open stance and slowly apply my size to direct him away from the bar and his mates towards the door. A slow walk to the front door being the plan.
His mates finally clock the plot and then start the shouting. Yelling the daft requests over the racket of the music.
My colleague emerges from the background and with the numbers better balanced the slow shuffle to the front door begins. The shouting continues though not from the prime nugget, he's just very bemused by the slowly approaching front door.
Out in the quiet by the front door the cheer squad were still bitching. Time for some crowd control.
"Gents, He's had too much, he's acting like a muppet, he's upsetting other customers. It's time he went home. He's leaving!" That was intended to end the conversation. Making it quite clear it was time he was off and why.
"You're out of line, you fat prick!"
What line is there that thinks upsetting customers whilst being insensible through drink is acceptable. What line am I out of when I think it's time this drunk bloke needs to be gone. What line am I out of when he's being escorted gently and slowly out as he's not a nasty threatening bloke, just a drunken dick.
"You're leaving now as well sir."

In your home

2009-07-13T12:46:00.000-07:00

In pubs and clubs I often wonder what the home life of some customers is like. Do the "blingin' gangsta" wannabe boys walk, talk and swagger like that when their mum's made their dinner and is ironing their overlong T-shirt?
Do the loud, singing swearing, threatening, football following types terrorising the whole pub and being crude and abusive to the staff in equal large measures speak to their wives, children or co-workers like that?
Do the skinny, shaven headed chav lads and lasses spit on the floor in their own homes?
I know a pub or club isn't a family or home setting but it's an environment people work in, some people like to have respect for it. If I see spitting on the floor/walls or abuse to staff, offensive behaviour of many kinds I generally advise the punter to make a swift exit. Most seem sorry and unsurprised at their unexpected departure. I think when they actually interact with people they remember they're part of the same species, locality and social group.
Most do. Some do not and have their own impenetrable ego so firmly established that only the swift removal of their drinks and their ejection into fresh air of the night illustrates the point to them in terms they can understand. Whether they bother to take it on is another whole matter.

Overdone

2009-07-06T12:33:00.000-07:00

This last sweaty week has been timed to coincide with the students finishing exams and A level students finishing their exams. Its meant all day drinking with a clubbing finish, sunshine, cider and alcopops. Sweat, beer and dancing all leading to an awful lot of drunken tomfoolery. It's the last time they'll be in so we have to keep an eye on anything not screwed down and somethings that are from wandering past us at the front door. There are old scores to settle. There are old girlfriends, old boyfriends to clear the air with. So amongst the very drunk and the very sweaty we've had domestics and scuffles and just folks causing havoc. All on nights too damn hot to be stuffed into a club with hundreds of sweaty students. Too hot to sleep during the day and too light to sleep well in the mornings.
I'm bloody glad that the heavens have opened and I'm not going to be boil in the bag again this week.

Ticking over

2009-06-17T13:58:00.000-07:00

One of the places I have the joy of working has seen a serious decline in numbers. Really over the past 12 months this has been going on. Part credit crunch, part decline in the number of people in the venue's target market, in this case the top end of the socially immobile.
We've not been getting the crazy nights when it's just a continuous conveyor belt of drunks to the door. The student nights packed to the gills still take place but once a term rather than once a week. The result of our diminished door and related bar spend is a serious pressure to reduce fixed costs. This pressure translates into being open fewer nights, this obviously means less nights when I can work there. The pressure to save also means less glass collectors and bar staff, this means when things get busy, the bars can't cope, the floor gets messy, broken glass and spilled drinks accumulate.
The worst consequence of this short sighted thrift however is the reduction in doorstaff levels on any given night. The punters are fewer, they're not miraculously better behaved. We're professional, we don't have jacket fillers, we can all do the job well, each in our own way but we can do it all well. When the door numbers are cut down and we get away with two or three weeks and no bother the change is cemented. Give it a few more weeks and maybe we drop another one. Our workload increases and we push harder but nothing goes wrong. So we go from a light mid-week team to two down on that. The money is saved, a few lads are out a few shifts but the businesses wage bill drops and all is good in the nightclub.
What we don't have is any spare capacity. We don't make widgets, we can't stock some up. We only work person to person and if two lads go at it we need a minimum of 4 staff to break it safely and get them out of separate exits at different times. The observant will note that we also require at least one on the front door and most likely one on the cash desk to stop the revenue walking away with a punter.
This kind of situation is common, we handle it as well as we can. We don't make it look pretty and we take risks but the job gets done and it costs less than doing it right.
What it will take for the business case to change? Until one of us or a punter gets it in their mind to sue for a lot of money they will not see a good business case for spending some money to save more money in the long run. Until they wake up to that we'll just keep ticking over, doing what we do, waiting for the sky to fall in.

Theres is not

2009-06-14T08:15:00.000-07:00

to question why, there's is just to wheeze and die.
A very good blogger who's dealt with more of these than I will ever do has written more than a few posts on asthma. Maybe because I know about these and maybe because I've seen things go wrong really very quickly I get stressed with asthmatics.
When doing pat-down searches and handbag checks I get the feeling one in ten to one in twenty go out with an inhaler. Probably the same again don't bother to bring one when they maybe should. We have smoke machines, we have energetic dancing, we have high humidity all of which when taken in moderation shouldn't cause too many people too many breathing problems.
What we also have in most nightclub environments is emotionally stressful boyfriends, girlfriends, siblings and friends. We have legal and illegal drugs. We have alcohol and plenty of it, consumed over ever extended periods of time. This combination is enough to get us looking down at gasping punters, more worried and calling ambulances as three, four, ten puffs later they're still not slowing down and getting closer to passing out.
Other times its the kick out of adrenaline as they're boyfriends, girlfriends, siblings or friends fight with us or each other and they go from partying to wheezing in the time it takes to walk back from the nearest exit.
The speed at which they turn white and drop is scary considering how many they're could be in on even a quiet night. Thankfully they've had the decency not to turn pale and pass out inside for a while, they do that in the fresh air by front door where we can both keep an eye on them and not have to carry them far to the ambulance. The wheezing punter may not appreciate this but its a load easier than lugging a floppy punter out of a cubicle and down two flights from the top floor toilets on a busy night. That we try and save for the passed out drunks.

Calamity

2009-06-01T14:22:00.000-07:00

There's one lad I work with who's destined to bring chaos and confusion to a venue. The drunken muppets walking through exit only signs. Bar-staff muppets pressing the panic alarm when they run out of ice. The noisy dark understaffed sweaty, smoke filled pit of a nightclub is bad enough as it is. Getting enough people to the right location at the right time is hard enough.
When you've gotten a walking catastrophe working with you it only gets more difficult. When he's not sailing down a flight of stairs with half an armful of punter helping him to loose the battle with gravity, he's called the fight in the wrong room and wonders why we're all running away from him only to charge back on mass thirty seconds later. This benny-hill like effort does not go unnoticed and by the time we've cleared up the inevitably bigger mess than we should have if we'd have gotten there earlier.
The lad isn't comically stupid, impaired in any significant way or otherwise handicapped. He's just prone to disaster. He'll be the one who's shirt gets ripped, bloodied or vomit covered while everyone else just gets their boots thrown up on. He's the one who catches the punch with his face when it was aimed by a drunken fool at the bloke next to him's nuts. He'll be helping the 25 stone drunken hen night girl outside when she blacks out and pins him against the front desk with her bulk. He means no malice and provides an awful lot of humour for the rest of us as we hear his trousers rip as he bends to pick up a coin or as he slides his way out from under the large lady and gets his radio piece tangled around her bra strap and end up looking like a late snack on a leash.

Night Crawlers

2009-05-24T10:29:00.000-07:00

I don't think I live a particularly healthy lifestyle. I train a few times a week and eat a balanced if generous diet when at home. I hardly sleep during the hours of darkness. I eat a great deal of dirty early morning fried fast food. I also breathe in far too much 2nd hand smoke and more than occasionally get direct threats against my life.
In comparison with some of our regular customers though I must look like a vegan Buddhist.
I see the same folks, several times a week getting more than mildly intoxicated. They stumble in from warm up bars here and there, neck a skinful more inside then grab a late night takeaway to stuff into themselves as they shuffle home. They must be more nocturnal than me. They have two alternating skin tones, a washed out off white tinged with grey and sun burnt to lobster. They have the physique reserved for smack heads and those with serious cancers. They seem to exist only to be active in the drinking hours and spend their lives drinking cheap booze and covering their social failures with another night to forget.
This kind of regular keeps the tills turning in bars, clubs and takeaways all over the world.
I get to go home and am glad that even my twisted anti-social life with almost no usable free time I still don't have that bad a lifestyle. I could always be a punter.

Tango

2009-05-15T12:38:00.000-07:00

Now some of the supplement taking gentlemen in my line of work do like their sunbeds. Seemingly the buff body beautiful is not complete without a large dose of melanin to enhance the apparent definition of their lean muscle. This usually doesn't pass unscathed the vicious wit of men who have nothing to do but stand around sober watching people get drunk. Some of the lads heed this, others can't deflate their egos enough to get in in to their muscle bound skulls.
Ladies at this time of year seem to think that sunbed orange or patchy bottle bronze is a look to be admired. A nicely tanned lady can indeed be pretty. A dripping orange mess however can be pretty funny. Wearing bright and light colours accentuates the depth of colour and makes the tan show to its best. The white bra's straps peeking through, the bright coloured tight tops and linen trousers getting patches of dull brown marks in an 'Is that tea or shit?' way are very amusing. After a few hours dancing in a sweaty summer club you can see the colour pouring off them. Sometimes it even drips onto the faces of pasty looking chavvy boys. This is how as they stumble past us we know that they've been tangoed.

Off

2009-05-15T12:08:00.000-07:00

For the first while in a long time I've taken myself a weekend off. I'm hanging up my long coat and clip on tie for a whole two busy nights off. I'm enjoying the delights of sane if not sober company.
I'll be heading out to enjoy the wonders of only drinking on rare occasions. 4 pints and I'll be merry, 8 and I'll be asleep.
There are problems with this seemingly simple plan. I don't fancy heading to a different town for a few so I have to contend with being recognised. I've been doing the 'go away you drunken twat' long enough in this town to be easily identified. I have to carefully select the venues I go to. No loud music or vertical drinking, no discount drinks and happy hours, no dimly lit hovels and no inexperienced bar-staff, all these kind of limit my choices. Luckily with a few years around town I know a select few pubs where I'll almost be the youngest there. The beer will be full price but well kept and I'll hopefully not have to prick up my ears to any bother.
When I'm out I can't switch off. I still keep my eyes open and tend to keep a line of sight to the door. I'll be checking out each merry punter as they bimble in and order their thirst quenching ales. If voices are raised or the language is inappropriate I'll sit up and listen. I think the years of working have tuned my adrenaline response to a very well used fast response. It can crank up my heart rate and focus my mind in less than seconds. Useful when working, a right git when out relaxing as a smashed glass or loud bang gets me out of my seat and ready to rock.
This said, by pint 7 I'll be very slowly rolling out of my seat and by 8 I'll be fast asleep in it, dreaming of loose women, machismo and takeaway food.

Taking your time

2009-04-30T12:28:00.000-07:00

When I ask someone to leave it's not likely that they are the only person in the venue.
It's very likely there are a lot of people in. Some of these others will require my attention shortly, some I'll already have in mind, some won't have done something to catch my concerned eye yet.
I do have a lot of patience. I don't like to use it all at once, on any one customer.
When I've told someone three or more times in differing ways that they are leaving, I've given them time to let their mates know they're on their way out, I've waited while they get their cloakroom ticket out of their pocket, always finding it in at least the fourth place they look, I've waited while they stumble and wrestle their way into their outer garment and I've waited as they make it down to to the front door and stumble off the front step. I'll brief the front door folks and turn tail back to the many others awaiting my consideration.
What I'll not do is spend any-more time talking, arguing, listening to the insults, the excuses, the grovelling, the cheapskate attempts at bribery or the fantastical threats. I'll just leave them there and they can wander in in their own time, I've got better things to take my time. There may be a soda water to be gotten from the bar, or a toilet check or maybe, just maybe another drunk to be shown the door.

The good guy

2009-04-14T15:30:00.000-07:00

When two or more idiots decide to let their testosterone run free and uninhibited from alcohol decide to attempt some non-invasive reconstructive surgery some other folk often get involved. We as doorstaff are paid to get involved and de-escalate the situation.
Sometimes a decent punter wades in and then it's a whole different story. Some rare occasions, these interruptions act to de-escalate the situation. Without the uniform and some of the Milgram experiment type authority that comes with it, its not usually successful. They can at best slow it down and allow us to get there before it's A&E for all parties. They can at worst be holding back one of the aggressors arms as he gets twatted by someone else.
Sometimes a prick of a punter wades in and that is an all too common story. They see the chance to land a cheeky punch or kick as the main protagonists tangle. Maybe the lead muppets had knocking into them as they were getting knock down, or maybe they'd crossed earlier and not been strong enough in spirits to start anything. They may just be scrotes who get a kick from smacking someone they vaguely know when they can get away with it.
When we've gone in and folded them all up into uncomfortable shapes we sometimes get the chance to unwrinkle them and their stories. If they are genuine, honest and not riled up so far that to let them back in would be dropping a firecracker in a bath full of petrol, they may be allowed back in. If they're scummy, drunk, shifty or just huffing and puffing a bit too much they'll be let loose to wander on. Not to keep on scrapping, we hold them back enough to stop them scrapping on our street. We try and send them that way and the other with enough of a head start.

Here comes the

2009-04-07T12:19:00.000-07:00

Sun.
Here come the drunken groups of gents who've spent all saturday afternoon in the beer gardens. Turning up to nightclubs to be singled out for their wearing of sandals and shorts with an all over body burn. The little patches of rain that fill a UK summer, even on a weekend, seem to do little to dampen their spirits, even if it does dampen their T-shirts.
Here come the hen nights, readying for the inevitable summer season of weddings. When fancy dressed and full of alcopops, wandering about the town from unsuspecting bar to unsuspecting pub or restaurant, terrifying the tourists.
Here come the tourists, in a long drawn out season of sight-seeing, over-indulging and re-capturing lost youth before encountering their real age in a club mainly packed with young locals.
Here come the mornings of walking out of the club when the sun is coming up and the chicks in the nest are squawking loudly. Trying to sleep as the sun stabs shafts of bright heat through my closed heavy curtains.
Here comes the seasonal sporting event guests to the city who always mean more hours and a load more bother.
I love the summer me.

Sliding away

2009-03-30T13:39:00.000-07:00

Working inside a hot sweaty student night. The air conditioning gave up keeping the innards cool an age ago, its just dripping down the wall every now and again. The mirrors are steamed up, the walls are dripping with a combination of beer and condensed sweat. This is the time when I find myself hurtling onto the dancefloor as two small and skinny t-shirted and scruffy haired student types tangle. They feel its time to be as manly as 19 year olds straight from mommys table to pot noodles and lectures can be. This involves pushing each others chests and keeping a nearly safe distance away. That is until we arrive.
My colleague and I arrive from opposite times and scoop both up, spinning them away from each other. All good, his one goes quietly, mine sees the crowded, no overcrowded room and figures he'll make a dash for it. Not exit-ward, he tries to bolt for the corner packed with folks. He's skinny, sweaty, full of adrenaline and his drunken mind is focused on a task. I've got one hand around his wrist and one around his elbow and he's wriggling and pulling and twisting this way and that. I'm struggling to stay standing on a dancefloor mainly awash with drink, sweat and a fine sprinkling of broken bottle glass. He's got a serious passion to be elsewhere and enough sweat on him to make it a serious possibility.
This is not the way to control a situation. Time to improvise. He's small, he's skinny, he's wearing jeans. keeping one hand on his wrist I throw a hand out and grab the top of his jeans. I then levitate the bugger back towards me. It's alot more fun to watch someone try and wriggle away when their feet don't reach the floor. A quick redirection towards the fire door and the gent rapidly gives up, preferring the dignity of walking to that of twisting like a worm on a hook.

Pick me Pick me

2009-03-16T13:56:00.000-07:00

We've had a small tv production company in doing the usual drunken interviews. They've a production assistant who's clearly just out of a tv production degree and getting less than minimum wage to get drunken punters to do 30 second interviews on camera and then remember enough details to complete the release form. All the time you can just see them praying that some drunken lass, goaded by her vicious mates, is going to flash her tits at the camera or snog her equally drunken girlfriend.
They're aiming to film the kind of low grade filler crap that even low budget high numbered channels don't broadcast 'til I'm coming home from work. It does make our punters put on their best horizontally striped, big labelled polo-shirts/sweaters or if female, the biggest set of hoops and the smallest set of tube and shorts they still nearly fit into.
Seldom seem to get much bother while they're filming. I don't imagine once they've given their name and then a short well lit interview they really fancy breaking the law and having their details immediately made available.

Whoops

2009-03-06T10:57:00.000-08:00

When you're following your colleagues escorting someone out of the premises there are some things not to do.
You don't want to wander off and get distracted by another punter in case the 1st one decides to go ballistic. You don't crowd in and jostle the group going out, leave the lead in the situation to apply or ease the pressure. You don't try and get past to have your fag break no matter what's going on.
You just move long behind them, keeping good eye contact with the doorman leading and a feel for the body language of the ejectee.
What you really shouldn't do unless you're very naughty is to see the ejectee lunge for the doorman and in one smooth sweep, bend, gather the muppets ankles together and lift them backwards. It looks a little silly and you do have to drop them to sit on their back. The surprised looks on the punters face and the front doormen's is sublime as their angry punter flies backwards and spins in the air until an abrupt face plant stalls his aggression quite swiftly.

The solution

2009-02-26T12:58:00.000-08:00

When on a quiet night on a quiet door I often find myself consulting my colleagues about various problems. Some personal, some political and most often social problems.
I believe I have found the solution to criminality.
How to stop criminal behaviour impacting upon the non-criminal.
I know rational members of the bar attempt to get it right, judging each case on its merits and obeying the sentencing guidelines.
The basic problem is the vast majority of crimes being committed by a small criminal minority who see crime and offending as a way of life. The law tries to be blind. Each cheap suited defendant could be up for the sole excursion beyond legality in their life or the umpteenth time they've been caught amongst the innumerable times they've acted criminally. When they've pushed a drunk over or nicked a few cheap clothes its only a minor offence. The maximum sentence will be puny, the reductions for guilty pleas, however late in the days play, takes that down further. The serve a third, probation a third for the inevitable not notably bad behaviour means they're back out bright and early.
For most folks who get a criminal record, it's a one off or part of a short period of poor behaviour, reality kicks in, rationality kicks in and reasoning about future prospects kick in. The system works, the sanction proves effective.
For the minority who don't kick in, the offending continues. They collect hundreds/thousands of offences. They are performing the vast majority of crimes committed. The public is suffering this directly and indirectly in too many ways to list. Insurance, retail prices, taxation, and deprivation of property are to name but a few.

The solution.

Cumulative sentencing. Clump offences into broad categories. Clock up an offence in any category. Serve all previous offences' sentences in that category after the latest one given by the courts.
Those who persist in drunken low level assaults, those who shoplift for a living, those commit fraud repeatedly, will in their own category get snowballed sentences.
Those who learn and quit, learn and quit. Those who don't could be facing longer and longer times away from the public unable to further offend.
It would also incentivise the police to pursue minor offences if they felt the offender would be away for a while instead of back out by lunch.

Your thoughts?

Give Up

2009-02-19T11:31:00.000-08:00

Thinking back about stuff as I near a decade of being paid to watch drunken muppets I realise how much stuff I've given up because of it.
There are a few ladies who didn't appreciate me always being sober and heading out the door at 9.30 every night. There are a few more who didn't appreciate me never having a weekend off so we could go and do something fun on a weekend. I've not had a good holiday in a very long time. I've been rude to more postmen than I really thought would cover one round.
I've gotten to know who works night shift at my 24hour tesco's from popping by at 4am to get my breakfast far too often. When I'm out on my rare nights off I still drift to the part of the room where I get the best view and tend to stand crossed arms tutting at the drunken young ones and keeping an eye on the tension building in that domestic or the rowdy buggers at the bar.
I miss watching a tv film that doesn't come from the world cinema selection with subtitles and a bemusing and harrowing plot.
I've missed a fair bit of stuff but every road taken excludes others. I've seen and done things others will never do. I've learnt more about myself and others than many will ever know or want to.

Domestics

2009-02-15T03:25:00.000-08:00

After the lovely romantic event of valentines night I am once again amazed by the number of people who feel the need to share their domestic stresses in public. Like a certain type of person who feels the need to fight with their children in supermarkets there seem to be plenty who argue their personal issues in pubs and clubs and on the streets.
With the increasing honesty and emotional openness that comes with drink and the application of gentle stresses of decision making and social interactions that come from nights out and its time to stand back and watch the fireworks. Well it's seldom physical fireworks but the screaming and threatening do provide quite a bit of street theatre. It keeps from getting to bored as the large gaggles of drunken boys and girls tend to have a night off on valentines. I didn't have the night off but spent most of it telling rowing couples to quieten down or take it outside. They generally did and I didn't have to put on my marriage counsellor hat once. I did direct quite a few stroppy singletons to the station and the taxi ranks.
Got back to a poorly missus whose idea of romance is a warm body and box of soft tissues. Suits me just fine.

Slip Sliding Away

2009-02-05T12:14:00.000-08:00

It's been cold and icy and a little bit snowy 'round these parts of late. I know I've been standing out in it a fair bit. I've got a hat, big coat and heavy warm boots. I'm not trying to totter past in high heels after a few pints wearing a belt and best wishes to keep the cold out.
It's such fun to watch punters shivering and shuffling in with bright red frozen legs. Even more fun to watch them shuffle out, a little less steady on their feet, hitting the cold air and the now even harder iced streets. Then they slip, stumble and slide their way kebabward, then slip slide and stumble their way back taxiward all the while getting colder and in just about every case more bedraggled and bruised.
Ho hum, salt does really take the polish of my nice warm boots.

Tickle me 'ell-no

2009-01-31T07:25:00.000-08:00

When ladies of an age to know better are left outside by their mates to finish their fag it'd be rude not to say something. I can stand stony faced and immovable when needed but for punters who've yet to warrant it I'll try not to be rude.
I'll often say some banal line to asses whether their up for conversation or happy in their own company. However ladies of a certain age and inebriation are a little too eager to talk and in about 3 seconds I'll be regretting opening my mouth. 3 hours later I'll still be regretting it.
In my head I'm answering. No I'm not single, no I'm not interested, no I'm not interested in your 4 children either. I'm not bothered that your ex used to cheat on you, nor am I bothered that you're really horny, or that your mates have all pulled. I'd rather rip off my own ears than have you flirt with me. I am not cuddly, sexy, or ticklish.
In reality I'm giving monosyllabic answers and hardening my body language and avoiding eye contact.
This is not easy to do when my colleague, who wisely kept his trap shut for the first 5 seconds, keeps rotating between telling the drunken tart details about me and sniggering and snickering like a tit or making lewd suggestions down the radio for only my ears and the rest of the team to laugh at.

Put it away

2009-01-22T12:41:00.000-08:00

When you work in a team, each brings their own skills and assets. They also bring their flaws.
One former colleague used to bring his love life to work. He was old enough to know better, had an ex-wife and kids. He also had a haircut not usually seen on anyone over 17.
He'd be energetic and keen at work, when stuff was kicking off or going to. He belonged to the 'he ran into my fist repeatedly' school of doorwork but wasn't at the top of the class.
He would however spend quiet nights having extended text flirts with his current stock of ladies. I think they may not have been very ladylike but they were female with a pulse and usually big shoes, fake blond hair and a conspicuous absence of sense. On some nights, I speculate here, but ones when he was out of battery he'd be chatting away to ladies, continuously. Not the 'how you doing?', 'what you been up to?' kind of nattering, more the 'do you wanna sit on my cock?'.
This got tedious when these lines worked. Instead of taking the early bath offered as the club calmed down, he often did this to drive his small loud car too fast to his lady for the night, he'd stay on, getting paid whilst sitting in a dark corner, ignoring his radio and getting some heavy petting done.
He wasn't the best fun to work with unless it was rammed and hectic. Every other time you just wish he'd taken the bromine rather than the pro-plus.

Go Blind

2009-01-16T10:45:00.000-08:00

Working on your own, will only lead to one thing. If you're working on your todd it really has to be a small venue, with little trouble, probably little passing grief and a sensible clientele. Potentially you'll have other staff nearby to lend a hand if needed.
It's not recommended but in a small place the manager just can't justify a pair and are asked by the local plod to obey the letter of their licence and employ doorstaff when asked to by the self same local plod. Would be corrupt if any plod ever moonlighted as doorstaff but they don't, ever, it seems.
You'll never get everything right. If you're on your own it's only your judgement keeping things as they need be. There's no need to be superman. You're not expected to turf out a full football team's worth of drunken muppets. Maybe don't be letting them in but if they're in, just turn off the beer and be polite and on your toes. If they go aggressive keep the other punters safe and wait for the blue light taxi tag team to get there.
You do have to have good self confidence, a good manner with folks and a good few ways to keep yourself amused. The one thing you will always face is boredom. Having done open 'til close shifts on a football saturday on my todd, in the grey winter, it is all about boredom. It's the one thing you're going to have to beat every hour of every night every week.

Oops

2009-01-05T11:06:00.000-08:00

As a fellow blogger describes sometimes you just connect. Not through planning and considered application of power, just through the developed reactions and subconscious movement.
In one venue I don't see the inside of much nowadays I was just standing watching the dancefloor when I felt a splash against the back of my head. Turning and legging it up the stairs to the balcony floor above I see one gent on the deck holding his face, one gent running up to him and delivering a kick to his head. I'm still closing the distance and contact the upright gent and give an open two handed shove in the chest. This makes some space between me standing over the victim and the other gent reeling backward. He kept going backward and collided with a balcony rail. This rail, set at well above waist height is not an easy obstacle to clear. The gent I had shoved kept going and going until there were no feet on the floor. One hand on the rail, one grabbing the air in front of him and one bloody big fall onto stairs below. Somehow gravity hadn't quite been overcome and he returned to the floor on the safe side of the rail but it did have me worried my night would have added an accidental death to add to the GBH with intent I'd just witnessed.
Similarly when static in a doorway with 6' of pavement between me and the street one gent didn't get the gist of 'not tonight'. He kept walking up and I kept placing an open hand on his chest and reversing his course. After a couple of efforts he tried running at the door. I set a foot backward, applied myself more energetically and much to both our surprise he flew backward a lot faster then he approached and with flintstone like twinkle toes shot across the road. He came to a halt when he found the far curb, and landed unceremoniously on his arse.
Sometimes you wish you'd connect like this but you can only improve the odds. You can get all the pieces in one place but you can't get that slick connection every time.

Policy

2009-01-01T08:21:00.000-08:00

When you work at venue it's really important to have a consistent door policy.
If you know it's spit and sawdust and upright is about the only criterion for getting in, you'll need to have a numerous heavy team possibly light on the conversation.
If you're keeping out the chav's and going for an older better dressed audience you'll need less staff, more communication and conflict resolution skills.
If you stick to young ones you need staff who keep their eyes and ears open but don't dismantle everything in sight.
Whatever your policy choice, you tailor the numbers, skills and team approach to it. If you want to chop and change policy night by night and week by week expect a team that doesn't match the venue and more importantly you'll have numbers that don't match. Too many staff and you'll get teams cut back when you'll be needing them all when it kicks off next week. Too few staff and you'll get your arses handed to you on a plate.
I don't like that happening. There's only so many folks you can hold back while pinning a coked up 'roider brute in the fire exit. Then you see that every member of the team's doing the same. and there's still half a dozen coming on. Not a good night but one to remember.

The Disrupted

2008-12-29T08:02:00.000-08:00

Over the Christmas and new year period the weeks are disrupted. Some folks have the full fortnight off. Others ended up with their Friday night on the Wednesday. Then we get a Friday and Saturday with no preamble and football playing on the Friday and Sunday. Then we get another mad Wednesday night. Taking us through to silly o'clock in the morning on Thursday. For some its back to work on Friday, other are off 'til Monday so is it a big weekend or has the January slump set in already?
With my reading of the credit crunch, Mytown's house prices and home ownership rate and one of the bigger employers looking skittish for the new year I think the last big party will be new years eve.
It's always in interesting night to work. Obviously there will be loads more drunken fun. We get to see all of our regulars out and about in full fine fettle. And we get to see a club full to the rafters with all the egos of the drunken male groups, the bitchy dynamics of the female groups and the unfathomable working of the domestics. I'm sure it'll keep me busy for the last night in a while.

Ho Ho Bloody Ho

2008-12-24T12:29:00.000-08:00

Yes I'm full of the Bah-Humbug spirit. Too many drunken fools with too much spirit in them. The gentlemen seem just seem to be too drunk too early to even enter the venue. The ladies are worse.
Pretty as the lady might have looked in the poster in the window. Most of our female customers do not look good in cheap red sateen with white polyester fluff. Especially when a drink's been spilt down it and the fake tan has turned the white to dun. Similarly stockings may be festive but fishnets looking like chicken wire and muffin tops on the top of each thigh make me lose my appettite.
I'll be thankful for the time and a half. Apart from that I'll be thankful when it's over. Only tonight, boxing day, the saturday and then the new ears eve and new years day to get through 'til the students return and a sense of normality can return. And a full working week.

No really

2008-12-18T13:24:00.000-08:00

When a tiny drunken, mentally special chav meets a cold, bored, tired me.
After a while too long standing in the freezing sleety drizzle I can loose some of my legendary patience. I normally don't let this mood creep past my professionalism. When faced with diminutive, socially bankrupt, intoxicated and aggressive chav what more can I do but have some fun and alleviate my mood.
'Good evening' as he approaches. He's thinking he's gonna walk straight on in.
'Kushty'
'No sir, not tonight.'
'You what?'
'Not tonight, try somewhere else.' He's still kinda lodged half in the door beside me so I took myself a handful of horizontally striped sweater and returned him fully to the pavement.
'Walk away now sir, we're done'
'Who the fuck are you?'
My normal patient silence
'You fucking dare touch me'
More patient silence and he takes this as fear and steps right into my chest. It would be getting in my face but really he's not that tall.
I wheel out my last chance gambit with a 'Go away now. Just Piss off!'
A little bit of swearing just lets a muppet know you're ready to shift up gears and it could be getting personal.
A little stunned step back and a moment to shake some booze out of his undersized brain then he looks me directly in the eyes and I begin to chuckle. His adrenaline is making him shake. In a moment I'm shaking trying to hold my laughter in. He then does the most offensive thing I've ever encountered and flips me the bird. One whole raised finger.
I am still keeping eye contact and swat his hand down. He tries with the other hand and I think about bending the finger back. Before I get the chance his adrenaline loses the battle with his fear and he steps back to blow some more hot air.
'You don't know any real men in Mytown, do you?'
Not gonna rise to this one
'Who the fuck do you know?'
Probably more real men than you will ever in Mytown and beyond its apparently rather stagnant gene-pool.

Thank-you note

2008-12-11T15:07:00.000-08:00

Only once, and I'm not sure just how sane the writer was. In the doorstaff closet, next to the rota's and the incredibly poorly written notes to doorstaff not to use their phones, was a thank-you letter.
It was from a thankful a punter, after having an asthma attack in the venue she had been swiftly and carefully treated by the doorstaff and her handbag found and returned to her. Not a massive thing in doorwork, just the kind of thing a professional team does on a nightly basis.
Very nice for someone to write in. Probably the only one who's bothered out of the thousands who we help. Some folks we go really out of the way for and barely get a nod good-night.
It was a nice little reminder every time we went out into the venue that at least one punter, once, even drunkenly, thought we did a good job.

Same old Tunes

2008-12-08T14:28:00.000-08:00

Even through the ear defender and radio earpiece I get far more volume than I require. In the 10 years of working in clubs almost all of the music has changed. Is it any better? Is it any worse?
I couldn't really tell.
What the music in clubs does is attract folks in to dance. They dance to enjoy themselves, they dance to pull. That's the theory. Club managers decide to pay DJs an awful lot of money for a few hours performing on the decks. Some clubs like a pop and prattle style, others like non-stop banging tunes. The tricks to getting them to the bar, filling the dance floor or keeping them in towards the end of the night are all fairly standard gimmicks. Not rocket science and not foolproof but enough to fool most of the people most of the time.
Is it getting better? I couldn't really say, I don't listen to it. It's just a background, a simple distraction, it helps pass the time on a quiet shift but can drag if its missing the audience and only the drunks haven't noticed it yet.
I do have tunes I think are well produced, well crafted and so on.
I know what music I like but you won't hear it in clubs, it doesn't suit being played at screaming volume, it's not what you'd call readily accessible.

Connections

2008-12-01T14:00:00.000-08:00

It's very easy when you work for an agency to be replaced. If the manager doesn't like the look of your face, if they're trying to cut back, if they want to piss off the area manager, if they'd rather keep a good bar-staff or any of a dozen reasons, good or not. None have anything to do with the quality of your work.
All you can do to keep yourself settled is simple. Be polite and friendly to the boss, ask how they're doing, keep an ear to the ground, don't whine to them unless you really have to, don't show them up to their minions, friends or peers. Be friendly with the other staff, even the new glass collector who you don't give a week. Make yourself part of the team, when they have staff nights off, go if you can, enjoy yourself in context. Don't vanish like there's wolves chasing you at the end of the night, it's that bloody late you might as well spend five or ten minutes seeing how it went for everyone else. Don't be unprofessional, even on your nights off, you can do that in a whole number of places, not where you work.
And don't above all of these sleep with the staff, from area manager to bar-back. Someone will always find out, someone will always tell everyone and unless you get married and live happily ever after it will come back and bite you in the arse, hard, with teeth.