Pitt gets a JOB! As a BOUNCER!

Will wonders never cease? Wee Willie Pitt has gotten a JOB! As a BOUNCER, no less! Remember Pitt's Bukowski buddy Ty the Bouncer? Well, Pitt has BECOME Ty the Bouncer! Trust-fund baby, pedagogue, pundit, press secretary, best-selling author, essayist, activist, ditch-stander-inner, indictment-scooper--now add BOUNCER to the résumé! Is there no LIMIT to this man's talents? Read about it here in this THREAD, "Do The Right Thing."

How the mighty have fallen! You see, once upon a time, Our Boy was a rising star in the progressive ranks. Pied Piper to the DUmmies, Wee Willie had attracted quite a following. But then came that fateful Fitzmas Day, May 12, 2006, when Journalist Pitt broke the scoop that the indictment of Karl Rove was already "sealed" and ready to be revealed "within 24 business hours." Well, the clock is still ticking on that one, and Pitt became the laughingstock of the internets. William Rivers Pitt, poster child for failed expectations.

So show some ID and proceed on in, as we enter the nightime domain of Will the Bouncer. Pitt and his pals are in Hand-Stamp Red, while the commentary of your humble guest correspondent, Charles Henrickson, is in the [brackets]:

Do The Right Thing

[Do the Write Thing. Please proceed, Will.]

For a number of years, the running joke about me among my friends was that, because I write for a living, I'm a bum.

[Imagine that!]

They didn't really mean it . . .

[ *muffled laughter* ]

and there was definitely a tinge of envy in their voices when they cracked on me about it. . . .

[A tinge of envy, right.]

after all, my commute to work is the 15 feet from my bed to my desk, and wearing pants is entirely optional. . . .

[Please, no word pictures, Will.]

These friends of mine are people who bust their asses for a living, as security guards and in hot restaurant kitchens and in windowless offices and in crowded classrooms and behind bar tops and pedaling bicycle rickshaws filled with inebriated low-tipping tourists back and forth between downtown hotels and Fenway Park. . . .

[Will Pitt, Friend of the Working Man.]

That all changed when the economy got eaten by a bunch of white-collar hedge fund bandits in Washington and New York.

[I see it coming: It's BUSH'S FAULT that Wordsmith Will had to go out and get a real job!]

I stopped hearing the jokes about my profession when my own financial security required I take a second job.

["A second job" = "one real job, far below my station"]

Since nobody anywhere was hiring anyone for anything. . . .

[Translation: Nobody in politics wanted to hire the Laughingstock of Fitzmas.]

I took the best gig I could find, which turned out to be bouncing at a bar.

[Pitt was more used to falling down at a bar than bouncing.]

Several nights a week, I pushed away from my keyboard to stand outside a door on a frigid street in a black shirt and check IDs, throw out drunks and keep the peace, such as it was. The gig also involved hauling out garbage, sweeping up cigarette butts, dumping beer swill buckets, polishing tables and dragging dripping boxes of empty beer bottles out behind the building at the end of the night. The pay wasn't great, and my work on average wasn't done until 4:00 AM. . . .

[Cue world's smallest violin.]

but it was enough to make the difference between eating and not eating, and I've been at it ever since.

[Eating? From your recent pictures, I'd say so!]

The job is as blue-collar as you can get, which is nothing new for me.

[Will Pitt, poet, longshoreman, philosopher. . . .]

I had my first job before I was ten years old . . .

[. . . boring my fifth-grade teacher with my "themes."]

Growing up, I never had less than two jobs. . . .

[That all changed when I turned 25 and started living off the trust fund.]

I've cleaned septic tanks, served ice cream. . . .

[Eewwww on the juxtaposition!]



and for one memorably nightmarish season, sold men's underwear. . . .

[Did the men object to having their underwear sold?]

and then a full-time writer, which I suppose you could define as "no collar" to go along with "no pants."

[No underwear either, I suppose.]

I'd been in my own cushy writing bubble long enough to forget what sore feet and long nights feels like at the end of a week. . . .

[Those several hours spent standing in the ditch in Texas, battling the fire ants--oh, it seems so long ago. . . .]

The best part about my night job is that most everyone who goes there to drink works very, very, very hard for a living.

[Unlike me.]

A great many of them smoke. . . .

[I try to get up close to their clothes and take a whiff.]

and since Boston banned butts in bars. . . .

[Butts in Bars: The Ben Burch Story]

I get to spend a great deal of time talking to the customers out on the sidewalk . . .

[. . . before they run away.]

in a very weird and interesting way, I have become something of an informal pollster on the issues of the day. It is a wildly unscientific process, to be sure, given that the people I "poll" are at least partially if not fully in the bag, and that our conversations tend to last only as long as it takes them to choke a butt. . . .

[Very weird and interesting, Will. . . . *muffled laughter* ]

The short version of my "findings" boils down to this: people are pissed off and scared.

[It would help if you wouldn't talk their ears off, Will.]

They've watched their jobs, futures and family security explode like the Hindenburg . . .

[. . . while Will sails along like Balloon Boy in mid-flight.]

if the politicians who have thus far failed to get this done were on fire in front of them, they wouldn't piss on them to put them out.

[A common image for a bouncer, I guess.]

So, screw my writing, my political analysis and my cushy little no-collar perspective.

[You can do that on your own, Will.]

This is the bouncer talking. . . .

[This is the beer talking. . . .]

This push for financial regulation and reform that's about to happen had better be the real deal, had better have some big sharp teeth, and had better include putting some fat Wall Street fillet-mignon asses in prison . . .

[. . . or you'll have WILL THE BOUNCER to deal with!]

I am here to tell you, the view from the sidewalk is nothing but livid little people. . . .

[Will Pitt, Friend of the Little People.]

I'd say more, but I can't right now. My night job is expecting me.

[Hooray for the night job! . . . Now to the Pitt crew . . .]

You make it live, my dear Will...you make it live.

[DUmmie CaliforniaPeggy, Will Pitt groupie, first in line, and again with the "my dear Will." How many times do we have to tell you, CaliforniaPeggy, Will is now a MARRIED MAN!]

Such vivid, strong writing. . . .

[From such a vivid, strong MAN! . . . Stop it, CaliforniaPeggy!]

Your glimpse of this world is priceless!

[You make the street scene COME ALIVE, my dear Will! So authentic, so gritty!]

Right on, Will Pitt.

[Signed, Will Pitt]

If I could piss gasoline, I'd piss on a few.

[Now playing: Urine Man II]

Well, Pitt....my blue-collar upbringing declares this one of the best pieces you've ever written.

[Tied for first.]

That was "lyrical" to read.

[That was "laughable" to read.]

A beer right now sounds good.

[May I see some ID?]

I think The Bouncer should write a book. A manifesto.

[Das Klientèle: A Bouncer Rubs Shoulders with the Little People]

I've read all of Will Pitt's books. . . .

[So YOU'RE the one!]

I've read all of Will Pitt's books. . . .

[Was this some sort of plea-bargain deal?]

Now if we all would agree on who to piss on maybe we could get something done.

[I see benburch with his hand up. . . .]

I feel the hot breath of financial ruin just behind me.

[That's just Will belching.]

You'll always be our Roadhouse Patrick Swayze!

[You'll always be our Bukowski's Keyser Söze!]

Will Pitt throwing drunks out of a bar?

[Taste the irony!]

I wish I had the guts to write. I remember sending PMs to Will and Larissa A. several years back looking for some advice on a writing career... It was always up to me to just do it, but even necessity is seemingly not enough to break me out of my torpor.

["Torpor"--that's a good start, if you want to become The Next Will Pitt.]

So You are working in the belly of the beast in Bean Town at a 'bar' that can afford to pay for a 'bouncer' sounds real blue collar.

[In the belly of the beast, man! Effin' A! Under the thumb of THE MAN, man! The little man just ain't got no CHANCE, man! Effin' A!]

What about ol' Bump? I had a couple cold ones with him last week. He was tellin me a story about some judge up noth, stole millions out of trust accounts, never did a day in jail. Said even the governor would'nt do nuthin' about it, 'cuz the people complainin' were the wrong sort of folks. Fairbanks, I think he said the judge's name was. And the judge was playin' the stock market with the money, with one of the Wall street big boys.

[Stories from the street. Real life, man.]

His ego is the bouncer on his posts

[Hee! Hee!]

Kick for THE MAN without pants. . . .

[Pantless Will Pitt, Friend of the Angry Drinking Puking Man.]

William, bouncer or teacher, white collar, blue collar or no collar. . . .

[William Pitt, Friend of Collared People.]

I find it disingenuous and tiresome, however, when a college-educated bestselling author picks up a job among the "little people" and then reports back what he's heard and speaks on their behalf.

[William Pitt, Friend of Fraud.]