Rolling in the Deep: A night in the valley

In 1994, one of the most devastating earthquakes to ever strike southern California hit the small San Fernando Valley town of Northridge. It caused 20 billion dollars worth of damage and killed about 60 people. But that's not the whole story, just what Wikipedia wants you to know. Anyone that has seen the classic film Piranha 3d knows that earthquakes (underwater or otherwise) also release ancient monsters from the middle of the earth, as that is the only way to describe the type of people that you will find at the bar Dublins on a Thursday night in the valley.

But let's step back a bit...why did I find myself here at 11pm on a Thursday?

I mean is this really LA? I haven't seen that many American flags in 2 years as I did last night at the Cowboy palace. They have a fucking horse post in case people ride there. And that confederate flag? Was California even invented at the time of the Confederate States of America?

Well last night wasn't a typical LA night for me, I went to the valley...deep valley.

First things first, the valley is like Fishers, IN. Like Fishers there are the nice parts like Geist and a few of the golf courses but most of it is just shitty flat farmland with some aluminum siding track homes. So I head out to Granada Hills (Geist-y Fishers) to meet some friends for dinner at the Yard House, a nice restaurant attached to a mall. Indianapolis as fuck, it was like going to Champps at the Fashion Mall, suburbia at it's finest. However, after several yards of beer (the 3 foot glass thing) we decided to make it a scummy Northridge night as I demanded to see the bars my buddies went to in high school and college.

Things started innocent enough at some divey karaoke bar. Apparently it was the "place to be before the latinos took over" which is fine. This is the California equivalent of a midwest bar "getting a little too hood" which is just the pc way of saying black people took it over, it's ok, it's not racist, we're just having an honest conversation right now. The bar was dead so I quickly destroyed my friends at foosball, blew everyone's mind with a stirring rendition of "Basket Case" and took off.

Seeing that I was categorically unimpressed my buddies decided to take me across the street to the Cowboy Palace, pictured above. Now remember, I live in Los Angeles, the land of gays and movie stars doing cocaine in their VIP lounges. Imagine my shock when I walk in to see cowboy hats and line dancing. This bar was literally adorned with old hand bills for Alan Jackson concerts and white washed jeans. I even had a Coors original (the banquet beer! Neumann's favorite!) I watched some middle aged women eat peanuts and dance to the country western band, and even considered making a pass at the 2 cute Jappy girls sitting at the bar. "What in the fuck are you doing here?" That was literally going to be my pick up line. Perhaps they lived down the street, I guess not every cute Jewish girl in stretch pants is rich and from Beverly Hills. 

4 games of pool, 17 Garth Brooks songs and a handful of heavy beers later it was time to get super grimey. Time to go to a CSUN bar. Time to go to Dublins.

Now let me try to describe the typical student that goes to California State University Northridge. In the state of Indiana if you are normal you go to Indiana. If you are normal and kind of a loser you go to Purdue. Overachievers go to Notre Dame or out east. The kinda dumb kids go to Ball State (even tho its kinda a good school) and the fucking morons go to IUPUI. California is a bit different in the fact that 10 million people want to go to UCLA and only like 2% of the population can afford USC. So the average middle class folk end up going really random places. A lot go to one of the 3 San Diego colleges, some go up north, some go to ASU, some go to the Big Ten and I'm assuming the kids that got C's at their public school in Tarzana end up going to CSUN...that and every single illegal Mexican child trying to get that elusive college degree that puts you on that "real path to citizenship."

Honestly, it's like that hole that was dug in season 3 of Weeds that went to Mexico and the other end came up in the dressing room of Nancy's clothing shop. That hole is real. But it comes up in the bathroom of a bar called Dublins in Northridge, CA.

But it sounded like a GREAT idea at the time, go hit on all the senoritas at Dublins. My first immediate impression when I entered the bar was that it is fucking uncanny how much latinas love Pitbull. That motherfucker was on repeat all night. I got to the dance floor and there were 40 spicy Mexican chicks droppin dat ass over that new joint that samples "Take On Me" just sweating without apology. I don't know if any of you have ventured to a dance club with this kind of clientele but it is a full contact sport. I couldn't even order a drink without some pudgy little hispanic girl grinding on my thigh.

Eventually I was able to spot my intended target. 3 white girls that looked to have particularly low self esteem hanging out in the corner of the dance floor. I approached doing some of my patented dance moves and quickly won them over, but then the most incredible thing that I have ever seen happened.

During the song "I make it rain on them hoes" some Mexican dude through 20 singles in the air, hence making it rain. What happened next was indescribable. The bar melted into pure chaos as everyone on the dance floor started diving for the dollar bills like they were trying to catch a falling baby. Women screaming and punching, scrambling for one elusive dollar bill on the floor. Hair pulling, slapping, scratching. One guy broke a bottle over another dude's head to try to get a handful of crumpled ones.

I couldn't fucking believe it. A bounced blew past me muttering "not this again" as if the making it rain and scrambling for the mud and beer soaked dollar bills is a nightly occurrence. I felt ashamed just watching it. I would like to think if I was a stripper I wouldn't pick up a dollar bill if it was crumpled up and thrown at me, let alone dive on the floor at a bar where people can see and judge you.

A few minutes after the chaos the dj made an announcement asking people to please refrain from making it rain for the remainder of the evening. But in the madness I had lost my white girls. Dammit. By the time I rediscovered them I knew I was fucked. The only threat to a tall confident white guy trying to pick up white chicks at a bar is a swaggy black guy. No shame those dudes. They just sneak up behind the unsuspecting coeds and start rubbing that dick on their ass and to not appear racist the white girls have to just fucking deal with it.

It's funny, the Mexicans want to hook up with other Mexicans. The white dudes and black dudes want to hook up with white girls. So that usually leads to me losing out to a guy in a flat bill Bulls hat but then dancing with the Nikki Minaj wannabe sistas in the corner.

It's always a fucking blast.

So we drove back to our buddies house (driving intoxicated is SO valley) got some McDonald's drive thru, hit a bong and went to bed. Suburbia at its finest.

And that's what it's like to grow up and live in the valley. Sure you get a little bit more land for your money, the public schools aren't abysmal. But I gotta say, I think I would rather just suck it up and pay the 40k a year to send my kid to a private school so I can live in LA. That or tell my kid to just sack up and join the gang with the cool kids at Venice High.

Oh who am I kidding there won't be minorities left in Venice by the time I have kids?

Gentrification for the win.