Let’s all play the silent game

I’ve always been interested in those theme-based bar crawls.  Organized events where dozens of dudes and ladies meet up  in a particular part of town, everyone dressed in a common costume, and parade from pub to pub, laughing, drinking, and generally engaging in good-hearted misbehavior.  Some local examples would be the Santa Pub Crawl, PiratePalooza, and Bar Golf.  I’ve always been interested in them, yet I’ve never participated.   Maybe because I’m too unmotivated to go track down the requisite costume, but more likely because my crippling narcissism prevents me from supporting someone else’s good idea when I could rather be organizing my own.  Course, I never have organized a themed bar crawl, nor will I likely ever do so, as it requires much more effort and promotional talent than I’ll ever possess to successfully pull one of these off.  And I’m pretty sure that if I were going to organize a bar crawl, it would consist of my emailing three or four of my friends at best,  and we’d probably spend the entire night at the first bar where we met up, our unworn costumes piled up on the empty stool next to us.

But, if I were ever to put one of these fine events to fruition, I think I’ve got a pretty good concept for what it would be.  It’s a bar crawl based on an old idea that my buddy Thane and I came up with, where we were going to dress up as mimes and sit at a bar all night, silent.

We’ll call this event the… um… the Atlanta Mime Wave…. because it kind of sounds like crime wave, a little societal element we Atlanta folks are all too familiar with… and because I’m tired and am a bit too preoccupied with this glass of stout to come up with anything clever.

Anyway, the rules would be simple.  All attendees would show up to a bar in full-blown mime garb – white faces, tight black and white striped shirts, black pants, and awesome berets.  As good excuse as any to purchase that beret we’ve all been eyeing in the window of our respective local beret stores, am I right?  So yeah, we’d meet up at the bar, and no one would say a damn word.  This group of 20 to 30 mimes would be absolutely silent.  You ever tried drinking heavily without talking?  I have.  It’s called drinking alone.  Which can be a wonderful pub crawl experience in itself, but I digress.   So we’d all stand there in the bar in our white face-paint and striped tees, drinking in silence, ordering drinks by scribbling our orders on a cocktail napkin and holding it up to the bartender, preferably while pursing our lips and widening our eyes – mime face – while pointing dramatically to the contents on the napkin with our white gloved fingers.

And we would spend the night like this.  How long do you think you could go without speaking?  Especially when the drinks start flowing upwards to your eyes and you spot that pretty mime leaning against the bar, sipping on a mojito, and memories of that beautiful goth girl in the Bauhaus shirt from 9th grade Home Ec. flood your senses and you decide that you’re not going to freeze up this time… no way, man… tonight you’re gonna talk to her, and if you’ve got to lie and say you’ve always thought Siouxsie and the Banshees were underrated, well so be it…

But, here’s the fun part.  As soon as you speak, as soon as you say one word – be it striking up small talk with the mime girl, calling out for the bartender, even saying “excuse me” when you squeeze past a group of strangers because you’re timid – as soon as you speak a single syllable, you’re out.   You’re banished from the group. You must exit the bar immediately.

At this point, you’re left with two choices.  You can head home in shame, or you can saunter over to another nearby bar, and bank on the probability that another failed mime will show up to join you.  Sooner or later, if you’re lucky, you’ll have amassed a group of mimes who’ve all breached their vow of silence.  And you can enjoy the rest of the night laughing and telling tales and just having a good ole’ time, albeit in a beret.   But… and here’s where it gets awesome… if the rest of the clan can keep up with their commitment, drinking in silence, well, you might just find yourself sitting alone in a bar.  A solitary, drunk, failure of a mime.  Banished from your own people, ostracized by all the others, you are totally, completely alone. An outsider.  And you are drunk.  And you dressed as a mime.  And all the while a group of mimes drinks happily, silently, in the bar next door.

I don’t know about you, but if I saw a sad mime drinking alone at a bar, I’d be stoked.  I wouldn’t buy him a beer or anything, and I’d probably point at him and mock him and throw crumpled napkins at him, but I’d be stoked.

So, what do you think?  Sound fun?  Simply, you dress up as a mime and drink in silence with other mimes, and if you slip up and speak… well, my friend, you’re on your own.

I think I’m pretty pumped on this idea.  I’m ready to get this thing moving, ready to take Mime Wave to prime time!

But I won’t.

Damn.  This coulda been fun.   Oh well.

So, while we’re at it, you got any ideas for a good themed bar crawl?  Let’s hear ‘em!