I moved home after college, slept for a week straight, then returned to my summertime place of employment—a Roaring Twenties-themed restaurant called Yesterday’s Royal. I’d started out there four years ago as a lowly dishwasher, but had worked my way up through the ranks in subsequent summers from kitchen expeditor to ice cream-scooper in the old-time ice cream parlor to I.D. checker/doorman at the front door on Friday and Saturday nights, until finally getting promoted to work behind the bar itself. While my fellow graduates were busy joining the Peace Corps or jockeying for internships with Lehman Brothers in Manhattan, I was busy dedicating myself to the noble pursuit of becoming the greatest bartender that the tiny resort town of Sylvan Beach, New York had ever known.

I purchased several books on the subject of bartending, including the hardcover version of The Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide, which featured an illustration of the iconic Mr. Boston on the cover wearing his trademark top hat. I challenged myself to memorize one new cocktail each day. I’d look at the recipe for an Old Fashioned before going to bed at night, then see if I could recite the drink—two ounces of whiskey, two dashes of bitters, splash of water, teaspoon of sugar, fruit, etc.—from memory at breakfast the next morning. I also borrowed some joke books from the library, and memorized  jokes which I could entertain my customers with. (“A man is in the audience at a magic show. The magician pulls a rabbit from a hat. The man shouts, ‘Hey, buddy, how did you do that trick?’ The magician says, ‘If I tell you, sir, I’d have to kill you.’ The man says, ‘Then would you mind telling my mother-in-law?'”) Finally, I picked up a bunch of second-hand neckties from the Salvation Army and wore them to work each day.

I knew my drinks, knew a handful of sub-par jokes, and classed up the place with my 25-cent neckties, but it was obvious that I was missing the one key ingredient that every bartender needed: a warm, welcoming attitude. From the beginning of my shift to the end, I was never anything less than 110-percent surly behind the bar. If you needed a drink from me, I automatically resented you. People would whine and wave their money in my direction, trying to get my attention. I served people reluctantly, like a warden doling out bowls of gruel on a prison ship. Then I got angry when they’d finish their drinks and depart without leaving me a tip I felt I deserved. Another cheap so-and-so, I’d think, wiping up the mess they’d left behind.

A recently divorced man named Tony began stopping by the bar on Tuesday and Wednesday nights. At first, I looked forward to seeing Tony, and would even start pulling a draft for him from the tap before he’d even taken his seat. “You’re going to love this one,” I’d say, skating a coaster across the bar and setting his glass on top of it. “A man is sitting in the audience at a magic show…”

But a few weeks later, I began dreading the sight of Tony for some reason. One night I’d ducked into the walk-in to restock the Budweiser, and when I came back out, boom, Tony was sitting at the end of the bar, patiently waiting for me. “Where you been? I thought I was going to have to serve myself,” he said. “Hey, got any new jokes tonight, buddy?” I told him I didn’t have any new jokes. I don’t know what changed, or when it changed exactly, but I could barely hide my contempt for him. I kept myself busy behind the bar, straightening bottles, rinsing glasses, trying to avoid him. “Listen, when is your night off?” he called down the bar. “I was thinking, maybe you could come down to the campground, I could fix some dinner for us, and we could have some laughs together. What do you say?”

“Sure, Tony, we’ll figure something out,” I said, dunking another dirty glass into the dishwater, while thinking, That’s never going to happen. A few weeks later, Tony must have finally gotten the hint because he stopped coming around altogether.

One night I stopped at another local bar for an after-work drink. As I sucked down my Coors Light with my co-workers, I noticed Tony sitting alone at the end of the bar in front of his drink. I stood there, contemplating whether or not I should say hello to him, or maybe even sit with him for a few minutes. Before I could make up my mind, I looked up again and realized he was already gone, his trademark two-bucks-pinned-under-his-empty-beer-glass left on the bar. I never saw him again.

Let’s talk about stage 9-1. Welcome to TOWER, the final milieu in all 101 stages of Donkey Kong. Possible nicknames for today’s stage: “Two Really, Really Long Conveyer Belts,” and “Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Junior: Together for the First Time Ever.” Yes, D.K. and D.K.J. both star in today’s stage, dancing around together in the upper-tier, obviously drunk on power. D.K. jumps into the air every four or five seconds, and when he lands, he sends an earthquake-like jolt through the stage that, 1. dizzies Mario, rendering him dizzy and helpless for several seconds, and 2. causes all kinds of Mario-killing trash to fall from the top of the screen. Way to avoid being dizzied and subsequently crushed by Mario-killing sky-trash: by keeping an eye on D.K., and jumping as his ape feet are about to land. If you’re in the air when he lands, you won’t feel the impact of his jump. Meanwhile, the always-rotten (but somehow still lovable) D.K.J. is busy pushing and pulling the switch next to him which extends and retracts a bridge that seals off the upper tier of the stage, preventing Mario from reaching Pauline.

Here’s what I did to resolve this situation: starting in the lower lefthand corner of the stage, I stepped onto conveyer belt 1, moving against it like a hapless salmon trying to swim upstream. I jumped whenever D.K. was about to land, and I hustled, being careful to avoid the trash falling from the sky. Don’t linger. The longer you linger, the greater the odds are that you’ll be stuck by falling sky-trash. At the end of the conveyer belt is a rising-falling monolith. Get close enough to its path so that you trigger it—but not close enough to get squashed by it—then, once it falls, hop onto it and ride it up to conveyer belt 2.

Note the retractable barrier in front of Pauline up above you? You’ll need to get rid of that in order to complete the stage. Travel from left to right along conveyer belt 2, again doing the swimming-upstream thing, jumping when D.K. jumps, and avoiding more sky trash. Also: there’s a mummy-like creature walking towards you. Don’t worry, he’s relatively harmless. Jump over him, and continue to work your way to the left, until you reach a switch.

Pulling the switch retracts the barrier in front of Pauline. With the switch taken care of, travel back the way you came along conveyer belt 2, avoiding the mummy again, the sky trash, etc. When you reach the right side, trigger the monolith (but don’t get crushed by it), climb onto its back, and ride it up to Pauline. Sweet victory is yours. Unless, of course, the extendable-retractable bridge that D.K.J. is in control of happens to be extended. If that’s the case, you’ll need to kill a little time until D.K.J. is in the mood to pull his switch again, retracting the bridge, and allowing you and monolith safe passage to the upper-tier of the stage. Then sweet victory really will be yours. A mere seven more stages to go, folks.