Last night, 25-year-old Brittany Patton shocked and impressed her colleagues by successfully ordering a drink at a bar after only seven attempts.
Patton and four co-workers went to Spitzer’s on the Lower East Side after work. While the two men in the group treated the fivesome to the first three rounds of beer, the men soon called it a night and headed out.
“As soon as I realized there wasn’t a guy to buy our drinks, I decided I had drank enough,” said friend Liz Cortez. “I just didn’t have the courage.”
The women started getting ready to leave, and Patton suddenly had a realization.
“I thought, ‘You know what? I can do this! I can order us drinks!’” she recounted.
Patton started out by pointing her finger toward the ceiling and slightly jutting her chin out while trying to make eye contact with the bartender. When that didn’t work, she tried waving her arms back and forth, which the bartender failed to see through a bustling crowd of 6-8 people.
She then attempted jumping up and down, and throwing a tiny red straw at the bartender.
Just as she was about to give up, Patton tried attempt number five: she stared the bartender down and recited her order, while also giving the universal symbol for choking.
Unfortunately, the bartender was talking with a regular customer named Dan.
After a moment Patton raised her voice as loud as she could, and yelled: “Excuse me, one Goose Island IPA, please.”
At that point, the bartender was noted as wiping down the counter. Patton briskly pushed her way through the small throng, smacked her credit card on the counter, and spoke her beer order directly into the bartender’s eyes.
“I said, ‘One Goose Island IPA, please,’ with all the strength I could muster – although I’m pretty sure my voice cracked and came out quieter than I meant for it to,” Patton said.
Against all odds, Patton eventually emerged from the crowd triumphant, drink in hand.
“It was incredible,” Menard said. “Liz and I didn’t think she could do it.”
“Even though we were celebrating, I regretted not asking her to get drinks for June and I too,” said Cortez. “But I didn’t want to ask her to go back in there. She was heroic enough for one day.”
Patton ordering a drink after only seven tries is truly a triumph for women everywhere.
“I feel more confident now, like maybe next time I could do it in just 4 or 5 tries,” Patton said. “But hopefully next time they’ll get my order right. I really don’t like white wine.”
