The Intelligence Estimate

I was riding the train home from a concert tonight and I was reminded of an incident at work the other day.

Let me set the scene. It is in gentle Verona where we lay our scene...and by Verona I mean the Blue Man Group ticket office. I was working will call handing out tickets to patrons. This involves checking a patron's photo ID from our bulletproof cell to make sure that they are who they claim to be. This is usually a non-event. Nothing exciting. "What's your last name? Do you have a photo ID? Sign here. Enjoy the show." DONE.

Occasionally that routine is derailed by a smart ass who wants to impress his "ladyfriend" or the odd drunk. In this case it was both. The guy steps to the window and I can smell him through the bulletproof glass. He's so drunk I'm fairly certain he thought he was at airport. The LONDON airport in 1934. And he was awaiting his autogyro. Anyway I asked him for his photo ID and he reaches into his wallet and pulls out a piece of paper.

"You see when the state of Wisconsin takes away your license for OWI they give you THIS."

It was a photocopy of his license. I gave him his tickets and he started to walk away and then remembered that he was going to ask me something.

"Where's the bar?"

Tonight's train ride home reminded me of that story because two gentlemen were discussing their court dates for various OWI violations. And they were doing it over a shared beer.