“I wish I could’ve done that! That guy’s a menace!” the bartender said. He set a fresh bottle of ice-cold Coors Light in front of me, adding, “This one’s on me!”

I said “thanks” and smiled awkwardly, sitting alone in the corner next to the popcorn machine, whose level never noticeably changed but always seemed to be popping.

I wasn’t ashamed. I wasn’t embarrassed. I just don’t like attention and prefer not to be on anybody’s radar — especially not the guy at the door who says who stays and who goes. This is my local dive, and I really don’t want to get the boot over one minor act of violence.

When I tried to walk into the bar, he stopped me, gestured to the tall, pasty-faced crybaby in the corner, and asked, “You kick that guy in the jewels?”

My eyes followed the direction of the bouncer’s thumb. I saw Bush-man turn to avoid eye contact. “Yeah, that was me. More of a ‘self-defense kick,’ as it were. Why?”

“He said you and three other girls jumped him.”

I couldn’t not laugh. I weighed in at around a buck-twenty-five, and even with the streetlight two hundred yards out — my shadow large and scary — there is no way I looked like four girls with “jumping” capability. I did have two friends in the parking lot with me, who laughed hard enough to sound like a whole class of 17-year-olds just getting out of gym, but: “No sir. Just me.”

Some of my best stories start with, “Remember that time we got so drunk…” So yeah, I felt a brief nervous flutter. Was I really going to get kicked out of the bar? Bush-man totally started it. He escalated it. He forced my hand.

“All right, you got a problem, you come to me,” he said, trying for that authoritative tone, like he wasn’t the owner’s cousin moonlighting as a scary tough guy. I mean, really — the only thing scary about him is that if he called the cops, they’d come. I wasn’t scared, but I wasn’t stupid either.

I got through the door, sat alone at the bar. Bush-man was hiding behind the pool tables. The bartender bought me a beer, seemingly jealous of whatever he thought I’d done. I mean, it’s a small bar, so the velocity with which the story spread isn’t really a surprise — but what was it that spread? Bush-man came in… I mean, it wasn’t like an epic battle or anything, but did he come in crying? Did he announce he got bested by a girl? After hearing he exaggerated my personal volume, I can only assume that whatever else he said was also a lie.

As the kicker — and the slapper — I can tell you what actually happened, so disregard whatever you heard from Bush-man. I know it’s lies, because there were only three girls: me, the violent one; one on the ground; and the other one several feet behind me.

You go to a bar, you order some dranks, you try to have a conversation. It gets loud and hot. Sometimes we dip out to let the sweat dry. Sometimes we smoke. Whatever the three of us may — or may not — have been doing is inconsequential. We were there in front of the bar, in a dark parking lot with lovely, well-manicured boxwoods around the perimeter — I hadn’t noticed them at first, but you need the visual.

As we giggled and tittered — as girls do — a man popped out of the bushes. I bristled. I don’t know what he wanted or where he came. What man in his right mind pops out of a goddamn bush in a dark parking lot? In the habit of self-preservation — you know, staying alive and junk — I told him to beat it.

He tried to talk. I didn’t listen. I told him again to get away from us.

He persisted. He was sloppy. Maybe drunk. Maybe high. I didn’t care — my patience had run out. I reached down, pulled off one of my flip-flops, and bopped him in the forehead.

Okay, maybe I was a little buzzed, but I didn’t go for the throat or eyes. I just wanted him to go away.

I heard a thud. One of my friends had thrown her head back with laughter but miscalculated the distance to her car, hitting it with more force than I expect she intended, which naturally made her laugh harder — her feet slid out from under her and she crashed to the earth.

Meanwhile, Bush-man’s eyes fluttered in confusion and he tried to speak again.

I gave him a stern “No!” and bopped him again, harder, right between the eyes, ordering him to get away from us.

At that, friend two went into a hysterical howl several feet behind me, completely doubled over — totally useless in this “epic battle” with the drunk guy who now took steps toward me.

I told him to go away. I gave him two warning bops; he gave me no choice. I kicked him. I hadn’t put my flip-flop back on; my foot was entirely naked. No pointy toe shoes, no Docs — my barefoot.

He melted, in slow motion, crying, “Whyyyy did you kicckkk meeeee?”

So that’s it — that’s the tale of the infamous “Flip Flop Ninja” night. To the bouncer I was a menace, to the bartender a hero, to my friends… comic relief.

Fan Art from Bob after watching my Facebook blow up the day after.