The shindig looked like the ‘60s if there had been cell phones, though in the sea of beehive hairdos I couldn’t find the party’s big kahuna, Jonathan Toubin. Alex Moyer, a tiny tattooed girl topped off with an Annette Funicello wig, was eager to help. “I can find him anywhere, he’s my boyfriend!” she said proudly. Toubin—his hair slicked back and sporting a white shirt and pink bow tie—was grinning widely as usual. “Me and you are going to have a great time tonight, this thing goes all night long,” he said theatrically.
Despite the all-night conceit, by 1 a.m., the air was thick with the need for some end-of-year-action. A mod Japanese girl with a Twiggy haircut was sliding fivedollar bills into the blue, peacock-feathered bikini bottom of Melissa-Anne the Hula Hoop Harlot, an Ann Margaret type frugging on top of the bar. The LES douche quotient was rising. A brawny jock from Houston (pronounced hew-stun) was whispering to a zaftig girl as he picked her up from the plywood floor where she had just taken a drunken tumble.
An overweight, middle-aged Cockney gent in a cowboy hat and motorcycle jacket looked calmer than his friends. He flashed a smile revealing two missing front teeth and introduced himself as Richard Windsor,an expert on all things masturbation related.
“It’s goin’ ta be a banner year for me spankin’ site,” he said. His two pals raised their pints. “Spank ‘ard and be ‘appy, is me motto.”
A tall redhead stopped twisting long enough to light a Gitane then rocked back into motion puffing away. Outside, in the 20below-freezing night air, I tried to steady my shivering hand long enough to grab a few drags of my own Marlboro. A boxy Chevy with too many passengers and no muffler came chugging up the street. A kid leaned out the window and yelled, “Happy New Year you motherfuckers!”
