I dated a girl who lived in the low low eastside of Chinatown, and there was a VFW around the corner on Clinton Street. We would sometimes stop by on our way home and have a couple beers. Mostly men hung out there, and drank and played pool, yet there was always at least one local lady present, and usually the lady was of a commanding constitution. Everybody was very inviting and congenial, real bullshooters. And of course, slurred, guffawing jokes were made about how none of them were veterans. A guy named Randy looked after the place, and in back from behind the small bar with stools Randy served the coldest can of Bud I ever drunk. Nothing ever got out of hand, and we could smoke inside.  Most of the people were locals who had grown up in the neighborhood. Randy’s father was the patriarch of the establishment, an old Jewish Loisada stunt-man kind of a guy, and during the day he sat outside with his elder cohorts and made buzzard noises at the passersby. One night we ended up at the VFW after a long night out. There was more activity than usual, everyone was living it up. There were these Argentinian guys, my friends Gary and Eva and brother Fud and Michi, and these guys who worked for the Dept. of Sanitation. One of New York’s Strongest passed out in his chair.  After all, they haul 13,000 tons of garbage every garbage day.