Will Arnett and the Peter McManus Cafe

This from an interview with Will Arnett in Details ...

DETAILS: You're sober now. What was the turning point?

Will Arnett: Every day at 5 o'clock, I'd go to Peter McManus on 19th and 7th. It's a classic Irish bar. For six years, I was there six nights a week. In the fall of '99, I did The Mike O'Malley Show for NBC. After two episodes, it was panned and it was canceled. I took it a lot harder than I thought. I had a lot of stuff going on in my life. I'd broken up with my then-girlfriend of many years. I proceeded to spend the next six to nine months on an unprecedented run. And by run, I mean downward spiral. A friend called me up, and she said, "What are you doing?" It was almost as simple as that.

If I was his friend, I would have called him up and said "What are you doing?  You're missing all the fun at McManus."  And hopefully he would have come back into the fold.

The late 90s were an excellent time to be at McManus.  That was the beginning of the Perez/Callahan era, which was one of the golden ones.  I miss both those guys.

It sounds like they're dead.
They're not.  I spoke to Callahan a month ago.
So.
So I say "Next time I'm in town let's get together" and he says "Great" but it never happens.
Why not?
Shit happens.  Times change.  The camel shits and the caravan moves on.  

A good drinking buddy is the most fragile of things.  I'm not talking about true friends that you happen to drink with.  I'm talking about people with whom you become friends because you're drinking with them.  It's like those movies where somebody steps on a metal plate and suddenly a bomb is activated.  After that, even the slightest motion can blow everybody up.  It's a ticklish situation.

Everyone in Saigon: 2B2F is named after a regular at McManus, including Perez and Callahan.