Back when I was still in my teens, I went to Second City in Chicago to see the show. Afterwards we went into the bar, and because we were too young to drink legally, we had cokes. Well, the place was quite a cool hangout for beats, and poets, and writers, and jazz moguls of all kinds. I started to frequent the place just to listen to the raps and the riffs going down. One of the fairly regular patrons was the great writer, Nelson Algren. He was always after me to order a beer, but I didn't want to spoil my welcome there.

One day, though, he was sitting several bar stools down the bar from where I was walking, on my way to the john or whatever. I guess he'd had one too many and he s--l--i--d his beer all the way down to where I was. I had to grab it or it would've gone off the end of the bar! As long as I had it, I drank the rest of Mr. Algren's beer!!

The bartender looked over at him and then at me, shook his head, frustrated, turned around, and waited on some other customers. But that was the first beer someone bought me in a bar---and it was bought for me by a man who later became one of my favorite writers!!

Art Thieme