Ghouls & Goblins:

Hospitality is about taking care of the guest. Extra lemon? Sure. Substitute one brand of vodka for another? No problem. Refill those free bar snacks (for the fifth time) because you’re too cheap to buy food off the menu? OK. Bartenders smile at you, chuckle at your tired jokes, provide a sympathetic ear to your problems and serve you booze. It’s the cheapest therapy around. Most of the time, it’s a win-win because bartenders are a friendly lot, and guests’ tips keep them housed and fed. However, every once in a while, an otherwise average-seeming bar guest shape-shifts into a power-wielding, horror story monster who makes a bartender’s blood curdle and sends chills down her spine.

Skeletor

It's no secret that cocktails are loaded with empty calories. And sugar. Loads of it. This gaunt ghoul bellies up to a bar, waving a bony finger in the bartender's face, and asks to eliminate every ingredient in a specialty cocktail, unaware that the "skinny drink" they describe in painstaking detail basically translates to "water with a side of lemon."

Creature From the Black Lagoon

The kinda creepy guy who slithers up to a barstool, with his shifty gaze, giving heebie-jeebies to nearly every warm-blooded human sitting nearby. This somewhat sullen, often black-clad, sunglasses-at-night sort of character may be innocently having a whiskey (or four) before heading home. Or he may be there to suck your brains out through your earhole at the end of the shift. Who's to say?

Wicked Witch of the West

This high-maintenance pain in the ass is recognized by her piercing cackle and name-drops that the bar manager is her best friend (even though that person moved on to another bar weeks ago). She insists that she's a VIP, which translates to wanting free drinks, and sneers at your best efforts to make her feel like the princess she believes herself to be. She sends back perfectly acceptable cocktails, moves tables a few times, and leaves a shitty tip…that is, if she doesn't complain about her experience just to get a few things taken off the bill at the end of the night. And then she skips the tip entirely.

Joker

He's loud. He wears brands like Ed Hardy or has on more bling than a high-end hooker. He considers himself the life of the party and is probably rolling with the Wicked Witch of the West and Skeletor, rolled into one female version of himself. He's bragging about his experience in film/music/nightclubs in "insert obnoxious city here." He orders the most expensive scotch or tequila, because he doesn't know anything about spirits but hopes everyone will be impressed when the bottle comes off the back shelf. And, yeah, he's a shitty tipper, too.

Chuckee

Any kid in a bar. The only things worse than kids in a bar are the parents who bring them there, expecting everyone to adjust their adult time to their kids' needs. Chuckee usually wants some time-consuming, non-alcoholic beverage like a hot chocolate, which is most often made somewhere in the back kitchen, forcing the bartender to leave his station and scurry back and forth according to the kid's whims. Leave Chuckee with the baby sitter, and have a real adult night out. Happy Halloween!

Santa Fe Reporter