After college I spent a few weeks working a crappy restaurant job in New York, in one of those places that reeks of failure: you know the whole enterprise is going to collapse soon, it's futile, and the owners and investors and managers know it, too, so they hover over you unhappily, and yell at you if you put more than an ounce and a half of liquor in a shot class.
There it is- the balance that is always struck in your stories- between humility and recklessness and all of it with perfect pitch.
Don't be fooled: it's just another way of boasting while pretending that you're not.
✅
Damn charming, as always.