late night bar etiquette - taking a pass

Imagine yourself lined up at a busy bar, you've been waiting a few minutes which has given you a chance to notice the bartenders working hard and fast behind the bar in hopes of serving everyone all the alcohol they could ever want.  You notice that the person to your right has been waiting just a few moments longer than you.

Now, you consider yourself to be polite, you don't butt in line, you hold doors open for old ladies.  That's nice.  But when the bartender turns to you, nearly frantic with the movement of multiple orders swirling in his/her brain, ready to take your order, DO NOT offer your turn to the person to your right.  Unless of course you aren't ready to order or intend to wait for your next turn, which could fall somewhere after everyone else already waiting at the bar.

You see, giving your turn to someone else is nice, but it DOES NOT mean that you will then in turn be served next.  The time it takes for you to pass your turn to someone else is the time it could have taken you to say "coorslight bottle" at which point the bartender would turn to the next person anyway for a multiple order.  You don't know if the next person is going to order a round of shooters for the whole bar along with a couple of pints for his friends and a cocktail for the pretty thing at the other end of the bar.  You have essentially made yourself wait quite a long time.

And don't go mentioning to the bartender that you were next.  We have a loose idea of who is next, it is at our discretion and though it may not be 100% accurate, we are the booze gods so what we decide is pretty much the law of the universe as far as alcohol consumption goes.