at the bar 2025

What is your diet?

Didn’t mean to start this yet
Answer was supposed to be a question
I blame zing touch

The missus and I are at Newark Airport as our flight back to Minnesota was delayed 5, oh wait, 6 hours, so it looks like we're grabbing the only open bar spots at Guy's American Kitchen (maybe there's an ILX thread or 4 worth checking out!?), and grabbing the Maine Beer County Lunch IPA (what kind of name is that? Shades of "Ruth's Chris Steakhouse" or "Fifth Third Bank"), which will be our balm to distract us from the sadness of a post-midnight arrival that awaits, and the inauguration of a rapist fuckstick donning (ahem) a bad mud-mask. "16 or 20 ounce?" OK, we'll do 20. At least the Notre Dame-Ohio State game is on. Sheesh.

^

“I know you! You’re the girl from that app!”

I don't drink, but there's a bar in my town that makes really, really good burgers, so I wind up there about once a week. I was in there yesterday, half expecting it to be full of hooting drunks in MAGA gear, but it was almost empty and the few people there weren't talking politics at all.

Trying some n/as cause work tomorrow
Fun to say “Brooklyn special effects” out loud

tfw you pay with a 10 and you get change for a 20

10, 20 years ago,there were more people here my age. As I get older there are fewer

the age you were then, or the age you are now?

if the latter, I have noticed a decline in the presence of middle-aged barmen but I have no conclusions

now

you're out there keeping the faith

Cal what percentage of your income goes to alcohol

Using an after tax base, around 3 pct

If you take your hat off in the bathroom, there is a non-zero chance that it will fall in the toilet

It’s the bartender’s second day. I’m paying in cash and she’s counting pennies

Arriving when the bar opens on a weekday is a special feeling
It doesn’t hurt to have a four hour happy hour either

"Sorry We're Open" as the sign says

Now that old guy in the corner of the bar blowing his nose with three year old napkins from his coat pocket

the man that i always see there is the manager of a chain of beauty salons according to his card. discussed with the bartender old bottle crown royal and the waterloo distillery. he promised without the request to text me the next time the kyrgyz girl that stops by sometimes stopped by.

Sup dyl

Getting served with the comment “all you” vs the other bartender’s usual “here you go, player”

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3pqXLeSqTFLhr0Pa8hgrUp?si=XIHvK2n5S52KyQOd3KL39g&pi=CKoXCoLhRuy6S

Some nee additions

At an upscale place, feels weird but hey

Cute blonde waitress wearing white earmuffs

Went to a couple of mezcal bars in Mexico City last weekend, one where they burned some palo santo and the other where they played some excellent dub/experimental/post punk stuff all night with nice acoustic treatments and candles everywhere.

I was probably the least cool person at both places but had a blast. Both were packed.

despite being open only a few months, this bar has a team of regulars. but there are no other places to drink. i had this impression. the man behind the counter asks new arrivals where else they like to drink, so i know that i was not alone. people mention usually can only mention one other place nearby—a former vegan curry shop run by a former actress, which relies on her friends stopping by, cocktails dreamed up by her much younger boyfriend, and deep couches. it's too small, too insular, and too inconsistent to allow a groups of regulars to form. so we came here. i can't claim to be a regular. the beauty salon manager is here every night, but i might manage a few times a month. he never remembers me. the bartender has to remind him. my memory is better. he has a daughter in primary school and his wife won't have sex with him. he's the only one that drinks bottles of heartland. i know he's there until closing time most nights. there: i could be a bartender. i recognize other faces. they don't talk as much as the hair salon manager. i can assume they live in the neighborhood. maybe like me they get sick of staying home all day and need to leave at night. if they had real jobs, they would be drinking at a chain izakaya beside a metro station, or they would be happy to return home on a weeknight.

While sitting outside today, I’ve had two flying insects land on me. Spring is in the air

3:12

lost my headphones

bar has a public Spotify “jam” which allows customers to play songs. I got in swv’s “I’m so into you” and had DJ Sabrina the teenage dj’s “agent somebody” queued up when I received notice that I had been removed, in favor of the police’s “synchronicity II” smh

scumbags

a man is explaining to a woman the cold war

Fiddling again with the bar spotify jam. Got some little feat on

Never seen anyone yawn so intensely as this bartender while taking my order for my fourth

Spouse took me to a coffee shop/bar directly across the street from a subway stop in Vienna and the inner me was screaming that there’s no way this place could have existed in Brooklyn past the mid 00s. Right near a university and a smoking area I haven’t seen in years!

Praise be to the telepathic bartenders who know when to serve another without need for acknowledgment

i'm drunk, it was the drinks i had in front of the convenience store, not the old fashioneds

Strong zero?

it sounds a bit silly but i try to avoid strong zero because they've made me sick. of course i was probably just drinking too much. still i blame some unfamiliar artificial sweetener or whatever upsetting my stomach. i like the takara-brand canned highballs that are juiced with just a breath of artificial flavors like umeboshi shikuwasa yuzu. they cost the equivalent of 60 cents. i drank them in front of a convenience store despite having bought them in a grocery store. it seems okay to drink in front of a convenience store and not okay to drink in front of a grocery store for some reason.

I think I’ve seen mention elsewhere of people drinking outside of convenience stores. Is it a scene? Are there seats or just standing around?

i'm sure some japanese anthropologist has already written a definitive history of drinking in front of convenience stores. if not, they will. i know it's associated with suburban juvenile delinquents. in the movies, they stand out front and hassle girls and old men. but as far as i've seen, they just need somewhere to hang out and run into friends. i didn't witness any hassling when i lived way out in the countryside. a warm summer night in front of the 7-11 probably beat running up the tab at whatever family restaurant was closest. you wouldn't want to drink at home. but i got the habit when i worked at a restaurant and everyone would meet up after our shifts in front of a lawson midway between the two train stations everyone was headed to, then drink until right before the last train. it was cheaper and required less commitment than going to a bar. we had to be back in the morning for lunch prep. i guess it was a phenomenon before the pandemic, guys putting down a few beers before heading home, people just hanging out, lonely drunks that prefer the street to their dingy apartments, small parties getting lit before taking the train to somewhere more exciting. especially if you widen this to drinking in a train station square with an adjacent convenience store, it was always an acceptable practice. that's how you should drink in koenji. buy an extra beer for the punks and old hippies that show up to jam there. but i think the peculiar sorts of lockdowns in tokyo helped popularize it. i forget the rule exactly but for a while, places that sold liquor had to close early. you didn't have to go home. you could still get loaded in front of a convenience store. after that, when it got too cold, you went to a karaoke, or you found a girls bar, since they somehow weren't subject to the same restrictions. it's a lot of foreign men drinking outside of family marts in shinjuku and shibuya these days. i think there are infamous spots for that but i couldn't name them. maybe near dogenzaka or kabukicho. those guys can't squat and there's usually nowhere to sit, so they pace, maybe by the end of the night sprawl on the pavement.

Backgammon bros at the bar

Some girl at the bar next door

One bartender looks like a young female Ozzy and the other has chessboard pants

with the pieces? or just checked pants

Just the pants

i mean nevermind

i sent an email to a jazz bar in uguisudani asking if i missed the show and skipped the twenty five dollar cover how late they would be open. they said we're open until midnight. the melodica free jazz was still going. let me order the man beside me a shot since i'm already up.

Bartender is all frowns and gives me 3 in change from 10 in cash on a 6 dollar beer. I point at the menu and he says “tax.” No tip 4 u

Yesterday the manager covered the opening hours and the place filled with children. Usual bartender came in a few hours later but only lasted 15 minutes behind the bar before leaving, shaking his head on the way out

tfw the bartender returns your bic after you offered it to her to use to light the candles because the house lighter wasn’t working

Amateur musicians playing in public. StSanders live

if you're hitting it off with a woman at the bar, wait for a lull in the conversation and abruptly make ready to leave. if she doesn't protest, then you have saved yourself lots of time and frustration, and you might get home early. if she encourages you to stay a bit longer, that is a good sign, although maybe still unreliable.

^ this is good advice

I asked her, “why are you giving me change?,” and she shrugged

no, this must not be good advice.

i feel bad about entering the bar beside my house after the period when they don't charge extra to see live bands. but i don't want to see them. or at least not enough to pay the twenty dollar cover.

40-year vet digs into these lemon wedges with his fingertips to extract the seeds before squeezing

Large woman makes several chopping motions in the air

You're still there?

Remember in pulp fiction how fabinenne daydreamed about a belly?

Intended conversation en francais

Barback off work so

old man dgaf vibe

Old man complaining about how the outdoor patio isn’t open despite the bartender explaining they don’t have enough staff yet to do so.

Hello cal we are bar buddies this afternoon 👋🏻

sup boring

Retired geezer at the bar just chilling

Upstairs residence has had enough, starts banging on the floor in time to the shite songs being played downstairs

At the bar on opening friday and it’s pretty good

*closing out

Lone hero bartender serving 50 customers ends her shift and gets a round of applause

Explaining last night to my s o
At the bar I ran into this bartender from the old days

Kid taking a bottle next to me at your bar

Nevermind

When I’m around excessive cleaning happens. I must smell like a narc

The new doctor mates take me to the hinterland brewery. Turns out the beers are as good as they get. Gimme that herbal tasting pale ale again please

Field research report
These are the six songs that everyone at the back of the bar knew the words to and were singin last night
https://i.postimg.cc/5yd2bMnB/IMG-2327.jpg

Wednesday is the new Friday

https://thelongbar.substack.com/p/bring-your-own-drinks-recipe

"These things are an epidemic,” read a recent post in the r/bartenders subreddit.

The "thing" in question was a business-sized card printed with the specs for a cocktail.

... For the past few weeks, bartenders on Reddit have been reporting that these cards have been cropping up more and more. Customers come in and slide them across the bar with a knowing nod, one that says, here’s my drink, buddy. Make it nice.

oh christ, let me get my second cup of coffee before I get into this

haha I suspected you might have thoughts

Omfg my dad used to have a laminated card w his special Manhattan on it (a regular Manhattan lol). When he passed they put it in the newspaper! My husband is now the custodian of the card.

Honestly as a server I’d rather lol at someone’s card than write down all their stupid specs

Also he started using the card circa 2000 or so so hey I guess my dad was on the bar asshole vanguard 🤷🏻‍♀️

ok
I've had one presented to me on a card, early on after I started bartending, and the drink was odd enough and the bar was slow enough that I didn't mind making it. The customer (a dead ringer for Mary Steenburgen) named it after herself; she and a bored bartender had developed it together. The L0ll@r: muddle a strawberry in 1/2 oz simple syrup in a pint glass, add 1 oz. Malibu, 1 oz. vodka and 1 oz sour mix; ice up and top off with sparkling wine. So that's what she had every time she and her husband came in for the next couple of years, and it got to be a bit of a pain in the ass.

Usually a customer will wave their phone in my face, with a drink recipe called up, and I have to transcribe it real quick or take a pic of their phone with my phone. It's always a relief when I can truthfully tell them I don't have all the ingredients, as well as when I can plausibly say that even if it's not true. The other bartender where I work is a "customer-is-always-right" people pleaser so SOMEHOW those customers always wind up down at her station after they see the look on my face.

Five of the six cards in that linked article fill me with dread. Cathy Boyette's Martini actually makes a tiny bit of sense.

A couple of years ago I tried the Johnny’s Dream from one of these calling card recipes (retained and posted by the bartender) and have made it a summer staple. Hope the mild virality of that card didn’t inspire these milady-fied vodka-and-red-bull goons but

i hardly ever drink these days but i don't think i could bring myself to order a custom cocktail recipe that is more complicated than 1 spirit + 1 mixer

I am happy to work with any customer on something that will make us both happy, them happier than me because capitalism, but it has to come about through a conversation. If someone sticks a recipe in front of me, they're negating my expertise and reducing me to a drink-shaking robot, and I'm not down with that. There are several bars in my town staffed by people who don't understand the hardware and wetware they're working with, just following recipes, and I'm happy to point the way to those bars.

hell yeah

Bars are more important than ever in this day and age “with everything that’s happening,” I just heard myself think.

Buyback on the second, marone

Standing room only and that’s fine

Guy next to me explaining Burning Man a stranger

"But it used to be wayyy better..."

Explaining it to a stranger,

Not exactly. He s also praising Burner related events that occur in Michigan

He’s moved on to explaining Slam Poetry

good luck with that

Now it’s Masquerade Galas. He s kind of awesome.

Yankees , Mets , knicks , who’s complanin’

^ left out George jones!

Underworld fan club meet up for a local show, but the bartender is only playing 50s country music

Guinness martinis…smh

Underworld fan club meet up for a local show, but the bartender is only playing 50s country music

"Born Slippy (George Jones edit)"

Chica in a mini skirt and pumps doing the crossword BAU

RHCP comes on and crush down the bar starts nodding FML

I don’t usually work saturdays but worked tonight for a big graduation party. Suddenly the party’s over, I’m clocked out and sitting on the other side of the bar having a beer and watching the braves game

*

Vs Boston , watching it up north 2

A lesbian couple started a conversation with me over my library book: more people should discover this wonderful resource, etc.

the lesbians are always otm

otm

Lady talking about her ex was really into 2012 and she had to comfort him when the world didn't end. But he still went through with the Anthropology degree.

Free martini night

!!!!! How is that allowed?

Virginia’s ABC would be cuffing the bartender right now.

Well, just for the cognoscenti

reading a book at yr sports bar

It’s a 3 server , 2 ‘back night

Eschewing bars that close at midnight. Currently sitting in a bar that closes at 1am, thinking about when bars used to close at 4am.

I have a certain tolerance for bar music but when RHCP comes on, you never seen a dude put his EarPods on faster

Calstars = Nick Cave

you should put on your conehead and enjoy

Wilburys on and windows open

The bars I hold in highest regard are the ones that have a urinal with a plastic housefly next to the drain

Chica goes outside. She opens new earphones from the package, leans over into the street and vomits

One TV playing Taken starring Liam Neeson with closed captions, the other TV playing MTV Classic with the sound on

Last week I left my hat here and today manager hands it back to me. That’s the kind of respeck I command here

A bar can do without a first mate, or a coxswain, or a few nameless ghouls, but it needs a captain

Yeah, Captain Morgan!!!111!! Lolllllllllllllll

Drinking miller light and listening to Steve miller nbd bau

Two-decade spot closing soon
Getting in some last licks

I’ll be here when you vomit on the sidewalk. It’s ok

Chica singing along with the verses of “waiting for tonight”

New spot is better than it has any right to be, but it’s missing a foot rail along the bottom of the bar. I mentioned it to one of the owners

Flat bud light never tasted so good

Bro gotta hole in his ear for an earring except there’s a cigarette hanging in there

Aggressive barback

“I’ll have 27 Bud Lights please”