Everything You've Ever Wanted To Know About Taking Me Out For A Drink But Were Afraid To Ask

Identity

A restaurant bar is not a bar, it's a restaurant, albeit the portion of the restaurant that is dedicated to the most important aspect of a night out: drinking. Nothing kills the good vibes of tying one on more than being surrounded by organized groups of talkative, bubbly people focused on nutrition, aka eaters. Such venues convey the sense that drinking is something you do only to kill time before eating or an amusing novelty to be breezed through shortly thereafter and not a desirable activity in it's own right lest you bare the shameful stigma of an alcoholic - a buzz killing paradigm if there ever was one. No one who is serious about a particular endeavor wants to feel like they are an afterthought, appendage, or necessary evil parasitically hanging on to the fringes of some other core activity. I don't particularly like bars that try to serve food either. Whenever I see an eater at the bar itself, sitting on a barstool, etc. I find myself resisting the urge to hand them a map of local restaurants, places that cater to people who eat so that next time there might be more room for drinkers with whom I might share drinks. The only food that should be at a bar should be pickled and dangerous looking; heavily salted peanuts being the only exception.

Noise

The miracle of alcohol is its ability to reliably open up blocked chakras so that the inebriant can see and feel outside of the box of normal waking consciousness and consequently establish a deeper, more meaningful relationship with both himself and others. The audible volume of a drinking establishment, usually determined by the music and/or the chatter of patrons, is inversely proportional to one's ability to appreciate or utilize alcohol's finest gifts. Hence live music (with it's amplification equipment) and the concophany of crowds are often incompatible with professional medicators, such as myself, on a quest for proper medication. At the other end of the spectrum, however, is dead silence - an equally abhorrent condition that can make it almost impossible for people to open up to each other for fear of being overheard by unwitting eavesdroppers. The ideal level of background noise in a bar falls somewhere in between these two extremes, erring toward the quieter side when in doubt for it is usually easier to create more noise when needed than it is to be rid of noise once it has already established itself. Suffice it to say that if I have to shout straight into someone's ear just to tell them I love them or ask for a light then someone better be paying for my drinks and polishing my knob before the evening's end.

Service

A drinking establishment isn't worth much if you can't get served drinks. This condition is most often created by a low server to drinker ratio - forgivable but not easily tolerated. Some bars however - even "proper" bars e.g. bars that aren't catering to eaters - are simply indifferent to the desires (and, in my case, needs) of their libation craving patrons. But I'm thirsty and not concerned with the underlying causes of this condition; I'm interested only in showing people how to identify its various manifestations so that corrective measures can be made - such as changing venues. They are as follows:

A) You can't get a dust cutter (your first drink) within two or three minutes. Prompt service on the first drink, just like most first impressions, is particularly important because it establishes confidence that you'll be properly taken care of throughout the evening. Five minutes is an eternity for the sweet relief of something as simple as a cold draft ale and causes worry about drinking the first round too quickly because god knows how long it's going to take to get served the second round - maybe it will take ten minutes......or fifteen! I might as well have stayed at home where I can nurse myself with a keg and an IV drip.

B) You're standing or sitting right by the beer taps, cash in hand, and wanting only a pint of Guinness while the bartender chats up other patrons who already have their damn drinks. A socially adept bartender is a wonderful thing, but not nearly as wonderful as a fresh pint of Guinness and the company of those you may have brought with you who patiently await the return of your full attention.

And a major service faux pas that must be mentioned: A rare but extraordinarily offensive maneuver wherein the bartender tips himself out of the money you gave him for drinks. That's almost as bad as not being able to smoke.

Oxygen

I've been nearly heartbroken over pubs that were perfect in almost every regard except that breathing was consider a luxury that everyone could temporarily live without while they tied one on. Most often, and somewhat ironically, this is caused by smokers smoking their smokes. But before you brand me with the hypocrite label consider this: There are three kinds of cigarette smoke:

A) the smoke that comes from the filtered end of cigarettes

B) the smoke that drifts off the lit end

C) the smoke that's been exhaled

Guess which one the smoker is exclusively interested in breathing? That's right. Smokers aren't interested in inhaling their own second hand smoke any more than you are - perhaps more tolerant of it, but still pretty much done with the smoke once it's already been in their lungs. Which means virtually no one would complain about a smoke friendly established providing some sort of ventilation when needed. In fact, as a smoker, I'm even more reliant on whatever clean air I can get into my poor, tortured lungs in between puffs and entire cigarettes.

Alas, the less astute proprietors of some smoke friendly establishments become numb to the stagnant, noxious clouds of incinerated tobacco. A few even seem to have some bizarre, almost subconscious aversion to providing a remedy even if just opening a window or turning on a fan would suffice. A request for relief will often get you labeled as a whiner or wimp of some sort..... as if your willingness to masochistically deprive yourself of clean air were somehow a measure of your machismo and virility.

Hence a venue with alternate outdoor seating is sometimes an excellent solution but one has to be wary of a whole new class of problems that this can introduce: seating discomfort, poorer service, weather elements, less ambience, less intimacy, etc.

Value

Booze is relatively cheap, especially purchased in large commercial volumes. An establishment with lots of frills, Italian marble counter tops, gold plated goblets, located on high-priced land, and trying to feature things to make the drinks more enjoyable such as strippers, bands, DJs, etc. has to mark up the booze to cover expenses. I don't need most of this crap and some of it - as I've touched on above - just gets in the way. When I go out for drinks I'm trying to accomplish just a few very distinct things:

1) getting relaxed, then buzzed, then comfortably inebriated

2) meditating on the mysteries of life

3) having enjoyable, friendly, and inspiring conversation in the pursuit of self-knowledge and intimacy with others

4) flirting, romancing and maybe getting laid

All of this together doesn't require more than a booze stocked bar, a place to sit, someone who can make drinks and pour beer, an ashtray, a juke box, and some oxygen. Pretty damn simple. If you're feeling fancy then throw in some candles and some mirrors. Unless you're in New York City this should keep the pints of Guinness under $5.00, although I've had them recently for as little as $2.50 in a satisfactory establishment.

Accessibility

Nothing ruins a night out drinking like getting popped for OWI and spending the night in a cold cell while your disgruntled significant other scrambles to bail you out. The ideal bar is equipped with teleportation devices but until we catch up with Star Trek it's great if you're drinking right next door to where you intend on going to sleep. Although a nice long stroll toward home can be quite medicinal and even give you a second wind for additional after-hours socializing which is sometimes the most memorable part of an evening.

If walking isn't practical then sometimes a well-intended friend will offer to be the designated driver, or some such thing. My concern here is that I end up stuck in the company of a bored-looking thumb twiddler all evening who constantly appears to be getting ready to leave and who indeed is much more likely to want to leave at any given point in time since they aren't drinking! When I go to an amusement park with a friend I expect them to get on the rides with me, scream and laugh as the wind whips through our hair and our bodies get crushed into each other by centrifugal force, not stand around looking at their watch while I go whizzing by on Satan's Triple Loop Thunderbolt Revenge. Just fuckin' go home and I'll hitch a ride back with someone that wants to be here.

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So let's review. The ultimate waste of time would be to invite me to clank beer mugs together with you in a loud, crowded, remote, needlessly expensive, non-smoking, food serving bar full of "eaters" attached to a restaurant with only one indifferent, chatty, tip stealing bartender assigned to handle everyone's orders, strippers trying to hit me up for a lap dance, and the only thing anyone wants to discuss is sports and cars. You might as well ask me if I'd like to have my teeth pulled out with a rusty pair of pliers. 

At the other end of the spectrum would be a quaint, moderately populated, smoke friendly, well ventilated pub right next door to my sleeping quarters with nothing to eat but salty, pickled turkey guts and hard boiled eggs floating around in dusty vats of vinegar, well regulated juke music, and $3.00 pints of Guinness brought expediently by one or two happy, service oriented bartenders to either my bar stool or my candle-lit nook where strangers openly discuss the pressing issues of our times and wax philosophical about everything under the sun and, if I happen to be single, invite me to have copious amounts of sex with their women.  

Cheers.