Type: Denny’s/Lounge
Class: Midscale

This high end steak place is located in the Bank of America building. Climbing the escalators and walking by the large courtyard gave it much more exclusive feel. This way it was protected from traffic and made a little more cozy.

Ruth’s is a very large establishment done up in dark woods, polished bronze, and comfortable lounge with large leather chairs, and giant impressionist paintings on the wall. The short bar had high chairs with backs and small bronze customer appreciation plaques built into the bar top.

Our $4.75 + tax drink was decent and our bartender was cute and friendly. Jason almost got Stacy to comp us our drinks, but at the end there was no free booze. She was in favor of a liquid diet and how could we disagree. Soft vocal jazz played in the background which is perfect for clientele but did nothing for me.

I liked the place, but there are much better in the area. I give them a flat 3 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Average

This small seafood restaurant in the ID should be avoided for drinks at all costs. It is small, dull, and unappealing. Row upon row of tables line the small eating area and a small banquet room sat unused upstairs. The only interesting piece of the entire place were interesting art pieces of paper overlay with Chinese imagery.

The $5 drinks were tall and weak. The service was slow and standoffish. The drinks came with the tiniest straws ever. I think they were meant to be coffee stirrers.

The only entertainment in the place came from this pair of women who sat down behind me. I wasn’t really listening to their conversation, but this large, bottle red head was just dumb. She was bewildered and confused by everything on the menu. The waiter was subjected to question after question about the food. The questions were not insightful or even particularly curious. They were just dumb. I wish I could give you an accurate quote from her, but all Jason and I could talk about when we got out of there was how inane she sounded. So take this as a recommendation: If you don’t understand the menu, ask a couple of questions to get a feel for what you might like and they just try it. I can understand if you have some very specific dietary concerns, but please, don’t be a dolt.

I give the Sea Garden 1 Martini Glass out of 5. That is how bad the drinks and atmosphere were. Especially when it is compared to all of the great places within but a block of the place (like Sun Ya Village.)

-wOOt

Type: Nightspot
Class: Average

This “private club” is Seattle’s premier goth/industrial club. Of course, by premier I really mean, just about only. Sure, the Vogue has goth/industrial nights but it is not really a goth club. My friends love this place and go here often. I used to go semi-regularly and still have my membership (not that I remembered it the night I went.) I just told them that I forgot my card, paid the $5, and went in.

Located down a small alley it is marked by a blue light, and strangely, a TV. This is new. This alley is often packed in the summer when it is really hot, but today it was totally empty. The Merc is average sized with a medium dance floor, a bunch of various types of seating and a small side room with a purple felt pool table. Whether you like the music or not, this is a great place to come and people watch. It is full of all types of freaks, losers, posers, wannabes, holier than thous, and even some regular people. There are all types of women in corsets, guys with capes, numerous pairs of leather or PVC pants, more velvet than a Jo-Anne Fabrics, metal studs, industrial leather, and more pairs of combat boots than a Marine platoon. Only here will you see a woman wearing a corset, velvet and combat boots.

Besides the people watching, the Merc is known for their drinks. They are tall and strong and incredibly tasty. The two favorites are the Vampire’s Kiss and the Neon Freeze. While they are priced at $7 or $8 and a couple of them will knock you on your ass. The Vampire’s Kiss is a deep husky red and the Neon Freeze is a luminescent blue green that glows under the dark light. Make sure you bring cash though because they don’t accept check or cards. Their well drinks are good too, mixed nice and strong and priced at $3.

I really do like the Merc, even though I don’t go there much anymore. It becomes tiresome after a while, but when I need my goth/industrial fix, this really is the best place to go. I give it 4 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

El Gaucho is a film noir wet dream. A place where life does not intrude and if you let it, everything becomes perfect. Put away your natural Seattleite desire to be casual and dress in your black suit or your little cocktail dress. Fling open the doors and let the ambience wash over you. Breath in the high life and let yourself be pampered. Imagine, even if for just an evening, that money does not matter and that everything and everyone is there to serve you. For here it truly is.

While this does not specifically relate to the quest, it does involve one of our favorite sponsors and one of our favorite places. A group of us went to El Gaucho for Wolf’s Birthday. The group was Wolf, Jason, Jeff, Sean, Jesse, Ryan, and I. If you can afford it the money you spend at El Gaucho will be some of the most memorable money you ever spend.

It began in the cigar lounge. The University of Washington (WU) and Washington State University (WSU) game was playing on the TV. I must admit that I am not 100% that it was this game, but the game was definitely important to a lot of people. As we sat in large comfortable leather chairs, sipping drinks and smoking, staff member after staff member would pop in to check out the game. Our servers were incredibly on the ball and had lit my cigarette before I could fish my lighter out of my pocket.

While we waited for Jesse, a server came in and asked if we would like the 410 room. This is a private dining room that seats 8 and also doubles as their upstairs wine “cellar.” It was like they could see us coming and knew we should not be on the floor. We just had that feel about us and to be honest, it made me feel notorious. I love private rooms. I had to sit with my back mostly to the door and after watching too much Sopranos, it made me nervous.

We began with a wine selection. The wine guy’s knowledge was just frightening. I told him what I liked and he picked a bottle that was just incredible. I always wondered what a $60 bottle of wine tasted like. Being a guy who likes a good $8 bottle of wine the differences were staggering. Jason ordered a sweet white German wine (it is something like a herzegemeiner, but I know my spelling is totally off.)

Then the appetizers began. Jesse and Wolf ordered Caesar Salad. I am so happy that they did. The staff came in with a cart and made the salad fresh. The presentation was amazing. They tossed the salad and added the ingredients with such flair and expertise that we just sat there and stared. There were some other appetizers that were good, but without the presentation, they just didn’t live up. The bread was excellent, as was their blended butter.

The highlight of the main course was Jesse’s Flaming Sword of lamb. The staff brings out a sword with skewers of lamb and vegetables. He then proceeded to use liquid fire to cook the thing as we watched. He poured it on setting the sword aflame and then would drain it into a small dish the size and shape of a gravy boat. He did this several times. I was so awed by the procedure that I completely forgot to take a picture of it.

At one point we needed a question answered. I forget what it was. Knowing how efficient the staff was I just talked about it loudly knowing that someone was listening and that they would answer it. Low and behold, less than a minute later a server had answered the question. Now that is service.

Everyone was finished eating except for Jeff and I. There were still tidbits of food on the table, some on our plates and some on others peoples. Bits of lamp, tenderloin, lobster, or bread were around for the taking. Jeff and I refused to be done until it was taken care of. The concept of letting any of the succulents go to waste was just too much for either of us to take. Eventually we were done and it was time for dessert.

Jason ordered the chocolate cake (from heaven) and Jesse and I ordered the Cherries Jubilee. Since it was a flambé dessert I knew that we were in for another performance. I was right and it was almost as impressive as the flaming sword. With a large copper dish and more liquid fire the waiter performed for our entertainment. Next time I come here I will be ordering Caesar Salad, a flaming sword, and a flambé dessert. What a floor show it will be.

Finally we were all satiated. Jeff ordered some cognac and smoked his cigar. He did a small performance for us by blowing smoke into the cognac snifter (like in Gattaca). The combination of smoke and cognac was tasty as well as beautiful. It was the perfect ender to the perfect evening. While I admit that the bill was, ahem, large, it was not as bad as we were expecting. Our tip alone was more than a family of four will spend at Outback steak house. I am impressed that they did not even tack on the standard 18% for large groups that lower class establishments do. They know that they would be just short shrifting their servers.

I can not stress enough that this was probably the most amazing meal that I have ever had. Jason and I retired to the lounge so that I could finish my coffee. There we listened to the piano player who plays in front of a portrait of himself playing the piano. Jason then waxed poetic. “Imagine that you did not exist before dinner. Picture it in your mind. Now imagine your whole life was like that. That’s what it’s like to be rich.” I admit that I do not really believe that being rich solves all of life’s problems, but it sure seems easier to live well when you don’t have to worry about money.

A night like this makes me feel bigger than I am. I realize that life can be truly beautiful and that it really is about the moments of amazing that make the day to day humdrum bearable. If every moment were as perfect as tonight, in would become mundane and I just could not accept that. So maybe, to be rich is to make the perfect mundane. That would be a curse that I just could not accept.

-wOOt

Type: Lounge
Class: Average

It was time for some more Dim Sum and that meant finding a place that we had not drank at yet. About the only one left was the Four Seas. I have never eaten here before, but Jason had. His last experience was not a great one, so my hopes were not high.

The restaurant is large and decorated simply. Large tiles in the entry way turn into worn red carpeting. Tables are simple just like every other dim sum restaurant in the area. There is a large slightly dirty fish tank and your standard smattering of Chinese décor. The food was decent and our service at the beginning was excellent. By then end though, it was like we did not exist.

Wolf picked up our very strong and flavorless drinks. The lounge was closed, but we were able to wave down our hostess and she took care of us. The group was fairly large and included: Jason, Wolf, Sean, Trevor, myself and eventually Missy, Dave, and a friend of Missys. I know there were more people there, but for the life of me I can’t remember who. I hate it when this happens. A guy who reads the website was supposed to meet up with us, but he never showed. He sent me an email a couple of days later saying that he got there and hour and forty five minutes late. An hour and forty five minutes? Now that is some organization. I was hoping to meet another reader and hopefully he will be more punctual the next time he wants to come out with us.

All in all, it was fine and the drinks were typical for a Chinese food place. I give them 2 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Hotel
Class: Upscale

This classic hotel in downtown Seattle has the feel of a great New York hotel. The décor is high class, the staff uniform is clean and crisp and the service is friendly and efficient. Marble and paisley are the designs of the age, each of a brown and gold color. Fake trees filled the empty corners and flowered drapes framed the street outside.

Our bartender was friendly and chatty about the weather. He poured a decent drink, but it is a hotel bar so it was priced at $5.00 The atmosphere was comfortable and Jason, Trevor, and I chatted lightly about Dim sum and whatnot.

While it was nice and comfortable, there is not a lot that would draw a person of my age and class back to it. The “crowd” was older and they were having a basic lunch over the high priced menu. I give Oliver’s Lounge a basic, simple, 3 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

I think it's a stretch to call this place a restaurant, although there is one there. It was closed by the time we arrived, closed and enclosed in a chain link fence. In the hall to the bar, there was a stamp machine, and notices about which bills could be paid there. I don't know why, but so be it. There were also signs, very much present in the bar itself as well, that the bartender apparently "wouldn't sell drugs in your house, so you shouldn't sell drugs" in his bar. This must be quite the problem, since there were probably about ten of these in the little hall area, a place you could really picture drug deals occurring in, and in the very crowded bar.

Brandon and I were the only white people there other than the bartender, and I was kind of glad we had Sean along, as a sort of passport. There were a few Hispanic guys, but mostly it was an all black crowd, and while by and large they seemed very mellow, the drug selling message looked appropriate for enough of them to make me a little uncomfortable. The bar was also completely packed, with no seats, very little standing room, and a very nice older woman who was carding people for the bartender.

We got our drinks, lingered a moment by the door drinking them and watching the replay of an old boxing match and then pretty much hurried out. It was seedy, craptacular and not the sort of place I would wander into alone, or with a woman. Not that there weren't women there; actually there were quite a number. But it's really that seedy.

It takes the title from Joe's, I think.

Anyway, they're moving in a bit to the Olympic Broiler space, so pretty much I wouldn't give them a good review at all in any case, but as it is, it's not a stretch to say they were awful.

The drinks were okay, but that's about the best thing I can say for the place.

Sadly, we gave the sponsorship to Glen. Sorry, Glen.

A very classy French restaurant in the Market, it was quite the contrast after the Turf. We sat in the upstair bar area, and were served with no great speed by a very busy waiter who was working the whole upstairs as near as I could tell. Really, we were in no rush, so it was alright, but slow service in general gets noted, so I mention it.

The waiter then was given reason to hate me when I ordered an item off the French menu by pointing, he said something confirmatory which I thought was something else, and of course I ended up with the wrong appetizer. So I told him, he gave me the look and said he had confirmed my order, but it was no trouble, but he had indeed confirmed it. This is the very standard, the customer is always right, but he's wrong, and I hate him, speech, which I've given to people hundreds of times. And he was fully justified in using it. But neither of us was wrong, so what can I say?

Anyway, the drinks weren't great, but they didn't suck either. The appetizer needed more bread, but was very tasty. The prices were kind of high. It was very nice looking, with a view over the sound (and the viaduct, but who cares, it was lovely).

Still, I woulnd't go back or anything. Nice, but not thrilling.

Glen got the sponsorship.

Wolf, Brandon, Sean and I were going out for a couple drinks, and we ended up at this fine establishment. By fine, I really mean in this case huge and trashy.

It was really, really large. There were massive spaces that weren't used for anything more than storage as near as I could tell. The bar, which was about half the area, was set up as if it were a bingo hall, and not that small a one, either, but that was still just the start of the massive bar area. There was a further section curtained off that was almost as big, and which featured a stage (they have bands, once not so long ago including the rather crazy but kind of fun Octabytes.) Other than this, the restaurant seating was pretty big, and there was a whole seperate seating area that looked as if it had been abandoned, almost like in some sort of decent place, they'd turn it into a banquet room. But not at such a classy place as Fiesta Mexicana.

The music in the bar was loud, but not loud enough to cover the argument that was breaking out between two of the four other customers in the massive space. It was a kind of fat girl with big hair against a slightly fatter girl with better hair. One had been drinking a lot, the other a little. And eventually, in our first bar fight, the bad hair girl slapped at the other girl a couple of times before being dragged off by a big Mexican guy who worked there, and had trouble getting the violent one away. In fact, he could just barely manage it, and failed to stop her from rolling down her rather tight sweat pants and showing the full moon to her rival and at least two of the unfortunates at our table. Me, I turned away before it was fully developed, but it was a very close thing. She was eventually hauled out into the night by two employees, and all was once again quiet and crappy in the bar.

We got out check and left promptly, needless to say.

Wolf decided it was so trashy he couldn't pick up a sponsorship here, so we gave it Glen. Poor bastard, across the country and we keep hitting you with the iffy ones. But you've got lots of good ones, too, so I don't feel awful.

We needed a second bar, and La Palma had long enticed us with their cocktails sign, so we stopped in. Sadly, their bar was not really there, and we just ended up with a table, having a drink. I also got a taco, which was pretty tasty.

The drinks were fine, but nothing impressive.

It was only when a bunch of guys looking oddly like the faux boy band De Jour arrived that our stay was complete. Nothing like a bad parody of a bad parody coming into your bar and ordering to Coronas to send you fleeing.

Which we did.

Wolf got the sponsorship, since nothing as awful as a big girl cat fight happened.

Type: Lounge
Class: Midscale

This waterfront restaurant lies at the end of a pier and is totally packed during the high season. Tonight though, it was a weekday in the winter and the lack of crowd reflected that. It is becoming harder and harder to find an interesting place drink. Each place becomes further flung a field, harder to find, less likely to be interesting.

The Fisherman’s Restaurant is not a drinking destination, but it is a nice place to take your family for some midpriced, non-chain, seafood on the waterfront. There is a small arcade with a Merry-go-round one door down and a bunch of tourist shops in the same mall.

Dark wood and semi-tacky fisherman themed knickknacks line most of the available wall space. A large wooden Seaman with a yellow rain slicker stands by the front door to greet each passenger as they come in. We were greeted by Kevin who doubled as host and bartender on these slow evenings. According to his card he is the manager of the Fisherman’s Restaurant. Kevin was friendly and chatty and helped to solve the problem of the other restaurant in this mall. I forget its name, but it was not open and we were concerned that we would need to come back. Fortunately, it is only used as banquet space now so we can mark it off of our list.

There is a small TV lounge off to the side as well as deck seating for when the weather is nice. Kevin mentioned that during the summer they have a Blues and Jazz Gazebo. I’ve never seen a Gazebo play a musical instrument, but maybe I will be pleasantly surprise. Glen picked up these $4.75 + tax drinks so thanks Glen.

I enjoyed my time at the Fisherman’s Restaurant and hope the high season comes sooner than normal for them. I give them 3 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Denny’s
Class: Average

This chain restaurant is known for putting paper down on your table and then pouring a bucket of what you ordered onto the table. This is usually something like vegetables and seafood (i.e. potatoes, sausage, and mussels.) We did not have to worry about any of this and instead sat at the bar where we had the absolute pleasure of Leslie’s company.

Leslie, our hot, redheaded, bartender with a great rack, was weighing booze bottles when we came in. It took a little doing, but once we got her chatting she quickly became one of my favorite bartenders. She has worked here for something like 7 years, so I don’t think she is going anywhere. Leslie told us an interesting story about the beginnings of Taco Del Mar. Strangely, I guess their first store was in this mall on the waterfront, but it ultimately failed, was refinanced, the menu redone, and then moved to Broadway, where it now sits next to a Blockbuster video. We learn the strangest things from talking to bartenders.

The Crab Pot bar has a medium stain with knots and other sea paraphernalia encased in a Lucite overlay. It was actually quite cool looking, although it could use some refinishing. Our drinks were $4 and since Leslie was weighing the bottles, I guess we could not expect any compage. Of course, when we are in a chain, I can pretty much write it off.

The Crab Pot was not terribly interesting, but I am going to rate it higher entirely on the force of Leslie’s personality and her great rack. At her behest, I will mention Leslie’s good looking breasts once more. (Go back to bed baby :)

I give the Crab Pot 4 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Neighborhood
Class: Working Class

This lower end establishment forms the perfect tri-fecta of bars in this small half black area of Greenlake. Located next to Luau and Eva it adds the 3rd and final level to a great evening: Hard drinking. Start at Luau for a Wasabi Mary or a bucket of Coronitas, then go to Eva for some French food and a quickie in their bathroom, and finally pound away what is left of the night, play some pool, and then go home to fuck. Unless of course you’re out with your buddies in which case you each go home separately and fuck your significant others. If you don’t have a SO, then you better pick up one before leaving this stretch. I recommend the trendy chicks at Luau or the busty bartender at Eva (if she still works there.)

Leny’s place is decorated simply, with white walls, a U shaped bar and lots of beer mirrors, A ball cap with Colombo’s face on it is nailed above the bar. There is a great jukebox and 2 dart machines in addition to the 2 pool tables. Behind the bar is an attractive dainty looking blonde with a seriously hard voice. I was expecting this soft flower of a voice and instead I got a truck stop waitress. It very weird.

The drinks are poured with a heavy hand and at $3.25 how could you go wrong. Leny’s Place really is the perfect addition to the small corner in Greenlake. We never would have found it, if not for this quest. I think I will need to plan a night out to this small area sometime in the near future. I give Leny’s Place 4 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

It's the last night of the year, there's a big party coming up, and we're going for a drink. It's a last minute thing, because it's still early for the party, and I thought (Brandon eventually agreeing) that a drinking quest should drink on the drinkingest night of the whole drinking year.

So we went to Bick's.

We've driven by the place before, but it looks like a restaurant with beer or something. In reality, it's a really big place with a lot of people, a lot of noise and a lot of good times appearing to happen. It's a wood trimmed family style eatery, I guess you could say. There's a full bar and a reasonably small bar area that we plopped ourselves down in. While the restaurant was really, really busy, the bar wasn't so packed, but the staff was still stretched a bit thin.

I went to the bar to try to order, and was promptly ignored. A lot. For a long while. Finally, a waitress tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I was at the corner table, I said I was, she said she was our server, and I abandoned the cursed bar.

We ordered drinks, while I admired the shelf that ran at the top of the bar and into the restaurant, covered with hot sauces of all sorts. The menu featured all sorts of hot selections, and I quickly realized I'd have to return with Jeff Ketchel to have a meal at some point.

The drinks were okay. Nothing special, but who cared? We were going to a party in an hour, and the booze would be both plentiful and good there. The prices weren't too high, which was a decent thing.

And we headed out, because there was nothing more to be done.

Type: Restaurant
Class: Midscale

This nice neo-minimalist Japanese restaurant is white with lots of beige and black. A trunk of a tree sits in the middle of the restaurant, covered in fairy lights. The bar is curved light pine laminate. I have to mention that we have come across a lot of laminate bars but until now, I just could not remember what it was called. Of course we have also come across some bars that I figure were little more than lacquered pressboard, but generally I was kind enough to skip mentioning it. Most of these places were just kind of scary. Does anyone really care what the bar is made out of, unless it is unusual (like beaten copper)?

The space behind the bar is cozy (like my kitchen.) There is room for 1, 2 if your friendly. We sat there waiting for an inordinate amount of time while the waitress and one of the waiters futzed with this half beer keg that they were trying to install. Our bartender was this tiny little Asian flower and there was no way she was moving it buy herself. She seemed sweet once she finally got around to taking our orders, but I was seriously concerned we were about to get Gaijined.

The Gin and Tonic I ordered turned out to be excellent. I’m not quite sure how that happened, but I just had a feeling. The drink was $5 + tax.

I don’t know if they have decent food, but their drinks were good and if you have Asian fever then you will love the waitresses here. I do not like Asian women any more or less than any other woman (they are all good in my book.) When I was in China, I learned that there were 20 white men for each white woman in the country. This lead to average white women being treated like super models and all the guys who couldn’t get their own white women quickly picked up Asian Fever. Technically it has a more derogatory name, but I will deign to list it here. Anyhow, guys end up dating a lot of Chinese women and then get a real “thing” for it once they leave. I wonder if they are that good in the sack and/or the kitchen.

I give Saito Japanese Restaurant 2 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Lounge
Class: Midscale

I don’t have a lot to say about Fleming’s Steak House either way, but they did score high in my book by serving us a drink when they were on that jagged edge of being closed. She could just as easily said we are closed (at 10 PM) but instead she served us our drink.

That having been said, she screwed up my drink. I ordered a whiskey, 7-up with a splash of bitters and what I got was Whiskey Sour with a splash of bitters. First, never order that drink. It tastes truly foul. I mean it. Next, Jason says to me, “send it back.” I decline and suffer through my drink. “You would think about 450 bars you would be able to send a drink back.” “Hey its only bar 449.” The look of “you are an idiot” on his face was priceless.

Flemings looks like every other midscale steak place. It has the same dark wood, the same semi-stylish wine display cases. There is a nice looking bar and dim lighting. The 5 other people at the bar were a lower class of people than I would expect at this place, but from the way they chatted with the bartender, I suspect they were her friends.

The real kick in the nuts came when she delivered the check. The drinks were $5.75. Sheesh, if I had known that I would have sent the damn thing back.

I give Fleming’s 2 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

We drove around a while downtown, just Brandon and me, trying to figure out which building Ruth's Chris was in, circling on one way streets and trying to avoid the various clumps of police and aid vehicles that were piled up all over the place. It was crazy, how many cops were around down there.

The bar looks pretty nice, really, spacious and sitting between the large restaurant area and a larger empty sort of space that I'm thinking must be a banquet area. There were a few people in the bar, a couple more sitting down at the bar just after we did.

There were little plaques on the bar with names on them, sometimes nicknames like "Pinky", each placed to mark a patron who they really liked. Not a dead patron, thankfully, as we've seen at a few other places, just a patron.

We ordered drinks and started to talk about the quest, at first just with each other, and then involving our bartender Stacey, who seemed to really like the idea, and who was on the verge, several times we think, of comping us our drinks. But then, after a last minute wavering, she didn't, and we were sad. But she was still very nice, and we recognize our presentation wasn't as good as it once was, because we're both out of practice since we haven't been presenting as much as before, and we're kind of jaded about it and I think it shows.

Anyway, the drinks were pretty tasty, the prices were a bit high, the staff was nice, the look was comfortable, and it was a decent place to be.

We coudn't even tell if they had a real bar, and we thought probably they didn't. But they did have bar hours, as it were, hours in which you could get drinks but not a full menu. So they counted, and although we weren't thrilled, we decided on the balance that we had to drink there.

So in we went, were sat, looked over a menu and decided it was too pricey and not various enough to get an appetizer. We ordered our drinks, and sat in the place listening vaguely to the people who were eating and chatting about how we were sunken awful low at that point, being in a non-bar that sadly qualified.

Only just, since they had to be spirits serving, and the quantity of spirits in the drinks that arrived was barely noticable. Not even barely notable, which is different. The alcohol could probably have been measured in parts per million at best. My drink was so blah that I wanted a five year old to give it to, so that someone with no tolerance at all could be as completely unaffected by that drink as me.

And, they weren't terribly cheap either.

So pretty much, it sucked overall.

We've just been out to the most fabulous dinner of my life, at the wonderful El Gaucho, and now most of the diners are going to head up to the Mercury, a (semi) private Goth/Industrial club up on Capitol Hill. We were going to have a drink, say hi to some people, and then pretty much call it a night.

We said hi to some people in that dark, dark club, mingling with all the leather/vinyl/lace/utilikilt wearing masses, and having a drink. The Mercury has a great strong pour, and the bartenders all treat you well, but that wasn't the best thing at this point. Sadly, coming from a marvelous meal, my mouth still full of incredible flavors, a strong drink was not what I needed. Just the opposite, in fact. It was harsh and bitter and not good at all. Of course, it being super strong was a plus, making it at least better than a weak drink would have been. It's good normally, really good, but at this point, nothing good could be said.

The prices are pretty good, too.

Anyway, any other night I'd have been very pleased with the drink, of that I'm certain, but this night it was the wrong night for it. So don't go there (if you're inclined and able) after the best meal of your life. Go there on a normal night (inclined and able still required) and have three drinks, or two specialty drinks, and be ready to call it a night.

A big mob of us were getting together to have Dim Sum, and in the case of Brandon and I, drinks, at this restaurant in the ID. They have a full bar, but it's pretty much dead on a Sunday afternoon when we were there, there's no bartender and so on, and it's almost impossible to get the attention of the hostess, who you need to get your drinks from.

Fortunately, there was Dim Sum to keep us all busy. We were a party of six (me, Brandon, Wolf, Trevor, Mel and Tim), which soon became a party of nine (adding on Missy and her roommate and their friend), and there was much brunchy appetizer goodness.

Eventually, we even got drinks. Which were not very strong, not very good, but reasonably priced. Of course, the drinks were an incidental here.

The Dim Sum's not as good as at the House of Hong, so there goes that reason to visit. And the drinks don't encourage repeat business. And past prime time, the dim Sum service is kind of slow, too.

Wolf picked up the sponsorship, and then just Trevor joined Brandon and I on the way to another bar, while all the rest scattered to the winds.

There's both the hotel bar, Oliver's, and a restaurant, Andaluca, both of which I think have liquor, but both under the same license, the hotel's. As Andaluca wasn't open, we went in to Oliver's and sat at the bar for a drink.

It was a nice looking place, the sort of upscale hotel bar that actually seems different from other hotel bars. While it's still somewhat impersonal, now it seems to be because it's kind of snooty, not because it's meant to be generic. But the Mayflower's a 75 year old hotel, so that makes sense. It was just us three (the usual two with Trevor) at the bar, and a couple of older women just down from us, and for some reason in this quiet and upscale locale, Brandon could not quit swearing. It was as if he were suddenly transformed into my Irish Longshoreman stepfather, a gem of a man with a totally filthy mouth.

We ordered our drinks, and Brandon cursed. We drank, and Brandon cursed. I descended into the lower levels to find the men's room, and I bet Brandon cursed. We paid, and Brandon cursed. Not at anything in particular any of those time, just because there was cursing to be done, I think.

I kept wanting to hit him, or crawl into a hole, or something.

They had very nice martini glasses. The drinks were okay. I kind of liked the place over all, but there's better hotel bars downtown, so it's not all that necessary. A nice place to take your elderly aunt while she's in town, I should think, but that's about it.

Jeff offered to take us into the south lands of Seattle. This is where the poor and impoverished of Seattle reside. It is known as the Rainier Valley and encompasses a large number of townships. Rather than talk about where we specifically went, I am just going to touch on some of the more interesting events, stories, and whatnots of the day. To rehash the whole day would take me pages. Lets just say that it started with Jeff saying we would hit maybe 3 or 4. By the end we had hit 9 (not all in Rainier Valley.) It was a hard day of drinking. I had no idea that we were even capable of hitting 9 places, let alone this late in the quest.

Jeff picked up Jason and I at 2 PM and then we ventured first to Rose Peddles. On the drive there Jeff told us about this bar owner he used to talk to in the area. There were two bars across the street from each other, one a full bar, the other tavern (beer and wine only.) These places were in the poor end of the Ranier Valley (and that is saying something.) In the first week, all the patrons would drinking in the Tavern, drinking relatively good beer. In the second week they would move to the bar and drink cheap liquor. In the third week they would be back in the Tavern drinking cheap beer. In the fourth week both places would be empty. Then on the first of the month the government checks would arrive and it would begin again all over again. It goes like this every month.

I was amazed, but with the exception of Rose Peddles, all of the places we went to in the Valley were not the divey hell holes I expected them to be. Most of them were clean and family like and the only down side to them was the neighborhood. I would not return to most of them again, but I would not shy away if I was in the area. The main reason I would go back to the south end is for this bakery. I don’t know the name (hopefully Jason or Jeff will list it.) The food was amazing and incredibly cheap. I will be coming back down here if only for $1 loaves of fresh bread, amazing pastries, and I can even buy pumpernickel. I have been looking for fresh pumpernickel bread for 3 years and now I find it in the Ranier Valley. We each had a bag of stuff that we had bought from this place. The éclair and berry tart was excellent, as was the potato bread. Jeff bought a $2 lemon meringue pie and Jason got some sort of pastry.

After the South End, Jeff dropped me off at home so that I could pick up my car and then I was to go to Jason’s house to watch a bad B movie called Galaxina. Galaxina is one of my father’s favorite movies because of Dorothy Stratten. Dorothy Stratten was Playboy Playmate of the year in 1980 (or so) who was murdered in the mid-80s. It’s most notable and perhaps only attraction is this gag they do throughout the movie. They are searching for something called the Blue Star, however whenever someone says it, this choir of voices goes “ah AH” in the background. It is very strange. I had told Jason about the “ah AH” and we had been doing it for about a week. I didn’t remember just how bad the movie was and when we finally watched it, we both ended up asleep about halfway through.

When I was home, I dropped off my note pad, got changed, and pretty much decided I wasn’t going out again. I get to Jason’s with the movie I rented and he tells me that Jeff has decided that he is up for more, possibly even enough to break the record. I should have nipped this in the bud, but I was weak and we went out. I am still not sure where we went. I don’t have the notes in my pad and hopefully I haven’t lost them. I’ll have to look for them when I get home.

So our trip into the southern lands was not as bad as I was expecting but we still have some really questionable places that need hitting. Most specifically we need to go to Oscar’s two. I think that going there on a Saturday at about 2PM is probably our best bet. I don’t know if I actually need to be worried about being white, or if it just in my imagination. So far, we have had no race related hostility, although we did get gringoed in South Park. It just occurred to me. I wonder if the two specialty drinks were $8 each and the well drinks were $4. Hmmm. I hope that I haven’t been bad mouthing them for the wrong reason. Oh well.

So we did 9 bars in about 8 hours. There was stopping and eating and driving and lots of Jeff and Jason pointing out landmarks of their youth. It was interesting, but for me, it felt more like an tour bus with cocktails. “And on your left you’ll see the new track and field at the school Jason and I attended together.” “Here you will find a place with nachos” “There is where I used to get sandwiches everyday during 3rd period.” It was all very exciting. I can appreciate a walk down memory lane, but ultimately it means very little to me.

My favorite bit of continuity throughout the day was the Titans playoff game that was on in each place that we visited. It would take us about 10 or 15 minutes to go from place to place and we would watch the score jump while we were gone. Ironically, the game ended when we were at the one place that did not have the game on the tube. Oh well.

So that was my day. It was long, it was fun, I discovered a new bakery, and I now remember why Galaxina is such a bad movie. A full on commendation needs to go out to Jeff who picked up all 9 sponsorships of this day. That is a sponsorship of Herculean proportions. I am just flabbergasted. Thanks Jeff.

-wOOt

Type: Neighborhood
Class: Dive

Here we stand in sunny Ranier Valley and we have ventured into a run down local watering hole. Jeff, our charming sponsor, knows this place and has warned us that we will be fine, but we should keep out eyes open. The following 7 minutes would be some of the best minutes that I have spent in ages.

We walk in through a small vestibule that has stack of local race oriented and neighborhood papers. The small front hall opens into the bar and into the kitchen. The walls are dirty as is the carpet. A large white women carries a tray back into the kitchen. The main lounge is large and rundown. There are booths to the right, tables in the middle, and a bar with a small counter to the left. Everything is in a general state of disrepair. I wonder if it was ever nice.

The two women working here are white, everyone else is black. Then there was us. We beeline for the bar. Behind the bar is a giant white cardboard sign with the names of 63 people who have been 86’d from the bar. To the other side a large piece of construction paper lists those people who have given to support a local family in need. Then we are, ahem, greeted by E.J. E.J. is a large black man with Lil’ Romeo style braids and an Outcast baseball jacket. He greets Jeff (who is the largest of our group) and starts treating him like his New Best Friend (NBF.)

E.J. recommended Gin and Juice, so we all had one. In this case, the Gin was Potters poured almost to the top and then a splash of grapefruit was added. It should have tasted stronger, but we can’t decide if the grapefruit was potent or the Potters was watered down. I noticed off to one side an empty table with a cribbage board and a set of dominoes. Very briefly I wanted to sit down and play either game.

At some point, someone, I think E.J. made a comment that implied we might be cops. This better than average looking black woman commented that “Don’t say their cops, its not polite.” Now I comment on her attractiveness because in a more comfortable social setting I would consider hitting on her and being friendly. Here though, I was very nervous and felt out of place. I don’t consider myself racist (classist definitely, but not racist) but here I knew I was out of place.

So we had our drinks, chatted with E.J. and I had a smoke. E.J. commented that he was rooting for the Raiders (who were playing the next day and would ultimately get trounced in the Superbowl.) As we walked out, we were all giddy with nervousness and excitement. It was as if we had survived a trial by fire. If we could do one strange and frightening dive, we could do them all. Now if only we could do them all at 3 PM on a Saturday. I give Rose Peddles 4 Martini Glasses out of 5, but I can not in good conscious actually recommend that you visit them.

-wOOt

Type: Lounge
Class: Average

This nice and clean family Mexican restaurant has great food, good drinks, and enough Mexican family atmosphere to choke a Jew. They kept stuffing us with multi-colored chips and the waitress was older and friendly. Even though they treated us well, I am just starting to fall beneath the weight of the freakin Mexican joints. Each one that we visit now devours a small portion of my will to live. I am beginning to believe that Hell is an amalgamation of Mexican Restaurants, Strawberry Shortcake (the toy), and Barney. Tell me you can think of something more frightening.

Jeff, our most excellent sponsor, went over to the juke box and picked 3 songs that he felt would be most inappropriate for the large family gathering across the restaurant. I hope that they appreciated the thought that went into offending them. Jeff also noted that the dart machine (which was right in the middle of the walkway between the 4 tables in the lounge) line was too far back. He has been playing a lot of darts lately and will be going on to the Regionals (I believe.) I am very excited for him.

Maya’s is clean, good, with strong ties to the community, and if I was in the area I would go back. I just wish it was a Greek restaurant or a Lebanese restaurant or something other than a Mexican Restaurant. How the hell did there get to be so many freaking Mexican restaurants in Seattle? Gah.

I give them 3 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Lounge
Class: Average

Vince’s is an average looking Italian Restaurant that Jeff says has incredible food. Jeff picked up our decent $3 drinks and we sat in the lounge and watching the Titans’ game progress. The lounge is large with a big screen TV, 3 dart machines, a wall mirror that stretched the length of the bar. The booths were dimpled red (p)leather and the walls were exposed brick.

My favorite part of Vince’s was the graffiti written in the bathroom stall. It said,

How to be a Pimp
Treat your hoes with no respect
If they don’t have enough money hit them

Words of advice for the up and coming pimp.

Vince’s held no thrill for me. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad. I give them 3 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Midscale

Jeff had been talking about how “they” were trying to gentrify Columbia City with only moderate success. Not two minutes later we walk into Deux Tamales. It is an oasis of cool and class amid the downtrodden and decrepit. I also give them props for opening up for us about 20 minutes before normal so that we could get a drink. I like flexible schedules. They make me happy.

The restaurant is themed in the color red. The walls are brushed shades of red with hints of orange and yellow. The tables are mottled, textured, and painted flame red. The bar is slate grey with a red baseboard. On the far wall are large paintings of a Vanilla sky. They look like the skies that are painted inside the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas.

We each order a specialty drink. Jason orders a Prickly Pear drink which is very strange. Jeff orders some sort of martini, and I order a Mohito like drink with lemons and Cachucha (the booze made of sugar cane.) Nobody likes their drink 100%. Jason’s is too weird, mine is too strong, and I don’t remember what is up with Jeff’s.

At some point, Jason and I have started to seriously grate on each other. I don’t know where it started, but we are both getting snippy and nasty. I think I am getting tired, and I could not tell you what his problem was. Jeff threatened to send us to our room. Jeff picked up yet another sponsorship.

I liked the Deux Tamales, but I would stick to a more normal drink. I give them 3 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Lounge
Class: Average

On the outside, this large Chinese restaurant is white stucco with a large backlit sign that says, “Jumbo Chinese” and a smaller neon one that reads, “The Boss Lounge.” What a weird name. I suspect that it is used more in terms of, “this is the Boss’s lounge” rather than, this lounge is “boss” (meaning cool.)

The inside is spacious, clean, and fairly uninteresting. Everything is new, but done on a budget. The tables are covered with red table cloth and the chair are upholstered with red cloth that was simply stapled down. It was as if Martha Stewart had came in and said, “here are some nice easy ways to spruce up your place on a budget.” Most of the budget was spent on these excellent silver mirrors on one wall. On the other hung head shots of famous people, but they were not signed.

Along with our incredibly weak $5 drinks, they brought us heavily salted peanuts and glazed sesame snacks. When Jeff (our exceptional sponsor) asked for lime, they brought over a large dish filled with lemon and lime pieces. A TV hung at one end and played Vietnamese Karoke. Jeff knew it was Vietnamese and it makes me wonder if this is actually a Chinese place.

I recommend that you give this place a miss. Sure the nuts were nice and I think they are trying hard, but the drinks were just too weak and it is in Ranier Valley. I give them 1 and a half Martini Glasses unless you are a big fan of foreign Karoke.

-wOOt

Type: Nightspot
Class: Average

This dance club is only 3 months old and it still has that shiny look. Behind the bar was the only white person in the place. We were basically the only patrons, but from what the bartender said, the place really fills up. He remains just about the only white guy here and for the most part only understands the drinks that are ordered. That night, they were having a singer, but the owner mentioned who it was dismissively when we asked him about it. He knew that we would have no idea who it was.

We sat at the long black bar with the purple arm rest and chatted with the bartender, Jesse, about the Titans game that had ended while we were elsewhere. We talked about the large amount of security here and that the techno they played was pretty good. There are a couple of table video games, a large projection screen, a couple of large booths, and a bunch of tables. Jeff picked up yet another round of these decent $4 drinks. I just wish they would stop giving me whiskey sours accidentally. I usually just suck it up and drink it, but I wish I didn’t have to.

When we ordered our drinks, Jesse warned me the Whiskey was off the gun. That was very nice of him. Although I think he was trying to get me to call. All in all, I liked the place, but I figure there is little reason for us Gaijing to go here. I give them 2 and half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Hotel
Class: Average

This large bar is quiet and simple. The most that can be said for it, is that it has a long zig zagged bar. This bar makes chatting a bit easier for a group larger than 2, but we just sat at one of the small round tables.

My drink was unmemorable. Jeff picked up the round and continued to plow through picking up sponsorship after sponsorship.

I wonder why a place like this even has a bar. I figure that since it is attached to the restaurant, they figure they mind as well have one. It just seems so pointless. I wonder if there is a list of rules for crappy low rent hotels that they are required to have a bar. I guess if there is a convention in town and they don’t want to travel the bar is the place to hang, but when you are in the middle of a big city who is going to come to the Best Western for a drink. I figure you could probably get away with just putting a fake room number on the bill. Who would expect locals to come in here.

I give this place 1 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Average

Jeff had nothing but nice things to say about the food and owner of this uninteresting Thai place. It is a medium sized restaurant with a central bar area that was closed for seating when we got there. They sat us off by the two other groups of people. The tables had white table clothes with an overlay of glass. The thing that I found kind of tacky was that each table had a photocopy of a couple of excellent reviews of the place from at least several years ago underneath the glass. This always strikes me as tacky.

I can understand putting up the review in your place, even framing it. I have the pop fizz article about us hanging in my office. I don’t however, make sure that everyone who comes to my home, or goes drinking with us, has to read the article as part of their visit.

We ordered some fresh rolls that were, in fact, very fresh. Our drinks were fine, but they also were not anything special. As a drinking establishment, this place leaves a lot to desired. With so many better places for drinking within walking distance, I recommend giving Thai Heaven a miss. I am sure the food is as good as our amazing sponsor Jeff says it is, but I probably won’t find out. There are just to many Thai places in Seattle for me to “trek” out to Lower Queen Anne. I know, the 7 minute drive from my house would probably kill me.

Through no real fault of their own, I must give Thai Heaven 2 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Dive

I know that I have messed up the spelling of their name. By the time you read this, I may have fixed it, but who can be sure. This Mexican restaurant is on 15th Ave in Ballard/Crown Hill and it was not a great way to end our mighty run of 9. I say this because they have a full liquor license for one reason: Tequila. They do not have a full bar. Rather, they pay a bunch of money so that they can serve shots of Tequila and make Margaritas. I can understand wanting to be able to do this, but shouldn’t they take advantage of the other boozes? For the most part I am speechless. Shah … right.

This restaurant is large and fairly basic. The tables and chairs are the minimum required, but a lot of work went into painting the walls. Each wall is an enormous mural of some facet of Mexican life. One wall is a huge Mexican hilltop village. Another has women carrying … things. I don’t really remember all of the murals, but they were large, multi colored, and not unappealing.

Our margaritas were not great, but we did chow down on the chips. Jeff picked up his 9th sponsorship of the evening. I can not even begin to describe how flabbergasted I am by this. It is just … incredible.

Our waiter was very nice and they were attentive (I think we ate 3 baskets of chips). I have eaten here and I recall the food being decent and not too pricey. I liked them well enough. I give them 2 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Good golly Miss Molly. Who would have thought, so late in the quest, that we had any new records to set? But stunningly enough, it's happened. In a single day (almost 8 hours) with a single sponsor (Jeff Ketchel) we've managed to drink at 9 bars in a run. Since there's only at most 100 left, that's about 10 percent of the total remaining.

So full of bloat, we were.

Anyway, many, many thanks to Jeff for picking up a whole lot of bars all in one run. This puts him at 19 bars, tied with Bridgit for the number 4 slot.

I am getting so freakin tired of Mexican Restaurants with bars. So far I think we have been to somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 + Mexican places, probably more. Now I know that there are tons of Chinese Lounges, Irish Pubs, and Steak Houses, but even so, the Mexicans Restaurants rule by sheer numbers. At first they were a god send. We got free chips every time we sat down and the drinks were strong. But as time progresses I feel their weight crushing me every time Jason says, “Are you up for another Mexican place?” “No I am not, but it has to be done.”

There is just something about them that is starting to rub me the wrong way and I think it is the “festive” decorations. I can only stand to look at so many brightly colored Piñatas, Villas painted on the walls, coat after coat of bright yellow or orange paint and then there is the Mexican music. I like Mexican music in small doses, but I would swear that they all ordered the same CD from the Mexican Supply Store and are playing the same 6 tracks. How it doesn’t drive the staff insane is beyond me.

I started to feel the same way about the Irish Pubs, but we haven’t seen any of those lately. Plus Irish Pubs usually do food as a sideline, but the drinking is the main purpose. There are no Mexican Bars in Seattle (that I have seen.) Rather they are all restaurants with a small bar or maybe a lounge. The bars are always utilitarian and uninteresting. They are festive like a house decked in Christmas lights on February 1st. It is forced and tiresome.

Please someone help me and spare me of any other Mexican Restaurants that I must drink at. Someone … please … help ….

-wOOO … *gasp* ….Ot

It's weird, the sort of places you'll stumble into. The sort of places that slip by the liqour control board, too. There're are more bars out there than you'd think.

Brandon and I had come to the waterfront to pick up the last couple of bars we had there. First was Michaelangelo's, but we quickly discovered that it didn't exist anymore. There was a cafe of that name, but the restaurant and bar was long since shut down. We discovered this by entering the Fisherman's Restaurant at the very end of the wharf, where upon asking the first employee we saw, we discovered that there was indeed a bar, and that he would be our bartender.

So we headed upstairs in this distinctly nautical restaurant, with lots of raw wood and some other naval accents, and sat alone at the bar, which seemed kind of abandoned. There was, it must be admitted, a couple upstairs across the staircase from us, but they seemed to be in a whole different world.

We ordered our drinks, and in a moment we were talking with Kevin about the lost Michealangelo's, which was now used as extra space by the other restaurants on the wharf which are in some odd fashion all owned by the same person or people. We started to talk about the quest, to share bars we'd liked, and hear about bars Kevin liked, most of which are former bars, no longer with us.

After about 20 minutes of hanging out, we thought we should depart, since we were done with our drinks, and we had the Crabpot at the front of the wharf to hit, and so we said our goodbyes, paid the check and moved on.

Glen got the sponsorship, mostly because I think Brandon knew in his heart there would be a hot redhead at the next bar, so he wanted that one for himself.

It's a chain, it's bright and cheerful, and they have to wear Crabpot polo shirts. It's kind of like the Red Robin of the sea.

However, we were lucky to end up with a great bartender. Leslie was a great looking redhead, as I mentioned last review, and she was, as we ordered drinks, weighing the bottles at the bar. On a scale. And recording the numbers in a log book. You see, they have to make sure nobody's pouring too much, or nipping a bit out of a bottle, or anything. They're a chain, did I mention?

Leslie had a great sense of humor about the silliness of that particular job, though, so it was all good. If she had taken the whole thing seriously there might have been problems, but as it was, I knew we'd get along fine.

And we did, having a fun time telling her about the quest, about various bars, hearing about the first Taco del Mar and how it crashed and burned to be replaced by the second one, now the basis of the entire chain, and so on. Great stuff, and good talk.

They also had very tasty fries, with sweet but runny honey mustard. Which Brandon always has to get.

So it was a good visit, but as we paid next to no attention to the place, I have nothing to say about it. Leslie was wonderful, the drink (remember the weighing) was fine but not in any particular way strong, and we got to say hi to Kevin again as he came up to find out who was closing the pier for the night.

And then we were off into the night, to find a third bar.

360-odd bars down the road (some very odd) we returned to the neighborhood of Luau and Eva, a place I can now find, unlike the last time we visited which left me totally confused. In fact, Leny's is right next to Eva, and kind of completes the neighborhood allotment. It's only just got its liquor license, but now the three make a perfect set: the young bar, the suave bar, the working class bar. All right next to each other.

Leny's is the working class bar. They sell meat sticks at the bar, they have pool and darts and a good jukebox, they have a list of Red Bull cocktails available. The bartender was youngish and looked kind of sweet, but she had a variable voice. Sometimes it matched her look, but as often it was a low growl that made her sound a lot bigger or older, or maybe just possessed.

The drinks weren't great, but didn't suck either. They were a bit more than you would expect for the area, but no one seemed to mind, since there was a decent crowd of folks having a pretty good time.

There's a lot of painted wood in the place, which is a terrible thing, and it's kind of run down and could use a remodel, but it's kind of comfortable, too. I don't think I'd head back, but it could be a good finisher to a night at the other two bars of the strip.

Coming as it does in the days before the nine bar run, I can't really say all that much about this place. It just didn't register compared to the day we'd have two days later.

Not that it was all that impressive anyway. It's a downtown sushi bar, pretty much, with seating in the front and the back, and the bar, with a bamboo shack type roof, in the middle. They were changing a keg of beer as we arrived, and as the process took a very long time, we sat at the bar ignored by the two people working there and the one who came by to check up on them. Five minutes after we sat down, someone finally asked us what we wanted. Before this, there hadn't even been a "Just a minute" or something of the sort.

The drinks weren't very strong, the prices were kind of high, and the service, as noted, was a bit lacking.

So skip it.

Fleming's is one of your dark wood, heavy furniture, soft lighting kind of steak houses, the sort of place you think must exist in small towns so local business types can have meetings. They're in Seattle, too, though.

They were closing, or technically, closed, as we arrived, but as we were just there for one drink, the bartender said that was okay. There were four guys at the bar, each with pretty much full drinks, so she wasn't in any real hurry to close up, I don't think.

We ordered, and she apparently misheard Brandon and brought him a Whiskey Sour, splash of bitters, instead of a Whiskey Seven, splash of bitters. I tried to tell her, but Brandon said it was fine, he liked a Whiskey Sour, too, and she moved off.

Then he took a sip.

Apparently, Sour and Bitters aren't good friends. They get along poorly. So Brandon, having let her wander off, and it now being too late to complain without seeming like a massive asshole, had to down the apparently quite awful concoction.

My drink was fine. They weren't very strong.

The prices were pretty high, but then, it's a steak house with a businessman's lunch feel. So there you are. And there we were, and then we left.

We were heading to the South End with Jeff for what I thought would be four or so bars, completely unaware that it would be a record setting day. Jeff used to be a health inspector in the South departement, covering the whole Rainier Valley/Columbia City area that we were going to be in, and he had long ago offered to take us down there and be our guide and sponsor to the neighborhood. So off we went, to hit what Jeff thought might be the worst bar right at the beginning. Which is how we came to Rose Peddles.

Now, as to the name. On the sign at the bar, it's called Rose Petals, as you might think it should be, but the name for the liqour license is as I have it listed above, and so that's the name I'm going with for the "official" name of the place. It looked like a roadside restaurant anywhere might look, except that it had an awful lot of cars parked there for 3 o'clock on a Saturday.

We parked and entered, and I noticed that there wasn't a soul in the restaurant portion of the place, which was to the left, but that the right hand bar area was pretty much packed. There was an empty table, I will admit, but just one, and there were people standing around with friends where there were no seats, so pretty much they were near capacity. And this at, as I mentioned, midafternoon Saturday, with nothing like an event going on. These were people determined to have a good time, and they were.

I should mention that other than the bartender and the waitress, we were the only white people in the place. Young black men and women hung near the bar, older couple sat in the booths, and a group of old black men played dominoes by the window, but they all kind of looked at the three of us as we came in.

As we approached the bar, a big guy started chatting with us at once about how we came to the right place, and we could have a good time here, and we should get drinks. We asked him what to get, and he said it was all about the gin and juice, grapefruit to be specific. We got the impression he wanted us to buy him one, and eventually Jeff did just that, after we got our three and didn't get him one, and he looked kind of put out. Not pissed, just kind of sad. Then Jeff got him a drink, because they weren't too expensive or anything, and suddenly EJ was our best buddy.

The gin and juice was actually pretty good, the two flavors cancelling and mingling to produce a very mellow, almost tastless drink that had a good amount of kick to it. EJ talked with us for a while, until one of the honeys at the bar wanted to talk to him, and I don't blame him. We were out of shape white guys, she was a pretty young thing, and that was that. While we had talked, we had bonded over high schools (me Rainier Beach 89, him Roosevelt 90) and over the good drinks, and EJ had told someone that no, we couldn't be cops, because we were too polite.

While EJ was distracted, we finished up and got ready to leave, saying goodbye since we had more bars to go to. He told us to come back and hang out sometime, and actually, Jeff and I both thought we could, because there was a totally fun and laid back groove to the place which faded for a moment when we showed up but then snapped back in after just a moment when it became clear we weren't official in any way. I could spend a while there, I'm sure, though I don't think it's likely I will. Which is too bad. I'm fond of dominoes.

Jeff picked up the sponsorship, what would be the first of nine for the day, and we moved on further south, to the other stomping grounds of this former RB Viking.

It wasn't even on our list, but Jeff asked if we had been to Maya's anyway. I said no, it wasn't on our list at all, and he assured us it had a full bar, because he had inspected it many a time. We were thinking of getting some food, and Jeff said it was good food there, so we decided to check it out.

Indeed, there was a full bar, in the back, with an actual bar, built in stools, lots of booze and several tables with chairs that were elaborately carved into the form of flowers, or dancing women, or similar things that might seem Mexican themed. With bright paint over them, these very decorative chair backs were certainly distinctive, but not completely comfortable.

I ordered a blackberry margarita, once the bartender/waitress was done serving the massive birthday table just across the half-wall from the bar, and it was quite tasty indeed. Chips and salsa were plentiful and warm, and the bocadillas platter of apps we ordered was big, hearty and good.

One problem--for the second time, I had a drink that smelled like dog. Wet dog. This time both Jeff and Brandon, who reeled back as if I had hit him when he smelled it, verified. Again, there was nothing at all wrong with the flavor, but the smell was definitely there. Wet dog.

I played an electronic bar game of Tai Pan in spanish, which was kind of odd. We played music on the jukebox. And we departed, having had a pretty good time hanging out at the place, and glad to have had Jeff along to tell us there was a hidden bar inside.

Jeff picked up the sponsorship, of course, which included the food. Very good of him.

We had tried to hit Vince's before Maya's, but they were still 40 minutes from opening, so it didn't happen. Now, returning only a few minutes after they opened, we entered the bar, and took a seat.

Vince's is on the route my school buses took for about 5 years, and which led directly to the grade, middle and high schools that I went to. This means I went by the place about 350 times a year, not counting the last year when I didn't take the bus but still went by it some times. So I've been by this place about 2000 times without ever going in, until now. That's some kind of record for me, I think.

There was nothing at all remarkable about it. We entered the lounge directly, so I didn't see the actual restaurant, but the bar has nothing in it which would suggest it was an Italian place. Dark wood, black vinyl, dim lighting, dingy carpet, it's just like any of the bars of my youth, places I couldn't drink at but could spend time at the door of, trying to talk to my mom while she tended bar. It was so generic in that sense that there's really nothing to report about it.

The drinks were nothing much, the prices were okay but not great, there was football on TV, and eventually I managed to pry Jeff away from watching the game so we could go on.

Jeff sponsorship number 3, and we moved on to cruise up the Valley to the north.

Advertised as a Franco-Latino restaurant on its awning, this prime example of gentrification right in the heart of Columbia City was a pleasant surprise. An oasis of comfort, as it were, in the wide desert of the South End.

It was a nice little restaurant, with a gauzily curtained entryway. They weren't quite open yet, but since we were just there for drinks, they let us in anyway. We looked over their drink specials and decided we would each have one of them. I ended up getting their Prickly Pear Fruitarita, which wasn't the best option. It wasn't awful, but I'm not at all certain what it tasted like, whether it was actually prickly pear or something else, but it pretty much tasted like nothing. Brandon had a caparihna (sp) which was nothing like the wonderful one we had at Gitano. Jeff's beverage was the best of the lot, but unfortunately I can't recall what he got, so it'll have to remain a mystery.

It was a pleasant looking restaurant and bar, with some latin sort of jazz playing rather loudly, but then, there weren't any other customers even after they had opened at about the time we ordered our drinks. A couple of older women did wander in just before we left, and there was no change in the volume, so apparently deafening the customers is pretty standard.

But, contrary to what might be implied, the noise and the mediocre drinks weren't that bad, and the place was kind of decent. Not decent enough to head out there, but if you're in Columbia City, it's a downtown kind of place to drink, if that's what you're looking for.

Jeff got the sponsorship, and we moved on, yet again.

The fifth bar of the day was in Jumbo's, a restaurant that claims to be Chinese, but seemed far more Vietnamese. We didn't actually look at a menu, but the karoake that was playing (no one was singing, it was just playing) was in Vietnamese, and the people there were Vietnamese, and they were all speaking Vietnamese, so that's what I'd call it.

Anyway, we got drinks, if you could call them that. Weak, sissified beverages, they were, so sad that I felt bad for them. Accompanied by sesamed walnuts and salted, shelled peanuts, it was almost okay, but they were really weak. And at 5 bucks, they were plenty pricey, too, especially for the area. We considered, and I'm still considering, that we were gaijined, but I think it's not likely. The lounge was kind of nice looking, in a Chinese Lounge kind of way, and I could believe they might actually charge 5 dollars. Though under other circumstances, they wouldn't have gotten it. But I wasn't paying, so there you are.

Jeff picked up the halfway bar, and again we moved on, not notable more tipsy since the drinks really did suck.

Again with a place that wasn't quite open. You'd think on the weekend this wouldn't be so much of a problem, but Le Lai wasn't quite ready for us, either. Still, they let us into this Vietnamese dance club, where the bartender Jesse was the one white guy there, and where everyone was busting their asses to get the place ready to open.

Apparently, they have live music acts most nights, and that night they were having some singer (Vietnamese diva variety) and dancing and such, and so they were in a scramble to make everything just right. It wasn't a great looking place, but it was a functional looking club, lots of tables, a stage, some dance floor area, some shiny accessories to flash when it was dim and there were lights working the stage, that sort of thing. Of course, as with all such places, with the lights on it looked a little shabbier, a little tawdrier, than you would hope.

Jesse said it was kind of weird to work there, with no one speaking English, with essentially no one non-Asian in the place at any time, but that he pretty much liked it.

We drank up, weak drinks again, though not as bad as at Jumbo's, and then moved on.

Jeff picked up the sponsorship, for six, which ended our first run. But after a stop at Borachinni's (sp) bakery across the street, and some tasty pastries and bread, we were soon ready for a second round, at Jeff's request, to go for the record of nine bars in a day.

So we'd been to six bars, and then took a rest of more than an hour because Brandon picked up his car, we ate bread, and Brandon rented a really craptastic film called Galaxina from Scarecrow. Don't rent it, by the way.

So Brandon shows up with said video, Jeff declares he's up for the record, and we again head out into the night. Jeff and I have already looked over the list, and we've picked three bars in the Seattle Center area. The first is the Best Western, which Brandon and I tried to hit once a while back after their 9 pm shut down time, but which this time we were rather on time for, especially as it was a weekend, 10 pm shutdown kind of day.

The bar was a hotel bar disguising itself as a kind of nice chain restaurant. It still looked like a hotel bar, except the layout was a bit different, and involved small tables and small, high booths. It was kind of strange, but not that strange, and there was nothing else about the place. Three other people were at the bar proper, and the bartender was bored and glad to have more customers, but there's nothing much that can be said.

We drank quickly, Jeff picked up the sponsorship, we departed.

We parked near Thai Heaven, north of Seattle Center, since it was our goal to go the Michelangelo's in the Center House and then back to Thai Heaven on the way out. Michelangelo's had closed mere moments before we arrived there (curse the terrible parking in Lower Queen Anne), so we ended up at Thai Heaven a bit sooner than expected.

It's a converted house, made into a Thai restaurant, and we ended up sitting in the restaurant area near the front windows. There are reviews of the place from about 8 years ago, when it was new, and when, for that matter, Thai food in Seattle was reasonably new. The reviews take the time to explain Thai food, which no one would now, since there are almost more Thai restaurants in Seattle than there are people.

The drinks weren't great, but didn't suck. They weren't terribly strong. We ordered, at the waiter's recommendation, a plate of Thai Fresh Rolls, which were tasty, and had a very tasty sort of Thai sweet and sour sauce. I suspect the food is all pretty good, but the drinks were nothing to write home about, so for our purposes the place was a bust.

Jeff picked up number 8, and we decided we'd try to hit one more spot, and if it worked out, we'd drink, otherwise we were done.

Their liqour license is so new they don't have a bar really, but they could make us margaritas, so we had some. And they brought us chips and salsa, even though we didn't ask for any. You see, by this time, I felt I was about to burst. But still, with the lure of chips and salsa, I ate some more.

The drinks were decent, a good sized strawberry margarita in a nubbly glass of good size. Any more and we would have exploded, so I'm glad it was what it was. The flavor was quite good, and the staff was pretty attentive for people who were already turning on their cars in the lot outside to warm them up. They were, you see, closing in moments, but were still more than willing to serve us, food or drink or whatever. I liked that.

Anyway, it was the ninth bar, I was feeling stuffed, and there's not much more to say.

Jeff has proven himself to be the man through his nine bars of sponsorship in a single day. While his total leaves him tied for 4th among our sponsors, he's the only guy to sponsor 9, or even close to 9, in a single day, and it was the only 9 bar day we've had, or likely will. So, to be clear, Jeff rules.

See, look at what happens when Brandon goes out of town. I get all caught up, and then there's nothing left for me to do but write a journal entry or something. But I don't have much to write about, so it ends up being some rambling affair about nothing.

Anyway, we're closing in on the end now. In fact, it's less than two months away. On March 21st, we'll be doing the last bar, but here's the issue. It's not going to be 570, or even very close to 570. There just aren't enough bars in the city. We're thinking about going for drinks at some places that were a bit marginal from our original goal, just to get a bit closed. And because without them these last two months will be a big cakewalk, and that seems a little anti-climactic. We wanted to have to really rush at the end, and now it looks like we can take a lot of naps and skip days and all that. Not what I, at least, was expecting.

Well, in any case, it's down to 60 short days at this point. For all those who have been reading, thank you for your attention to date, and keep reading for the denoument. For those of you have who have been drinking with us, there's still about 75 more bars to hit, and we'll see you all there. For our sponsors, the game's not over yet, and the standings can still change. And many, many thanks to each and every one of you, whether you've picked up one bar or 30.

That's about it for now.

Well, it's still almost two months off, but we've got to start thinking that far ahead. We already know, but aren't telling, what the last place will be. What we are telling is that space is kind of limited for the main event there, meaning if you want to be there, we need to know. Priority goes to our sponsors, of course, but anyone could be there. If we get enough people, we'll have to alter our space a little, but that's totally possible.

A few things to know. A famous person will be there; there will be booze; and we will also have food, which, sadly, will end up costing attendees a bit of cash. We can't spring for everyone who might come, but I suspect we'll be subsidizing the cost somewhat.

So if you want to come, now is the time to tell us. Send an email to jason@570bars.com, or brandon@570bars.com, to let us know.

Thanks.

Well, we lost another one. Hiram's on the Lock has closed its doors, at least as far as being a restaurant/bar. It's now just an events space. Which is too bad, because it had a lovely view, and a pretty good looking bar, and it was the first bar Jeff ever sponsored us to.

And although I'm not certain, it also seems that Jack's Roadhouse might be gone. At least their sign was the last time I went by, and all the windows were curtained.

And, in reincarnation news, from the ashes of the missed Lush Life has arisen the long dreaded Marjorie. Dreaded because it's not Lush Life, and because it has a silly name. But we'll have a drink there and see what's what. It got a good mention in the Stranger this week, but who can say what that will mean?

So I think that's 7 dead bars out of our list, which isn't too bad, especially since 4 of them have been reborn.

Type: Lounge
Class: Average

Charlies in Shilshole, no relation to Charlie’s on Broadway, looks a lot like its namesake, but is not nearly as cool. The first thing we noticed was that a side seating area had old style glass topped tables in the style of backgammon boards. This way you can play backgammon right on the table. They look really awesome. I would love to have some of these tables on my deck when I “get me a house.”

The parking lot was large and kind of confusing. There must be other stuff here because there is no way this restaurant draws enough people to make all of this space worthwhile. When you walk in, there is a restaurant to the left and a lounge to the right. The lounge was large, with a good crowd. A U shaped bar stood to the right, regular seating to the left, and a big screen TV in the back. A large number of taps stood behind the bar.

Their booths really need to be bolted down. I kept leaning back too hard and caused my booth to skitter backwards a little. This would not have been a problem if not the big hick sitting on the other side. After about the 3rd time I did it (I had not idea) he turns around and says, “If you do that again, I’m gonna kick your ass.” Or some other fucking bullshit. Unfortunately, the 3 of them would have cleaned the floor with us. Sometimes I wish I was willing to start a bar fight, knowing that I was going to lose it. I just don’t have that kind of aggression in me.

We had a view of the boats and while the chalk art was nice, it wasn’t our guy. The Golden Tee hadn’t been programmed yet, as it said, “Welcome to this location.” Wolf picked up this sponsorship, so woot to him.

So while I would like to punish this place for drawing the type of meat head crowd that it did … I … well fuck it. Lets punish them. They were fine, but there are places with better drinks, a better view, and less annoying customers. I give them 2 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Midscale

Tonight we picked up Melody and her new friend Billy (from Ireland.) Brad also met up with us here. I was very happy to see him after his T-birds game (watching, not playing). The restaurant is large and covered in red and floral. One wall is dominated by a pyramid of mirrors at one end and a pyramid of wine bottles at the other. In the center, blue painted pillars held up the ceiling to prevent it from falling in us. I truly believe that they had a purpose, as they were poorly placed and kind of distracting. If they were not there for structural reasons, then they should be removed.

Some very nice brown glass light fixtures hung over the long L shaped medium wood bar. The music was some sort of strange vocals. I have to assume it was in Italian, but it was too low to really make out. Our drinks were pretty good, except for poor Billy who got a well washed glass, but not a well rinsed glass. His drink had soap in it. Ick. Billy picked up the $4.75 drinks. Man those Irish guys can be generous. This is very much the case in Ireland. If you strike up a conversation with just about anyone friendly enough to talk back, you are almost assuredly going to end up trading rounds with them. Sometimes the round doesn’t even make it to you and they are not at all upset. I was willing to pay, I swear.

I love the hard core Irish. Some of my best times in Amsterdam was with the Irish girls. God I miss those gals. Talk about a group of girls with a wicked sense of humor, kickin’ looks, and just amazingly great … personalities. It makes me sad just thinking about it.

I give Isabella 3 Martini Glasses out of 5. Nothing special, nothing wrong.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Midscale

This cozy restaurant is just big enough to give you some room without losing all of the great smells from the kitchen. There is a short 5 person bar, but once we all decided to get appetizers we swapped over to the table. The older Mediterranean bartender was a crack up. He was very friendly and made us all feel at home. The waitresses were all attractive, but alas, we did not get one. Rather the bartender stuck with us.

Pictures of Italy and strings of dried garlic hang on the two tone walls with a brick dividing line. The food was incredibly good. We each got a different appetizer and they were all excellent. I got a beefsteak tomato with mozzarella and parmesan. I am sad that it was not in fact Caprese but it was still tasty. Brigit would have really liked it. The salmon was excellent as were the mussels.

There is not a lot to say about this place as a drinking establishment, but as a chilling with your date establishment or a quiet drink with your friends, then this place has earned its stripes. In addition, it is very near to the Porta Greek Taverna.

Brad picked up another sponsorship, taking him out of the Doldrums. Congrats Brad.

I plan to go back soon, but first I need to find someone to take there. I give them 3 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Brandon's back, we've been to three bars, it's the morning after and I'm already writing them up. What a world we live in.

After having dinner with the family, we (Wolf and me) met up with Brandon at the bar of Anthony's on Shilshole, and then headed north a few blocks to Charlie's. It's not at all affiliated with Charlie's on Broadway, despite the very odd coincidence that both of these bars have glass, backlit backgammon tables, in the same style, and they are the only bars I've seen them in. Odd stuff.

So we got a seat in the bar, which is in a marina. The restaurant is across the hall, the bar is definitely working class and old folks, for the locals I guess, although the marina's not terribly local to anything. It was very generic except for the backgammon table.

The drinks were pretty decent, and the prices were good. Brandon kept leaning forward and then slamming back into his seat for some reason, and as it was the same seat as a large guy was sitting on in the booth opposite, eventually he turned around and asked if Brandon could stop slamming into the seat. Brandon did so, quite wisely, since the three guys in the next booth could have totally taken the three of us.

Wolf picked up the sponsorship, and then we went to regroup and see if we could figure out more bars to hit, and more people to hit them with.

We got a hold of Melody, and picked up her and her Irish friend Billy who's in town for an indefinite period while visiting his cousin at the Irish Immigrant. Wolf had dropped out, so there were four of us, plus maybe Brandon's friend Brad would be meeting up with us later.

We were driving to Isabella Ristorante when the call from Brad came, and he was indeed going to meet us there. It's a nice Italian place in downtown, which apparently stays open as late as 10 or 11 normally, but is more than willing to close early if it's dead. Tonight, we got in while there were still people, but we've been less lucky before.

It's a nice looking place, with tulip shaped hanging glass lamps over the bar, nicely set tables and such, and a lot of little Italiante accents. The bartender was attentive, and spent a lot of his time trying to encourage me to have a second drink I never had. We were there for a while, so I was the only one who didn't have two.

The four of us, not yet joined by Brad, sat at the corner of the bar, and started in on our drinks, when Brad arrived, and another drink was ordered for him, and then another for Melody, and then another for Billy, and then another for Brad and Brandon, and suddenly we had been there for like an hour and all the people who were there had left, and it was later than we thought. It was fun, though, and it always happens with Melody, that we sit and chill a little more in the bars, which is good. Now that we're down to a relatively small number of bars, it's probably even better, since we aren't going to be gunning for 5 or 6 in a night much anymore.

Melody was about to pay, but then Billy insisted on picking it up, which is a very admirable trait about the Irish, the picking up of rounds. I still owe a round to a random group of Irish guys in Ireland who I'll never see but who had to hurry off to a meeting so that I didn't get to buy my round. And so we have a new sponsor, and we're grateful.

Finally everyone finished their drinks, and we decided to hit one more place, a good idea as it turned out.

We stopped in at Pomodoro, which has a bar but isn't on the master list, just like Maya's a couple weeks earlier. I'm wondering how many of these places there are. In Pomodoro, it was a little area of three tables and five bar stools, but it's still there. We sat at first at the bar, but a bit later, after surveying their menu, decided to get tapas and moved to a table.

The owner, as he must have been, was charming and engaging, constantly stopping by to talk with us. The drinks were pretty good, even if Melody eventually cast hers to the ground. (It was an accident, but it was kind of funny, because she knocked her own glass out of her hand with her other hand.) The food was pretty decent, too, the perfect amount of nibbly things for the group of us.

And again, we sat and talked and drank and ate for a while, perhaps a bit more than an hour, and it was good. We always have such a great time going out with Melody. She always tells us we need to call her more often, and of course, she's right.

Brad, feeling bad about having only one sponsorship, and from 400 bars earlier, had decided to pick up this one as well, and after a few attempts to offer him money for food, everyone gave up and let him pay for it all, and we were all happier for it. Thanks to Brad for coming out and picking up a bar, you're a hell of a guy.

Brad had to go, and Brandon was getting tired, so we pretty much called it a night after Pomodoro, and everyone went home. Billy's staying in town for a while, so hopefully we can get to go out with him again before he takes off. He's a good guy, and I think we amused him a bit. So it was a good night, really.

Type: Nightspot
Class: Average

Playland has two parts, but we only went to one of them. One side is what used to be Arena or any one of about 12 different establishments in the last 3 years. That side is a dance club. The other side is the kitchen and cold chillin’ area. We went to the kitchen side. That side is great. It is filled with tons of classic video games. Here is a failry complete list: Tron, Joust, old pinball, missile command, Pacman, Ms. Pacman, Defender, and while not classic, my favorite: Medieval Madness Pinball. There are other classic video games, but I got the important ones.

The drinks come in tacky plastic cups and they are really strong. Normally I would mark them down for that, but really it just added to the experience. At the far end of the “current” video games, was a guy who was playing a lot of this deer hunting game. He had a look in his eye that just wasn’t right. He needs to have that checked out. It could be pink eye. “There have been some amazing advances in topical creams”

Walking freely around the bar was a large mangy dog. It looked to be a cross between a large ugly dog and large fucking ugly dog. It had a sloped face and a half exposed grin made it look like the dog equivalent of a yokel. The dog poked at us for a little while and then tried to eat whatever was on the ground beneath my feet. Thankfully it went away when we tried to get rid of him.

Damn. Jason said that this was going to happen and I really hoped it wouldn’t. I have something funny written in my notes and I can’t remember what it means. Well, here it is, maybe Jason will post what it means.

“Once again the Jews have conquered pork.”

It makes me chuckle but I don’t know why. I am getting a recollection. I think I ordered some food with bacon or ham or something. Damn, I just can’t remember.

I am glad to see that the old video games from the other (now torn down) video game place have found a new home. Now hopefully it won’t follow its predecessors and be gone within the year. I give them 4 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

It's getting to be a real pain to get Brandon to go out. He's just not up for it so much any more. That's why there haven't been many (any) bar entries from the last while.

Oh, sure, he's got good excuses. "I have to do some paperwork." "I've got to train my replacement." "I'm on the other side of the continent." Yeah, whatever. Like any of those, with the possible exception of the other side of the continent thing, should slow us down.

And now he says, "We need to go out this weekend, but I'm busy Friday." Hel-lo, isn't Friday night part of the weekend? But, okay, he's got something going on, so fine, we won't go out. Ah, but then it's not til 8 and he's (surprise) actually willing to go out before. So a couple bars, maybe.

Hopefully, this is just temporary. Hopefully he'll get back into stride. He did have all that "other side of the continent" shit going on.

Until then, good luck with "something" Brandon.

Due to circumstances beyond anyone's control, Glen's having to drop out of the sponsorship game. We've still got a couple bars to pick up for his list, and we'll make sure they're good ones, but the whole thing came up so suddenly there was no way he could continue his long distance support.

I haven't said it enough, but I'm deeply grateful for all Glen has done for this quest, from the moral support to Brandon, to the very material support vis a vis the drinking, to the web site work he did for the new front page and interior layout stuff. And it sucks that he's having to stop even a part of that, and it sucks that it's for a shitty reason, rather than the far more sensible, "I'm just fucking sick of that Jason character."

So to Glen, I raise a glass and toast your brilliance.

By the way, El Gaucho's conditional status will be gone as soon as we get an update. You'd love it, so it should be fully yours.

The current total for Glen is 36 sponsorships, with two more to come as far as I'm aware. So due to his unfortunate need to drop out of his much-appreciated sponsorship gig, he'll end up with a total of 38.

Wolf has 32. That's a gap of 6, out of not so many remaining bar.

Will we see a shift in the leadership of sponsors? I don't know, but I'm keeping my eyes open to see if Wolf makes the move.

Type: Nightspot
Class: Midscale

This comfortable nightspot was recently remodeled about 3 months prior to this review. So if you haven’t been there recently, you need to go back. Ben and Casey have really turned the Zig Zag into a place where you can lounge comfortably with excellent drinks and good food.

We spoke with Ben for a long time and while he was both entertaining and quite knowledgeable, his place in our memory was set when he spoke the following phrase, “You mean Cassis-my-ass.” And with that phrase his greatness was assured. Ben is friendly, good looking (objectively speaking), pours a great drink, and has a number of interesting tattoos. My favorite is written in Arabic and says, “Do good, get good. Do evil, get evil.”

The door opens onto a long curved grey slate bar. Vases with a single red rose added a touch of color. In the back there are large semi circular booths that look really comfortable, but weren’t. I hope that it is simply that the booths need to be broken in, rather than that they just suck. Hanging on the walls were two oil paintings by the same artist. They were just incredible looking. Jason loved the one on the far wall which was of the underside of a bridge and a field of grain (I believe that is what it looked like.) It is really simple in composition, but very beautiful.

Ben mentioned that he had worked over at the Waterfront and knew Jesse. He talked about how Jesse first introduced us to amazing Rum. Ben then had us try some of their rum selection. We tried an Angoston 1824 that was truly excellent. There were some other rums, but the most interesting in concept was Old Havana. Old Havana is brandy aged in rum infused casks. It really tasted like rum.

Their menu is a little on the pricey side, but we had some tasty calamari with some excellent focaccio. Sitting next to us was a guy named Mark. He was friendly, but a little to far on the drunk side to make meaningful conversation. He really wanted to be part of our little experience, but it didn’t really work out. The crowd here was young and good looking, but mostly couples.

I really liked the Zig Zag Café and suggest that you make an interesting two fer of your evening by visiting the Zig Zag and Typhoon on the same evening. You won’t be displeased. I give the Zig Zag 5 Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Midscale

When I was at Miriani, I got a whiskey coke that tasted like Tequila (foul!) It has happened a couple of times since, and I could not figure out why until now. The older bartender poured the drink and handed it to me. I immediately tasted the Tequila foulness and asked him what he was using. He indicated that it was Potter’s Bourbon. After he replaced my drink with a different crappy whiskey the problem was solved. So, if your Whiskey and Coke tastes like Tequila, then it is because they are using Potter’s Bourbon. Go back to the bar, call them on it, and then bitch them out for using utter crap that mixes improperly. They may even thank you for it.

El Nino, which means child in Spanish, was the theme of this Mediterranean restaurant. There were busts of the blowing winds (children’s faces) behind the bar. Numerous other small statues of (usually angelic) children were scattered about the place. The crowd was totally downtown yuppie. The smell from the kitchen was caramelized onions and spices. The drink, once fixed, was fine. That was until we were charged $5.50 plus tax. They have a large Tequila selection, but they don’t have the bottles that matter.

I give El Nino 2 Martini Glasses out of 5. It is nice enough, but it is not a drinking destination by any means.

-wOOt

Type: Restaurant
Class: Average

After 3 tries, we have finally managed to successfully hit the Cha Bar. We first saw the sign for its coming in the smoking hulk that was Avenue One. Alright, it didn’t burn down, but its passing has left a smoking hole in our memory. We have decided, that after visiting the Cha Bar, the Avenue One is our most missed Dead Bar. The Cha Bar may do some good food (I recall the appetizers being decent) but they mix a weak, expensive drink.

Our first try to hit them failed because while they had their license, they did not actually have any booze yet. Our second try failed because they still did not have any booze. We ended up getting appetizers though because we were waiting for Star to make an appearance. This was the night that we all went to Figaro Bistro.

Finally, on our third try we got in, sat at the beautiful Avenue One copper bar, and drank our crappy drink. The staff was friendly in that way that only Asian servers can be. They are attentive and helpful, without ever actually saying anything. I am not sure if it is a cultural trait or if it is because they don’t understand half of what I am saying.

I give the Cha Bar 1 and a half Martini Glasses out of 5.

-wOOt