Others

Some people brought up a couple bars that escaped my mind, so I thought I'd address them here.

Lucky Lounge - this place, situated on 5th street, is actually pretty fun. Problem is, I always seem to use this place also as a jumping off point (and it only plays hip hop on Saturdays) so it's never one of the main places of the evening. Lapability and circumnavigability sucks here. Similar problem to the Wave. Service is pretty good though.

Red Fez - I like this place, I really do. It's hard for me to say much negative stuff about the place, but you don't have to look far to find it. You can't do laps in here, and if the (very small) dance floor is packed, good luck getting anywhere fast. The feung schwei in the place sucks, it could have not been designed more poorly. However, this place does have good music and a decent crowd.

Nights in the A

My friend Michael Pemulis offered this thoughts on the Austin bar scene recently and inspired me to do the same.

Just like MP, I tried to come up with my top ten Austin bars. Starting from an initial basket of 37 bars in which I excluded restaurants and hotels (The Driskill would easily be top 10 if I included hotels). I'll also pattern this post similar to his, going through my bars that did not make the top 10 for various reasons. Soon hereafter, I will post my top 10.

Neither of these bars have some one or two negative attributes in common, it's just for some reason they aren't in my top 10. I used evaluative measures similar to those of MP (crowd, service, navigability, lapability, danceability). However I did not use batting averages, run totals, or any other baseball analogy to measure my "hitting ability" at said bars (although arguably they could be a factor in my evaluation of the "crowd").

With that said, here goes:

11) 219 West -- I promise that MP and I do not really at all think alike when it comes to the Austin social scene, except for this. 219 would be in my top 10 except for the lack of a "scene" and a proper dance floor (which isn't that big of a deal for this place). But it is definitely a good launching pad, and it's physical position on 4th street makes it an easy walk to 6th, 5th, or the rest of 4th streets.

The rest of these are in no particular order:

Logan's -- I fucking hate this place. At one point, I simply refused to go there. As in, if all of my friends decided to go, I was going home. Generally terrible music (read: waspy 80's shit), terrible lighting (porkers become skinny, etc), overpriced gigantic beers, and the stark absence of diversity makes this place my third most hated bar in the city. But it's not all bad; this place has exactly three things going for it: (1) it serves pretty decent jello shots, (2) it's a few doors down from Spill, and (3) one day its owner will run out of money and close the joint.

Cedar Street -- surprise, surprise you say. Anyone who knows me knows I pretty much can't stand CS. I am certain this is in MPs top 10 (actually, it's in his top 5 and I'm so sure of this, I'd put my left arm on the line). Same shitty characteristics as Logan, except this place also charges cover on certain nights. The Chase doesn't pay cover. And the service sucks. I will say, however, that an inordinate amount of cougars (and probably a few snow leopards mixed in) give this place its only positive remark. Navigability here sucks too, and the bathrooms take forever to access.

311 -- I stopped going to frat parties for a reason. This place is a frat party exported to 6th street. Yes, there is some decent talent, but the bar is hard to service, the band/entertainment leaves a lot to be desired, and the crowd may be the most out of touch, stupid, overprivileged frat/sorority kids from all over Texas. 72% of all frat date rapes start here*. I don't go to this place.

Prague -- if I wanted to party with douchebags and the girls who jock them, I'd buy an Affliction and/or Ed Hardy t-shirt, join the MMA circuit, take steroids till my balls shrivel, grunt alot, and develop a massive, uncontrollable cocaine habit. Or I could just party at Scottsdale bars. Either way, I'm not going here. The place fails nearly every one of my criteria; it's hard to move around, wayyy too dark, terrible music, and inconsistent service. I'm waiting for the day this place is raided by the DEA and subsequently shut down.

Gruv -- see "Prague" above

Qua -- I generally dislike places that are "25 and up" but only enforce this (and dress codes) on select occasions. But even getting beyond this, Qua doesn't have much to offer. I don't need to pay $8 for a drink to watch a fish swim around in a tank that's not even kept clean most of the time.

Speakeasy -- this is almost a tie with 219 West, and could very easily be in my top 10. This place has a decent crowd, a couple of bars inside, but one hell of a hike if you're trying to go to the roof. You're literally climbing 150 stairs if you want to get up there. Good luck with that. Music is decent. Crowd lacks ideal level of diversity but it's manageable. Sometimes they have cover, which I don't like but I'd be up for going again.

Light -- super cool bar on 4th and Congress. Great music, good bartenders, decent dance area, and diverse, reasonably classy, crowd. I've liked this place since the first time I went there. This could easily be top 10. Problem is it doesn't get crowded till very late and there is a "second wave" element beginning to overtake this place.

Lavaca Street -- there's nothing wrong with this place, but there's not too much right with it either. Crowd is unremarkable, and the only reason to go here is for dollar beer night on Tuesdays.

Firehouse Lounge -- This place is like an upscale Spill, which is perhaps why it's not in my top 10. Awesome music and dance floor, but I have two gripes against this place. One, the bar is physically too high for my tastes, like it goes up to my fucking chin and I feel like a midget trying to order something. Second, it's too dark. I had an unfortunate incident back in 2005 at this place. Yes, it was a chick I was getting with, but when the lights came on I had to run for the hills.

Latitude -- any place with as big a dance floor that plays as much hip hop as Latitude would almost automatically be in my top 10. Add in the $2 JaegerBombs and you'd think I'd never leave. But it's not a favorite: (1) there is usually a line, which I don't do, and (2) the JaegerBombs aren't actually made with red bull, they use some other "energy drink" which tastes closer to Kobe Bryant's ass than it does to red bull.

Treasure Island -- T.I., to which it is commonly referred, is admittedly a terrible bar. The drinks are the worst I have tasted in Austin. I suppose this is what I get when I expect great things from 25cent well drinks on Wednesday nights. The crowd is definitely sketchy, although the girls here seems to have major self-image issues, which may help you break out of a slump. Unlike Pemulis, I think TI is the wost bar on 6th.

Pure -- my friend Gris flat out refuses to go here, and I don't completely understand why. Pure is admittedly a poor attempt to copy the namesake of the famous club in Caesars Palace, but it's got a decent crowd, great music, and it's relatively cheap. On the other hand, navigability in this place sucks, and the service is terrible. On top of this, they charge cover and I can't get in wearing flip flops (who thinks they can enforce a dress code on 6th street??). This place gets the thumbs down from me.

The Wave -- the first time I went to this place I wound up having a pretty good looking chick take me back to her place, so I suppose I had a good impression from the start. Upon further review, however, alot of stuff is wrong with this bar. Walking around this place is a chore, with the bar hitting you right as you walk in and there only being a 7 foot wide walkway for 400 people to try to traverse. If you can make it upstairs, you get a decent outside area, but can't really hear the music.

Shakespear's Pub -- this also could be in the top 10. This place may be the most underrated bar on 6th. They just opened up a separate room that's just a dance floor and they've got great music. The crowd is super chill, no dress code, reasonably priced drinks, and they just set up a nintendo wii if you want to play it. Plus the girls are hot. For some reason, this place just doesn't do it for me, probably because a bunch of super drunk people roll in around 1:30 (the pizza stand is right next door to this place) and are annoying.

Maggie Maes -- my chief problem with this place is the crowd. Everyone looks like they're about to walk out and roll straight to 311. No diversity whatsoever. I try everything I can not to go here unless I am with some gigantic group and can't really avoid it. As far as bar fundamentals are concerned, this place is decent. It's got a number of bars inside so you don't have to wait forever for a drink, decent service, a huge rooftop with a gigantic tv projection screen, and a lot of girls come here. The music leaves a little bit to be desired. I've never had any remarkable experiences at this place, besides always thinking I want to leave. Maggie Maes is out of the top 10 (and probably out of the top 20).

Ok, those are all the places that didn't make my top 10. I'll post my top 10 over the next 10 days, so check back often!!

*I made this up, but the actual number is probably close.

The Olympic Trials

In the spirit of the upcoming 2008 Summer Games and of general faux-douchebaggery (faux because I don't own, or even wear, Affliction or Ed Hardy or any other stupid screen-printed graphic tees when I go out), tonight I asked a friend to pull out a stopwatch at a bar to measure how long it took me to get some girl's number.

I was hanging out with a few friends at this bar, a pretty cool spot called XO in midtown here in H when the idea stuck me. Such ideas are rare given than I generally don't approach a ton of girls I meet in a bar (more on why I don't do this later), let alone challenge myself to accomplish certain ill-intentioned feats in front of people I don't know in the social equivalent of a track and field time trial.

Anyway, this group of 5 (2 girls, 3 guys) walks in and posts up next to us (4 guys). As usual, I observe their dynamic to see if the guys are "with" the girls. It becomes clear within about 2 minutes that they're not. Each of the girls bought their own drinks and the 3 guys all loaded up on to one tab. 3 tabs between 5 people. No way. Step 1 - Check. So one of the girls is pretty cute, although wearing a super ugly dress, and I'm thinking I'll go talk to her (at this point largely unaided by the effect of alcohol, so the wittiness/cleverness was going to have to come early tonight). Somehow I feel super confident (that's sarcasm, when have you known me not to be super confident?), so I ask my friend to run to his car, pull out his stopwatch, and see if I can talk this girl into my cell phone (and I into hers) in 3 minutes or fewer. So I throw in a fresh piece of ultra-minty gum and head for it.

I don't do pick up lines, never have, and I doubt I'll start anytime soon. So I cut right into whatever stupid conversation she was having with the other chick and begin to talk her up. I tend to talk about general stuff (probably part of my problem) when I meet girls unless something strikes me about her (this also helps explain my wristband habit). So I'm chatting her up, trying to be nice, but aware that I need to close fast. Somehow the conversation turns to personal stuff (guessing this was about the 1:25 mark) when she tells me she just had a kid. Having already found out she was 22 and already questioning why she's out at a bar on a Friday night (drinking nonetheless), I ask how old her baby was.

I'm thinking maybe she's got a 2 or 3 year old at home. Nope, not even close. Her baby was 3......weeks. Yep. Even showed me pics on her cell phone. After being polite and joking that at least she made her husband (knowing full well she didn't have one) stay home that night, I get the (almost expected) response that the father was "not in the picture."

I couldn't go any further. After having lost all respect for a chick who was out boozing after giving birth 3 freaking weeks earlier (plus she had bad breath), I had to fake a hamstring injury and stop the race. At 3:31 on the stopwatch, I decided I didn't want these digits. As fun as this game was (and I intend to play this again, probably a lot in Dallas), this was not the kind of quality I was looking for.

What was worse, for the second time in as many nights, I start talking up a girl who, unbeknownst to me, has a kid. The previous night it (at the Fict no less) was a 25 year old (who happens to be moving to Dallas soon) who disclosed her 3 year old at home. Arguably this was more ridiculous because somehow we started discussing baseball and her love for the Mets (she is originally a girl from Jersey). Evidently she named her kid Shea, after Shea Stadium, home of said New York Mets. People, I can't make this up.

I don't know what it is about me that makes me meet girls that already have kids (something I am definitely not looking for), but whatever it is needs to stop. This makes no fewer than four, FOUR, separate instances where this has happened. I don't think this is what Colby O'Donis meant in "What You Got." Responses from these Dallas chicks should be interesting.

That's all I got for now. The weekend was awesome. I'm sad that this is my last week in Houston for a long time.

Awesomely Ridiculous

Amidst all of the spectulation surrounding Brett Favre's initial interest in returning to the NFL, sports fans everywhere have taken to calling sports talk shows to propose their ideal return scenario for the future hall-of-famer. My sports talk show of choice these days is the Jim Rome show. Frankly, I think the guy is funny, although I don't think it's very substantive. Rome will literally make a statement and repeat the same statement five different ways to drive the point home. But for some reason I don't care. Anyway, today he had a guest host when a caller proposed that Favre, should he return, go to the Chicago Bears.

It is at that point when the guest host lost his mind and exclaimed that Favre going to 'Da Bears wouldn't work. His rationale, though completely absurd, was probably the funniest thing I've heard in at least two months.

He "argues": Lovie Smith (coach of the Bears) hates quarterbacks. In fact, if Smith could play the game without a quarterback, all would be right in the world for him. Smith would love to petition the league to allow the Bears to only play defense. How would this work, you ask? Smith would draft 52 defensive guys and then Devin Hester (to complete the 53-man roster). The Bears would only play defense against other teams. If the Bears stopped the opposing team, Devin Hester, the SOLE OFFENSIVE PLAYER ON THE TEAM, would return the punt. If he doesn't score, the other team gets the ball back automatically. Totally absurd idea, but funny as hell.

I bet the Bears would still make the playoffs under this system :-)

American Gangster

The movie is about the heroin drug ring led by Frank Lucas. This picture, which is real and actually did appear on the cover of the NY Times magazine (June 5, 1977), is of Nicky Barnes, one of Lucas' competitors. I thought it was interesting.