We don't rent pigs.

Things Which Make for a Good Bar

--Bag/coat hooks under the bar. I will not linger if I gotta fucking stand there with all my shit over my arm, or sit on my coat on the barstool, or whatever, while I’m tryna drink.

--A foot rail under the bar and under all high tables. It’s a lot less fun than you might think to sit there with your feet dangling all night like some neglected little kid at his rich grandparents' dinner party.

--Configurable barstools. No good having them bolted to the floor at equal intervals or so big and heavy and furniture-y that you can’t move them around to accommodate groups of various sizes and makeups.

--A specialty. Every bar ought to have something it does that is interesting or different or local or whatever, in addition to the basics.

--Nooks. Ever been in one of those joints that’s just, like, one big room, like a Chinese buffet restaurant at a mall? Depressing. No sense of intrigue.

--Dimness. See above. I came to booze it up and talk too loud – don’t make me do it in a setting that’s lit like my fucking office.

--Music. Live, juke, bartender’s iPod broadcasting from the dock back of the bar – doesn’t matter, as long as some human picked it out and it’s playing at the right volume to suit the atmosphere.

--Proper bathrooms. Many of you who’ve been in agreeance (as the great philosopher and wordsmith Kid Rock once said) up til now will balk at this one – but listen: I just mean the ladies’ room at least has to be:

A) Possessed of more than one stall. See above, re: DRINKING.

B) Operational. Each toilet unit has to have a seat, and a working flush mechanism.

C) On the premises (yes, I’ve been to bars that make you exit the building to find the toilet).

D) The approximate cleanliness level of the bar area itself – it’s all relative, and what wouldn’t make me blink at a dive bar will put me completely off my feed in a place that features a lot of fritzy little ‘tini drinks on a hardbacked menu, you dig?

A Thing Which Makes Me Laugh (an occasional series)

Literal New Yorker cartoons. [hat tip: Mr. Gleemonex]
(Note: I do not generally laugh at actual New Yorker cartoons, though as a twelve-year subscriber to the mag, I have read pretty much every one they’ve run in that time … it’s a compulsion. Tractor-beam action.)