Bar – WHARVED

Sloppy Pour

Hello.
My name is James Arnettison.
In the following words,
I am going to enlighten you
on the perfect form that is
the sloppy pour.

First off, you might be asking:
“hey James, I gotta ask you something”,
and then I’ll say:
“well go on ahead”,
and then you’ll say:
“cool, thanks for taking the time to listen”
and I’ll say:
“of course, any time!”

It may take a few more exchanges
before getting to the question at hand,
which is this:
what is the sloppy pour?
Excellent question.
A sloppy pour is an upcharge
on a shot (the kind you order at a bar).

Rather than a neat pour,
where all the contents are neatly contained
within the confines of the glass,
the sloppy pour
requires virtually no skill.

The bartender is, in fact, encouraged
to waste alcohol
as they attempt to hit the glass
with about 80% accuracy (give or take,
depending on the establishment’s preferences).

The result is the perfect sloppy pour.
Those long ropes of vodka and tequila
will now be even ropier–
up to 30% ropier, in fact–
as bartenders are given the go-ahead
to wreak havoc on the bar top.

We can get into
the sanitary aspects of this practice
another time, though
liquor does tend to disinfect
more than it infects.

Inebriation

Nothing like total collapse of an ancient civilization to completely ruin your day–unless that’s just your business as a mercenary of the righteous lord of all things merry-go-round (circular logic and all, you see). I would have bought a nice cup or two of java if it weren’t for the beast of the west constantly sneaking up behind me and issuing edicts in the name of all things cylindrical.

This is truly a sneak peek of the upcoming legacy stalling that probably would have burnt out my retinas if it hadn’t been for that egregious charm manipulator staining everything they touch with naiveté. But if it weren’t for that unfortunate fabrication of logic, I wouldn’t be standing before you here today. We take our small victories wherever we can get them.

True story, folks. I only have several things to say at any given point, and in order to figure out which–if any–to engage in for the sake of our fallen ancestors (be their downfalls organic or orchestrated), I’m going to need to understand the frequency of my more lucrative brain farts. Only then will I contemplate counteracting the absurd impacts of ancient inebriation in relation to our contemporary neighborhood ecology. Ya dig?

But brain farts have nothing to do with our current predicament. We need to scrape down to the root of the issue before we can even think of attempting an exclusionary rift in downtown traffic patterns, and until you take this topic seriously, I’m going to have to cut you off. six tequila shots is probably enough anyway, wouldn’t you say?

(#373)

We are the TOXIC Group:

Tastemakers
Obligating
Xylophones
Into
Conversation

Our meetings typically consist of 30 seconds of clever xylophone-related banter followed by 48 minutes of unbroken claptrappery (occasionally punctuated by a sneeze or self-important cough that reminds folks in the group of their own flimsy mortality). The list of covered topics is indeed long and tedious; an indeterminate amount of talking points is covered multiple–sometimes numerous–times, with very little ceremony.

The talking points typically meander around with little consequence, and our staffers have learned to endure them long enough to get to the meat of the meeting: attempting to reach a quorum on where to go for pizza afterwards. There’s been a glut of new “artisanal” pizza joints in the area, not to mention the existing restaurants who need gimmicks to keep up.

Gino’s Northeast: an old school pizzeria with a hint of sports bar (now with 25% more sass back)
Donnie’s Bunker: war hero’s spot with authentic Vietnam War memorabilia
Skip’s Dugout: retired baseball star’s spot with authentic ’60s and ’70s memorabilia
Gugliotti’s: Sicilian-themed ristorante
Chunkster’s: Most Toppings Around!®
Steggo’s Dino-mite Pizza: self-explanatory
Jeffrey’s Tamborine: adults-only gaming and entertainment-related eatery (wine allowed in the ball pit)

This particular installment of the TOXIC Group (#373) eventually ended with a near-unanimous selection of kofta kebab, since there’s only one local option for that cuisine and we were rapidly running out of time. For the record, a good portion of the group rallied for the adult play place, but Susie’s new around these parts, and we want her to stick around for a month or two before we test her patience with a drunken happy hour.

Bully for Them

The very first horse-drawn carriage must have come as a shock to the ants taking their time crossing the land that at one point had never been designated specifically for human travel–and subsequent travails.

Now the unattached heel of a wayward boot has come across my plane of vision, and all of a sudden, horse-drawn carriages and ant opinions have no bearing over my perception as a red-blooded artist keen on taking over the world several well-placed poems at a time.

A long-suffering server has come to understand–a solid number of years ago, mind you–that people have no rhyme or reason when it comes to leaving their shit behind at a bar (even if they haven’t imbibed enough to lose their conception of personal property and the detriment of ignoring the objects directly surrounding them). Perhaps that very basic principle just isn’t present in their conscious minds in the same way as the long-suffering server–we’ll call him Frank.

Perhaps, just perhaps, they’ve transcended the idea of personal property entirely, to the point where everything is everything and nothing, and a backpack or purse or boot heel are inconsequential in the grand scheme of their lives. And bully for them.

Like this:

Like this:

Like this:

Like this: