Stout is one of those bars that you may like, but everyone else thinks sucks. It is a block away from Penn Station and Madison Square Garden, so its clientele is high in douchbagery. Never the less, the bar is HUGE, with 3 floors and a grand total of five separate bar areas. It has the main bar, a dining room upstairs, a backroom for private parties, a downstairs dining room, and a ‘dart alley’ bar downstairs. Even with its high commuter crowd, there is always room here. The food is pretty tasty and the tap list is impressive at the main bar. They often have cool bands play on a small stage above the bar, and host tons of special events. I busy bar of nothing else.
My history with this bar is not lengthy but mildly complex. I found out about it when an actress I used to work with worked there. She recommended that we rent the back room out for a huge 4-way birthday party we were planning. That party, known as the ‘Quad Birthday’ featured 20 year old Irish whiskey and karaoke; it was a huge success. We threw two more parties there (another birthday and a Theatre fundraiser) both blowouts even without a group sing along to “The Weight”.
The only other times we would go there was for a beer after going to the Garden. Rockstar can sometimes access his corporate seats, which are amazing. We went to a Ranger’s game and were 2 rows from the ice. In club seats, they have waiters who get you beer and food, and use wacky computers to have your food brought to you by the time you finished paying the guy who took your order (what an age we live in). After such a decadent sporting event, we would head to Stout for a post game beer, the only time such a trip was made.
Then around February, something dangerous happened. Teach got a job there as a bartender.
The last time Teach tended bar, it was at an upscale Midtown restaurant called Mix. He bartended there for around a month, then the place went out of business (the two events are unrelated, trust me). The closing was a mixed blessing, as it was fun to get apple martinis comped in a fancy restaurant bar, but if he had kept working there, I would be dead broke. I went there so often, the staff would get angry at me if I went more than three days without stopping by. This job did culminate in a Saturday night where we took over the whole restaurant after the bar closed, the entire staff heralded my extravagant tab, and Bourbon Samurai stole a bottle of Jack Daniels. Mix was also the spot where the nickname ‘Uber260’ was forged.
Needless to say, Teach working at a bar equals a good time.
So I have found myself spending many evenings after work chatting up Teach in Dart Alley, drinking a beer and munching on some bar food. Having a bar near the office where I know the bartender means the option of a happy hour pint is always on the table, even if all my friends are lame. This does not lead to a ton of drunkenness, just more time away from home.
So Stout holds a special place in the annals of NY drinking spots. Not the best, but much too good to ignore.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Ode to Drinking Games
Last weekend, I played flip-cup for the first time. For those unfamiliar, Flip-cup is a drinking game, a team relay race where two teams race to have everyone drink a shot of beer, flip their cup exactly 180 degrees, and move down the line. It is a rare drinking game where in general women are better than men (due, I suspect to the high skill quotient and low drinking quotient). While it will not get you wasted (or get me wasted, at least) it is a lot of fun.
In honor of learning said socially acceptable drinking game, I thought I would muse on the various drinking games I have played. Here they are, in order of awesome
4: Kings: I like playing cards. I like drinking tons of beer. Yet I have never gotten that much of a kick out of card drinking games. I would much rather have a couple of beers and play a card game than marry the two. It breeds annoying rule quoting and is generally too tense for my taste. Card drinking games are best served at all-guy weekends in the woods, where just drinking or just playing cards has become too boring, and a new form of entertainment is needed.
My favorite cards and beer story (besides many wonderful poker nights, but that is a different beast) is when Teach brought a deck of cards to the Continental, and we played Spades at the booth as we drank cheap beer. Again drinking + cards = good, drinking * cards = too much work.
3: Beirut: Also know as Beer Pong (but purists will tell you Beer Pong is technically a different game, a variation of Ping Pong including beer), Beirut is the frat boy standard. Two teams of 2, one long table, some Dixie cups and ping pong balls and off you go. While it gets a bad rap for its high douchbage following, Beirut can actually be a blast. It has a great balance of social interaction, physical activity, and inebriation. The average person can play the game, and drink the amount of beer required without getting blasted (for a game or two at least). Oddly enough, I never played this game in college. The only places I have played Beirut are in dive bars in New York, and with my siblings at my parent’s home in Westchester (my little sister needs to work on her game). Sadly, one such dive bar, Time Out, closed down (probably due to numerous health code violations), so if I ever get the urge, I will need to go hunting for a new dive.
2: Quarters: I have played two types of Quarters. In High School, I played Speed Quarters (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarters) which did a number on 16 year old Quantum, especially since I usually played with Lacrosse players, who beat me both in coordination and size. In college, I played a more relaxed variation, using only one glass and requiring everyone to take a single shot at the glass, and the person who sank it made the person next to him drink the glass (that person had one chance to make the shot, if he did, more beer was poured into the glass. Once we had a pot of 2 full glasses). I like both games very much (Speed is a little too intense though), but I find my stomach can no longer take the quick chugging required to play this game often. Hubris, Irish McJew, and I tried to play this game stoned once, and it was the saddest sight ever seen by men (McJew, it should be noted, is notably bad at this game).
1: Land Mines: This is the D-day of drinking games. Here are the official rules
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_mine_%28drinking_game%29. Make no mistake, this is the big one. My roommate Gangsta taught it to me at the end of junior year, basically shaving five years off my life. Playing it guaranteed someone was doing a porcelain prayer before the game was over (I would occasionally pull a booting rally, ah college). Playing this game required about 2 cases of beer and five or six of the craziest sonabitches you could find. The danger of the game is that its high consumption rate and nature of play (using the empties at Land Mines is the secret of the game) would often leave the game ending with threats of fistfights. On one of the earlier games played, Hubris was sitting on my right, and Gangsta was sitting on his right. Hubris was getting pretty drunk (one nice thing about Land Mines, it encourages casual drinking while playing a drinking game, hence getting really messed up) and was earning his namesake. He eventually got up the gall to land mine Gangsta. Now Gangsta was already better at the game than all of us, but since he was sitting on Hubris’s right, controlled how much beer Hubris had to drink on his turn. This act of pride resulted in Hubris being punished mercilessly the rest of the game, leaving him utterly wasted and enraged. We later than coined the phrase “Never go to war with the man on your right” in honor of that massacre.
Alas, I am reaching the age where drinking games are both immature and somewhat life-threatening, but I will always look back at the good old days, where flinging a ball or coin could cause another man to vomit. Salad days indeed.
In honor of learning said socially acceptable drinking game, I thought I would muse on the various drinking games I have played. Here they are, in order of awesome
4: Kings: I like playing cards. I like drinking tons of beer. Yet I have never gotten that much of a kick out of card drinking games. I would much rather have a couple of beers and play a card game than marry the two. It breeds annoying rule quoting and is generally too tense for my taste. Card drinking games are best served at all-guy weekends in the woods, where just drinking or just playing cards has become too boring, and a new form of entertainment is needed.
My favorite cards and beer story (besides many wonderful poker nights, but that is a different beast) is when Teach brought a deck of cards to the Continental, and we played Spades at the booth as we drank cheap beer. Again drinking + cards = good, drinking * cards = too much work.
3: Beirut: Also know as Beer Pong (but purists will tell you Beer Pong is technically a different game, a variation of Ping Pong including beer), Beirut is the frat boy standard. Two teams of 2, one long table, some Dixie cups and ping pong balls and off you go. While it gets a bad rap for its high douchbage following, Beirut can actually be a blast. It has a great balance of social interaction, physical activity, and inebriation. The average person can play the game, and drink the amount of beer required without getting blasted (for a game or two at least). Oddly enough, I never played this game in college. The only places I have played Beirut are in dive bars in New York, and with my siblings at my parent’s home in Westchester (my little sister needs to work on her game). Sadly, one such dive bar, Time Out, closed down (probably due to numerous health code violations), so if I ever get the urge, I will need to go hunting for a new dive.
2: Quarters: I have played two types of Quarters. In High School, I played Speed Quarters (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarters) which did a number on 16 year old Quantum, especially since I usually played with Lacrosse players, who beat me both in coordination and size. In college, I played a more relaxed variation, using only one glass and requiring everyone to take a single shot at the glass, and the person who sank it made the person next to him drink the glass (that person had one chance to make the shot, if he did, more beer was poured into the glass. Once we had a pot of 2 full glasses). I like both games very much (Speed is a little too intense though), but I find my stomach can no longer take the quick chugging required to play this game often. Hubris, Irish McJew, and I tried to play this game stoned once, and it was the saddest sight ever seen by men (McJew, it should be noted, is notably bad at this game).
1: Land Mines: This is the D-day of drinking games. Here are the official rules
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_mine_%28drinking_game%29. Make no mistake, this is the big one. My roommate Gangsta taught it to me at the end of junior year, basically shaving five years off my life. Playing it guaranteed someone was doing a porcelain prayer before the game was over (I would occasionally pull a booting rally, ah college). Playing this game required about 2 cases of beer and five or six of the craziest sonabitches you could find. The danger of the game is that its high consumption rate and nature of play (using the empties at Land Mines is the secret of the game) would often leave the game ending with threats of fistfights. On one of the earlier games played, Hubris was sitting on my right, and Gangsta was sitting on his right. Hubris was getting pretty drunk (one nice thing about Land Mines, it encourages casual drinking while playing a drinking game, hence getting really messed up) and was earning his namesake. He eventually got up the gall to land mine Gangsta. Now Gangsta was already better at the game than all of us, but since he was sitting on Hubris’s right, controlled how much beer Hubris had to drink on his turn. This act of pride resulted in Hubris being punished mercilessly the rest of the game, leaving him utterly wasted and enraged. We later than coined the phrase “Never go to war with the man on your right” in honor of that massacre.
Alas, I am reaching the age where drinking games are both immature and somewhat life-threatening, but I will always look back at the good old days, where flinging a ball or coin could cause another man to vomit. Salad days indeed.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Video game ruminations
It is a busy season for Video Games, and here are my thoughts on some big recent releases.
1: Grand Theft Auto IV: Honestly, not a huge fan. I appreciate the graphics and the scope of the Sandbox world it created, and the story is top notch but the actual game mechanics I do not enjoy at all. Driving is awkward and fighting is clunky. A problem with the series too is that is simulates stuff I could be doing myself. Virtual Bowling is not for me, I could just go freaking bowling!
A dangerous side effect of playing GTA is that after awhile, you start thinking the real world works the same way. You will be walking down the street, get tired of walking, and contemplate going over to a car in the street, yanking the driver out, and driving away, running any red light that slows you down. This is very bad.
There was an article in the Times a couple of weeks ago about how the actor who did the voice and body work for Nico was screwed out of tons on money. I feel little pity for the guy, as he still was very well paid for the work. I am interested by the idea that Video Games are making enough money that royalties are now an issue. This should be a cool discussion to track.
2: UEFA EURO CUP 2008: I have been playing this a lot with the boys, and it has been fun. The nice thing about a soccer sports game is that it can be played by anybody (Get the ball by the net, then shoot it, not hard to understand), but is better enjoyed by fans of the game. Although, much like watching The Beautiful Game, playing Euro ’08 can be both really fun and really frustrating. The controls have some funky spots and the nature of the sport can induce fits of rage. I do not play it that much with others because of this aspect, as the last thing I need when I come home from my stress inducing job is a video game designed to create stress. That and everybody else is better at it than me.
3: Metal Gear Solid 4, Guns of the Patriots: OH MY FRAKKING GOD! It is rare that a game can live up to gamer’s hype, but here it is. The graphics are truly Next-Gen, and the story is huge and multi-layered, making a point to tie up every loose end from the entire series. The game-play is the best the series has ever had, eliminating some of the more annoying tweaks from previous games. Having a stealth game take place in war zones is an awesome idea that allows for great visuals and creative game-play. Finally a reason to own a Playstation 3 besides a blu-ray copy of Talladega Nights.
MGS 4 has very much been a factor as to why this blog as been so slow of late. I finally have a reson for a quiet night home. Lucky for you, dear reader(s?) I have beaten the game, and will return to my drunken antics shortly.
1: Grand Theft Auto IV: Honestly, not a huge fan. I appreciate the graphics and the scope of the Sandbox world it created, and the story is top notch but the actual game mechanics I do not enjoy at all. Driving is awkward and fighting is clunky. A problem with the series too is that is simulates stuff I could be doing myself. Virtual Bowling is not for me, I could just go freaking bowling!
A dangerous side effect of playing GTA is that after awhile, you start thinking the real world works the same way. You will be walking down the street, get tired of walking, and contemplate going over to a car in the street, yanking the driver out, and driving away, running any red light that slows you down. This is very bad.
There was an article in the Times a couple of weeks ago about how the actor who did the voice and body work for Nico was screwed out of tons on money. I feel little pity for the guy, as he still was very well paid for the work. I am interested by the idea that Video Games are making enough money that royalties are now an issue. This should be a cool discussion to track.
2: UEFA EURO CUP 2008: I have been playing this a lot with the boys, and it has been fun. The nice thing about a soccer sports game is that it can be played by anybody (Get the ball by the net, then shoot it, not hard to understand), but is better enjoyed by fans of the game. Although, much like watching The Beautiful Game, playing Euro ’08 can be both really fun and really frustrating. The controls have some funky spots and the nature of the sport can induce fits of rage. I do not play it that much with others because of this aspect, as the last thing I need when I come home from my stress inducing job is a video game designed to create stress. That and everybody else is better at it than me.
3: Metal Gear Solid 4, Guns of the Patriots: OH MY FRAKKING GOD! It is rare that a game can live up to gamer’s hype, but here it is. The graphics are truly Next-Gen, and the story is huge and multi-layered, making a point to tie up every loose end from the entire series. The game-play is the best the series has ever had, eliminating some of the more annoying tweaks from previous games. Having a stealth game take place in war zones is an awesome idea that allows for great visuals and creative game-play. Finally a reason to own a Playstation 3 besides a blu-ray copy of Talladega Nights.
MGS 4 has very much been a factor as to why this blog as been so slow of late. I finally have a reson for a quiet night home. Lucky for you, dear reader(s?) I have beaten the game, and will return to my drunken antics shortly.
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