*sorry*

I survived another Saturday, and that’s always my goal. This one was a little different than usual.

The birthday boys’ Barretto bar crawl was on tap to commence at 3 p.m., so I escalated the completion of my daily routines and then headed into town to join the party.

The first stop was the Outback bar.

Wasn’t sure what to expect, but we started off with a dozen or so partygoers.

Second stop was Alley Cats, my old darts haunt.

The birthday boys took turns picking the next bar to visit, and I’m not clear if it was by happenstance or design, but each bar was on the opposite side of the highway from the previous one. That f’n road is especially bad with weekend traffic, add multiple beers to mix, and we were playing with fire. I’m happy to report that we suffered no casualties on the night.

The third stop was Thumbstar. This is a bar I don’t frequent much, but it is actually quite nice. My reasons are personal, but it might be time to let them go. I also had a couple of chicken shwarmas here for dinner, and there were very tasty.

We made an old favorite of mine, Wet Spot, our fourth bar of the night. So, at a consumption rate of two or three beers per bar, the buzz was on. One of our group was spending big on the bar girls, pulling the rope and throwing balls on stage at 1500 pesos a pop…I counted at least three pulls.

After Wet Spot, we visited the newest bar in town, a place called The Gentlemen’s Club. I’d never been there, so obviously hadn’t had the opportunity to review it yet. I’ll go back and do that another time. First impressions: Tiny place, but they have a stage and dancers. The dancers have bellies similar to mine. Still, it had a friendly vibe going. And then something a little strange happened. I’m sitting against the wall on the opposite side of the bar. I look up, and the bartender gestures for me to come over. Naturally, I complied. When I sat down, she said, “I know you.” I asked how she knew me, and she said I saw you on the mountain. What? What mountain? When? She told me it was earlier in the week above La Union street. Ah, that would have been Monday’s Hash. And then I remembered–at the top of the steps, a group of women and kids were sitting around, and I gave them cookies.

Still looking fine for 38 years old. One kid, a daughter who is twenty. And then it gets even weirder–her daughter works in the bar too! She pointed her out to me, sitting with one of the guys from our group. I wouldn’t mind getting to know mama a little better. I sent her a friend request on Facebook while I was still in the bar, but as of this writing, she’s not responded. That’s okay. I know where she works and kinda know where she lives. 🙂

Crossed the highway again and went to another bar I haven’t visited in over a year–Bottom’s Up. Didn’t see anything last night that makes me want to come back anytime soon.

And then we dodged cars again to visit another bar I’d never been to before, aptly named The Secret Bar.

It’s another very small bar, but it also has a stage and some dancers. To be honest, everything is very vague at this point in the night, and I have no recollection of what the staff looks like, other than I seem to remember one of them being “a girl with something extra,” if you know what I mean.

I had gotten a message from Lydell asking me to visit her at Snackbar, and I told her I would try. After The Secret Bar, the remaining members of the group crossed the road to It Doesn’t Matter. I chose not to join them. When I got in the trike, I was thinking I’d have one last beer at Snackbar, but then I realized that would be a mistake. I was more than drunk enough, and it was past my bedtime. I’ll try to hit Snackbar after I feed Joy and the girls at Hideaway tonight.

Here’s Jim, one of the birthday boys at IDM, looking about the way I was feeling at this stage of the night. I started two hours earlier than normal and finished over an hour late. I was very near the stage of putting the crawl in bar crawl. Glad I didn’t!

And there you have it, dear readers, the long-awaited bar crawl post! I hope to make this a semi-regular feature (hey, any excuse to drink some beers works for me, besides, I’m going to drink them regardless). And I’m going to learn to make a damn map. Promise.