Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Jim's Garage Liquor Lounge

Jim's Garage Liquor Lounge
4509 S Saginaw St
Flint, MI 48507

(810) 744-3670

**Note: We have more pics coming (ours got deleted). We have one really good one (thanks Ira)
Nights to go: Not sure, I'll have to go back a few times.
Nights not to go: I told you, I don't know!
Theme: Grandparents remodeled spare room
Decor: Office furniture
Bar: Nice bar
Bartender: Old dude, pours a mean whiskey
Proper ID: referred to as "paperwork"
Beer selection. Miller Lite-y

I always guessed this was a grimy hole with skull shaped dents in the door and just enough light to roll your own. I was way wrong. This is the most non-bar looking bar I have ever been in. Before I get into that though, how about that name? That's a damn good name. But it sure doesn't look like a garage. This looked like a brand new office that just opened up in an old bar and decided to leave the bar in. Its a mildly darker computer-monitor beige. Room was clean as hell. And the bathroom cleaner that most pint glasses.

And a old surly crowd. Well one guy was visibly irked that some people were in there that are obviously not collecting Social Security. But the bartender didn't care. We were paying and we had our proper paperwork, as he put it. My sister in law is a whiskey drinker and I think that helped our situation.


While we were hanging out a girl came in in with a cake shaped like boobs. It was for her dads birthday party later in the night. What a sweet girl.



Beer selection was similar to Rite-Aid's. Liquor selection was decent.

What to expect when you are expecting another beer:
• foot tapping
• anxiety
• bathroom break in a really clean bathroom
• sing along to a karaoke song
• need to check wallet to see if you can afford a 7th one
• realization you have a debit card
• sadness from an empty glass
• jealousy of the full glasses at the table
• choose a karaoke song
• the waitperson is good/bad even though s/he is ugly/hot
• another beer
• watch baseball highlights
• strong desire to check your phone, FIGHT IT!
• realization that you should have ordered some greasy food too
• monopolize conversation until you have beer to put in mouth
• eaves drop
• bomb a karaoke song
• eat a cake that looks like boobs

Saturday, July 11, 2009

Reexamination of the cost of beer


One of the things it's easy to forget when you live in Flint is how expensive beer can be.

Photo courtesy of Sokwonele-Zimbabwe on Flickr


I've been living in Pellston (15 miles south of the Mackinaw Bridge) deep in the heart of tourist country for the last couple of months doing a temporary job. Whenever I go out to a bar around here I'm shocked when I have to hand over most of my paycheck to get a pitcher of beer.

Whenever friends come to Flint from out of town they seem shocked at the bill when we get it. I (being the mostly pessimistic person that I am) always assume that they think the bill is too high. Usually though they're shocked at the amount of change that they've gotten back. Last time we were at the Red Ribbon we got 6 shots for the big city price of a couple of Miller High Lifes.

In Flint, it's like happy hour all the time.