The Dubliner

So for my D bar I chose the Dubliner. I've gotta admit though, we kind of half assed this one. We basically just stopped by after work for some food and a drink and then went off to our respective Friday night activities. I did have some tasty fried oysters and there was some Magner's cider to be had, so it wasn't an entire failure on our part (that came later in the night when I drank too many long island iced teas and lost my wallet on the metro).

It wasn't entirely our fault though. False claims had been made on the interweb about so called "Irish Fridays."* These claims involved $3 Yuengling, half price appetizers, and live Irish music. None of these were true.

*Why one day has to be specifically referenced as "Irish" at bar called the Dubliner I never understood.

Real specials were $4 Blue Moon and Sam Adams. Fine, but we'd been lured by falsehoods.

Chef Geoff's

I've heard a lot about the Chef Geoff's happy hour basically since I've lived here, and the specials are pretty bitchin.

The main attraction is the SuperMug, i.e., the almost 40 for when you're taking a break from the Schlitz: 33.8 ounces of draft beer. They have some pretty good options too. I got a Magic Hat #9, and there was a winter cask ale and a nut brown. The mugs are $7.95 at happy hour, which goes all night on Mondays and Tuesdays. Monday is also half priced bottles of wine night, which we didn't actually take advantage of on account of our liters of beer, but I saw some on the list that sounded worth it. There are specials on burgers and pizza too.

The down side was that I couldn't really lift my beer without threatening to give myself tendinitis, but it did help me take the edge off of my crappy week. And yes, I do realize that it's Monday.

Highlights of the night included realizing the napkin was resting on the candle, Teresa realizing the bar used Papyrus font and regretting having set foot in it, hiding from Ebo and Danielle for no reason but having them totally not notice, Ryan getting confused between northwest and northeast, and meeting the Duke of Ebo's neighborhood on the walk home.

Bourbon

After Asylum, I decided to kill two birds and head a few doors down to Bourbon. This was definitely a very different scene. We went straight upstairs, but it looked like the first floor was pretty quiet, with some nice tables and mood lighting. The second floor was a more crowded dance scene, so we worked our way over to the bar by the front windows.

As soon as the bartender handed us the leatherbound volume of a drink list, we knew we were not in the land of 50 cent Natty Light anymore. In fact, I think even the Miller Lite was about $6. Luckily for me, as I was looking it over I felt someone tap me on the shoulder, and it was a guy who works in another office on my floor with a beer in his hand for me. Score.

Later I got lucky again when the Weave realized she'd overindulged while beating the clock, so she gave me her almost full old fashioned. I must say it redeemed the bar a little for me, as I guess a bourbon drink had better at this place. Another friend told me later that the bartender made a mean Rob Roy too.

We got down to business, clearing a large area for Ebo to tear it up to. Well, not exactly....his dancing just kind of cleared it on its own. Apparently it was not large enough though, cause he did a crazy kick thing and ninjaed the glass Sarah had right in half.

I'm not sure exactly how the Bud Light got broken (I hear it involved Katherine somehow) but it seemed to happen at the same time, so they both got in the picture.

Later there was a dance off between Ebo and this other guy we didn't know, resulting in the other guy being seriously owned. And then them becoming best buddies. I guess that's how these things work.

Asylum

For my first step along my journey of 26 new DC bars, I chose Asylum, a dark and kind of gritty Adams Morgan dive that hosts live music. It reminded me of a place you might have seen a punk band in the 80s.

We went down to the basement, which had some vinyl booths tucked into nooks, but these were all taken, so we pulled up some rickety tables to a long bench along the wall. There's a pool table down there too, which we definitely spilled a lot of beer on at one point...

The real reason to go to Asylum on Saturday nights is that they do a beat the clock special, where beer starts at 50 cents at 5 pm and goes up by that much each hour. We got there at 6 and still got pretty drunk for less than 10 bucks each. The beer wasn't great or anything (I think it was Natty Light?) but for a price you could probably find in your couch it wasn't bad.

I hear they do a good vegan brunch on weekends too. But it has real food too (I made sure).