But when you coin a new word, only your age cohort will know it. Civilization’s collapse will come with the breakdown of inter-generational continuity, accelerated by the constant coining of replacement vocabulary…
This is how I define a dive bar. I call them “sad bars” - not a lot of smiles in there, and if one does appear, it’s only in passing, while reminiscing of better days. I’m not a bar person in general, but these places are definitely not my scene.
We always called them “shot and a beer” joints.
The meaning being that if you ordered anything other than a shot (preferably whiskey) and a beer you should be probably drinking somewhere else.
These establishments were notable for the old men playing cribbage and drinking draft beer at noon on weekdays, mounted fish and beer brand mirrors on the walls (extra points if there was an old Ham’s), and a tight knit clientele.
How about “dump bar”?
There used to be a great example in my yuppy neighborhood, called Sterch’s, which stuck out like a sore thumb between all the DePaul frat-boy bars. They had a hand-lettered sign in the window that said, “No Corona. No foolish drinks. Limited Dancing.” That seemed to be the perfect filter to discourage the Chads and Trixies while sucking in the folks looking for a real dive.
Ah, MOL is in Chicago. Years and years ago, even before the hipsters, Mike Royko wondered what was up with all the kiddies invading the city’s pool rooms. An odd intrusion into the old Nelson Algren environment. And: the little bastards weren’t just running the clientele out: they were running the tables! Royko surmised that these were the suburban kids who’d perfected their game in their parents’ rumpus rooms.
How about “shithole”?
a dive bar is where the floor is done in peanut shells.
Nah, then you would have to include the Long Bar in the super-luxurious Raffles Hotel in Singapore. That’s where the Singapore Sling was supposedly invented. Now they keep them mixed up and stored in large containers to serve to the tourists. They serve peanuts, and you’re encouraged to toss the shells on the floor, but you still can’t go in wearing shorts or open-toed footwear.
I think what you are talking about are what we called “alky bars” when I was in college. Bars for serious alcoholics who weren’t there to do anything but get drunk. They weren’t there to listen to music, play pool, eat food, or even really talk to anyone. They were there to get drunk, and probably lived with someone who limited the amount of alcohol that could be kept in the house, or who nagged them when they drank at home. A lot of people there arrived alone and left alone. Occasionally you saw someone with a newspaper, but never a book. Sometimes people at the tables talked, and there’d be a jukebox, but it didn’t get played much, and the music was really out of date. When it did get played, it wasn’t terribly loud, so you could still have a conversation over it.
The main reason anyone I knew in college went to these bars was that they were notoriously lax about checking ID, so you could get served even if you were under 21. The sports bars and live-band bars were always crawling with people with fake IDs (average age of patron: 24), had doormen who were trained to spot them, and caught about half of them, and the police raided those bars a lot. The police never raided the alky bars.
Oh, good one! How did I forget about that? I’ve heard that term around here before. That actually does intersect pretty cleanly with what I would call a “dive bar.” I don’t necessarily think a dive bar need be “sad.” My local dive can get quite odd at times (my favorite was coming in one night and there was only person at, I mean, near the bar–an old Polish guy passed out on the floor. The bartender instructs us to be aware of him and step around him. About an hour later, the Polish guy stumbles back into consciousness, and before he can even steady himself at the bar, the bartender has his next shot of vodka ready for him.) However, when there’s a group of people there, the atmosphere can get quite festive. And sometimes a bit combative. But I don’t think dives are necessarily sad places.
In my case, I’ve never seen a peanut-shel-on-the-floor bar unless it was a gimmick for a mid- to upscale bar. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a local dive with peanut shells on the floor.
I think the word you’re looking for is ‘real’. As in;
"Hey, let’s all head out to a dive bar, what say? "
MOL “Do you mean a dive bar? Or a REAL dive bar?”
Now you get to make your points about poser dive bars and real dive bars, and nobody need be confused! Win/win!
(As an aside, hubby’s current most favourite Tshirt, says dive bar on it. It’s from a beach bar frequented by dive masters, and their pupils, on the Andaman sea though! ‘Real’ dive bar, or not? Who can say?:D)
We could call them “Martini’s” after Nick’s place in It’s a Wonderful Life.
[QUOTE=Nick]
Hey look, mister - we serve hard drinks in here for men who want to get drunk fast, and we don’t need any characters around to give the joint “atmosphere”.
[/QUOTE]
It might be a little confusing, as there’s already a beverage by that name, but if you order one of those in a place like that you get what you deserve.
I miss the hell out of real bars. They are a dying institution.
In my day everyone had a “local”, a bar that you belonged to like a club. Everyone knew you and you knew everyone. If you lost your job everyone knew and an afternoon in the bar would result in at least three offers like* “I got a job laying tile in Evanston and I could use some help, I can give you $12 an hour. It’ll at least help till you find something…” * Your local was like family. You knew you would be helped and in turn you helped whenever you could. We went to each others weddings, funerals, and our children’s christenings. On more than one occasion we took each other in when one of us had no where else to go.
Chicago used to have a local just about every third block.
I miss those days.
In college I worked as a part-time gas station attendant. I used to give rides home to one of my co-workers when our schedules overlapped – a very working-class dude who lived near what seemed to be a pretty sketchy, rundown bar that always had a crowd milling about at 8 AM after the graveyard shift. When I asked him what it was like, he shrugged and said, “It’s the kind of place where you wait until you get inside to spit.”
Spit-on-the-Floor Bar, then.
At the next level down is Jimmy the Priest’s from The Iceman Cometh
How about a “two-holer?” A Men’s and a Women’s restroom, only one toilet per. And you could mention no-craft draft.
How about calling them “Archie Bunker” bars?
You young folk today probably don’t even know who Archie Bunker was…He was the stereotypical workin’ class man (and also the first realistic character to appear on prime time TV with a non-glamorous lifestyle.)
(yes, kids—that’s how old I am—I watched the original “All in the Family” on a black and white TV)
How about “dump”?
I’d call them Mafia bars.