Читать книгу New York City's Best Dive Bars - Ben Westhoff - Страница 13

Alibi

242 Dekalb Ave (Clermont Ave and Vanderbilt Ave) Transit: G to Clinton-Washington; C toLafayette Ave

(718) 783-8519

Normally, I took notes for this book by sending myself text messages, as I stopped using pen and paper after the bartender/lap dancer at Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge ripped my notebook out of my hands and began reading my assessment of her dump aloud.

However, at Alibi I sort of lost my head. I’d heard that the venerable Fort Greene garden-level watering hole was a writer’s hangout, and therefore I didn’t think anyone would give me grief for jotting down notes in my Mead. And they probably wouldn’t have, either, if I hadn’t done it while peeing. “That’s what I call multitasking!” chided the gaunt guy with the cigarette behind his ear at the urinal next to me. He then proceeded to compare me to women who drive while applying make-up. “In America, we’ve got to cut that shit out!” he concluded. Walking out of the rest room, he proceeded to flirt with my friend Anna—a different Anna than my wife Anna, but still—and then, to top it all off, he bounced the cue ball off of a bumper and sent it directly into the corner pocket on the other side of the pool table. Damn.

But who cares? Alibi is the perfect dive bar, equally grungy and comfy. “It seems kinda borderline welcoming, almost,” said Anna’s husband Justin, nailing it. The tin ceiling hangs low, the fireplace props up 8 Ball trophies and is full of debris, and the unvarnished wooden tables have an eighth-grade girls’ school worth of gum under them. The bartender calls the Brooklyn Lager simply “Lager,” like they do with Yuengling in Philly; that might be because there’s not much else by way of selection. They’ve got a dozen bottles of Jameson behind the bar and seemingly little else, but my happy-hour serving of said Irish whiskey was only $3, so there’s that. And Anna’s Coke was free.

In conclusion, yes, Alibi is a writer’s bar, but don’t get cocky.

Dive Bar Rating