Goofing Off on Saturday with Bombers and Beer
After spending Friday wretching from what I suspect may have been a mild case of salmonella poisoning, when I woke up feeling refreshed on Saturday I knew it would be a perfect day to spend the day goofing off.
I spent much of the day on my roof watching the 2006 KC Aviation Expo. Living directly acros the Missouri River from the Downtown Airport, I had a great vantage point. I shot several dozen photos of planes buzzing just overhead, however I had to use my film camera so it will be a a few days before I have them available for posting.
During lulls in the show I overheard a few dumb conversations among my fello roof-squatters. Such as:
Gal: "I'm going to the Waldo Crawldo tonight with some people from work."Guy: "Is that in Waldo?"
Gal: "Yeah. I'm not really sure where it is but I hear it's a cool area."
Guy: "I think it's around 95th & Metcalf."
Gal: "I think it's near the 75th Street Brewery."
Guy: "Ah, I've heard of that place, supposed to be good. I think it's more around 80th & Quivira."
(The name of the brewery gives a pretty obvious hint as to one cross street. And Waldo is in Missouri, not way out in Overland Park. It's 75th & Wornall, people. Know your city. Sheesh.)
Or this gem, from a lady chatting on her phone and trying to figure out where to get food for 3 teenage boys she had with her.
"I don't think there's anything open around here. They want pizza but there isn't a Pizza Hut around here and no one else delivers. Yeah, there's McDonald's, but the closest one is across the river. No, there's no other restaurants around here. At least not anything that's open"
(Yes, there is a Pizza Hut nearby that delivers, as well as 4 other pizza places within 4 blocks that also deliver if needed. There's a McDonald's at 11th & Main that's open on Saturdays. Plus a dozen or so other open restaurants within 4 blocks of us that were open. Plus City Market with tons of stuff only a block away -- she could have even gotten the boys hot dogs and funnel cakes there.)
During the Blue Angels performance my buddy Brandon showed up and we left to do a little barhopping. Our first destination was intended to be Knuckleheads, but we spotted another place on our way there...
Stop 1: River's Edge Cafe [map] A basic little diner that only serves breakfast and lunch (kitchen closes around 1:00-2:00) but remains open as a small bar for the rest of the day. There were probably about 3 or 4 other people here.
Upon leaving we turned right when we should have turned left. So instead of Knuckleheads our next stop became...
Stop 2: Tom's Bigger Jigger [map]
A well-worn place with a large sqaure-shaped bar and about a dozen patrons. Our bartender, Norma, was a friendly older woman. One of the patrons attempted to give us directions to Knuckleheads but her instructions were so convoluted we decided to find it for ourselves.
Stop 3: Karen's Kozy Kabin [map]
This is one of the smallest bars I have ever seen, it was a full house with approximately 6 patrons. Though 2 months ago it "expanded" -- in that they knocked a hole in the west wall and slapped up a quick ceiling and plywood exterior over their former beer garden to make room for a pool table. There is still a very small patio in back, it looks like it had seating for about two. Draft beer here is served in mason jars.
We headed down to Cliff Drive to look out over the East Bottoms and get our bearings. After a long convoluted journey we finally found North Chestnut and made our way to the right area.
Stop 4: Knuckleheads [map]
This is by far one of THE coolest places in KC. If you like the blues at all, you HAVE to check this place out. Indoor and outdoor stages, huge amounts of indoor and outdoor seating (and the indoor seating is easily converted to open-air when the weather is nice) and great talent.
We then did some massive backtracking in order to hit...
Stop 5: A.J.'s [map]
Brandon had told me about this place before. He had seen a customer bring in a shopping car that had a TV in it, and while drinking a cockroach crawled in and meandered across the the bar. So naturally I had to see this place.
I didn't come across any roaches, but before we left a customer did come in with a shopping cart full of groceries.
With 5 beers in us we decided it was time to stop driving. We did a quick check around Columbus Park to see if there was a bar we didn't know about (nope, just Caddyshack, which we've already been to) and then dropped the car off at my place. The rest of the night was on foot.
Stop 6: Dos Hombres [map]
We stopped here due to being hungry. I think I have now figured out the pattern. If you get seated in the middle room, you get good service. If you get seated in the front room, you get shitty service. We were seated in the front room. We found it very hard to bring ourselves to even leave a tip.
We had planned to go to The Red Front next but were worried Zoo Bar might close, so we decided to skip it for now. But on the way to Zoo Bar is Stables Bar & Grill, our next planned stop. But when we arrived, they were... closed??? WTF?!? Why would a bar with 3 major residential towers within a block and a half and close to several other viable bars be closed on a Saturday?! It makes no sense at all!
So next we headed on to one of my faves, The Zoo Bar. It was right at dusk, but, score!, they were open!
"Sorry, boys, we just closed," the bartender said as we stepped inside.
Arrrrggghhh!
Unaware that Willie's Pool Hall was now open, we embarked on a very long walk over to the next place on our list.
Stop 7: PR's Place [map]
The bar that doesn't look at all like a bar. After the long, hot walk our beers were welcome but not as cold as I'd hoped for. We watched a little football before heading on.
Stop 8: Jilly's [map]
I don't suppose I'll ever "get" this place. Here it was about 9:00pm and we were the only people in this place. This was the only place we went to all night that was empty. I just don't get a place being totally vacant at 9pm on a Saturday night. "We'll be packed after 10:00," the bartender said. I know they will be. But the DJ was already playing (to no one) and there was no cover -- why not arrive early and get in free rather than wait until you have to pay? Trendy places just don't make sense to me.
We wandered around the Crossroads for a while but were bored with the idea of going to trendy places and paying too much for beer. So we walked over to 19th & Main and hopped on the MAX. On the bus with us was a man carrying two large garbage sacks holding who-knows-what. He got off at Armour. We got off at 39th & Main. As we stepped off we were immediately greeted by an old man at the bus stop who shouted "Bunch of pussies! Kansas City sucks dick!" at us.
We headed west to Broadway and started walking north, and soon did a double-take after spotting an unidentified place that looked like a bar but looked like it was closed, though we noticed movement inside. We stepped inside thinking we'd found someplace we hadn't been before. It took two seconds to realize we were wrong.
Stop 9: Chez Charlie's [map]
It took no time at all to realize that we had indeed been here before. We had a beer anyway and then headed next door to...
Stop 10: Fitz's Blarney Stone [map]
We knew this would be our last stop because even though the MAX now runs north to the River Market until a semi-decent hour, Brandon lives in Waldo and the last one that goes to Waldo departs at around a ridiculously-early 11:30pm. So we dawdled by playing several rounds of bar trivia as we slowly sipped our beers.
When we left, since the MAX only runs every 30 minutes this late in the evening, we didn't want to spend a large amount of time dealing with the derelicts and scum at the 39th & Main stop. So we walked down to 43rd & Main instead. After several minutes Brandon's southbound MAX arrived, followed a few minutes later by my northbound MAX. Trash Bag Man re-boarded my MAX at Armour, his trash bag supply having grown by three. With that, a lazy day of goofing off drew to a close.