April 19, 2010

San Diego: Gaslamp II

Let's wrap up San Diego, shall we...

After filling up on Italian eats and resting back at the hotel. We headed out to the Gaslamp for one last night out on the town. We planned to check out a bar with live bands called Stage, but they were closed at 8pm. Despite all indicators saying they were open. Good news was another bar I was interested in happened to be located right next door. It is the Tipsy Crow. It's basically a 3-in-1 place with a bar, lounge and club.

It was Sunday so only the bar was open. Rather than happy hour they have this promotion called the drink exchange. It works just like the stock market, prices are based on demand. For example, when I ordered my first Stella it was $3.75, by the time we left it was $4.25. If you don't mind switching beers & cocktails I suppose you could totally work it to your advantage.





The bar had oversized games like chess, checkers and connect four. We passed on them all to play Shuffleboard. It's the one bar game I'm good at, naturally, I love to play. We played three games best of the three was the champion. Yes, that would be me. A group sat at the connect four table, so we had no reason to hang around. We checked back at Stage and caught them opening the doors. They said they would be open, but no one seemed to know when bands would take the stage. We opted to return later.

Next stop was the Shout House, the dueling piano bar. No cover on Sundays. We ordered drinks and took a seat near the stage. We had a couple rounds and enjoyed singing along to the tunes. One bit, had the room going... something about Lucille... You bitch! You slut! You whore! Good fun. The riot of the night was a girl celebrating her 21st birthday. They brought her on stage and had her sit on the piano, they sang her a song and then brought out a Blowjob Shot. They set it up so she had to take from one of the guys legs.




It was too funny. Made me want to bring my sister there to celebrate her 21st in August. She'd kill me, she doesn't even like to have "Happy Birthday" sung to her. As a kid, we mortified her by telling the restaurant it was her birthday. They brought her dessert and sang, she was in tears. I don't think she's forgiven us to this day.

Anyway, we grew hungry so it was time to head to La Puerta, we couldn't resist getting another fill of tasty Mexican food. This time we also sampled their Cadillac Margarita with Cazadores Anejo, agave nectar, fresh lime juice, and a float of Grand Marnier. It was sweeter than I prefer, but still tasty. Again, we snacked on their delicious chips and salsa.


Frank had the California burrito which was good, but Los Panchos is better.


I had Tacos Al Pastor. Fabuloso!


It was another great meal. From there we went back to Stage and caught a band mid-set. Not sure what their name was but we enjoyed the show. They wrapped and then we were off to find another bar, but it was a race against last call. We didn't make the cut off. We did find one club open, we thought we'd give it a try, but at 15 bucks each, not a chance. Instead, we accepted that last calls suck and went back to the hotel.

Monday came and time was winding down, one last trip to Con Pane Bakery and we were on the road headed home, back to the land of no last call. Just one more reminder that there is no place quite like home.

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