What are the signs you're in a really good dive bar?

[LynneSin]

Is it the sticky floors?
Is it a jukebox with nothing older than 1984 on the selections?
Is it the crappy selection of beverages except that one really really good beer on tap?

What are your signs that you're in a really really good dive bar.

Me:
Must NOT have a website on the internet
Must have just one bathroom used by everyone
Must have a pool table

That's just a start

[davidinalameda]

1. the drunk passed out in the corner

being used as a coat rack

[Worst Username Ever]

2. Good mozzerella sticks.

[kick-ass-bob]

3. When its name is...

Dive Bar of Raleigh

http://www.zspotlight.com/establishment.asp?EstID=9967&EstSub=specials

[Richardo]

4. One of my favorites when I lived in Denver: "Warm beer, lousy food"

...was the sign out front. :D

[Jessica]

5. If it has one of those

mirrors with a deer painted on it in the ladies room. Then you know for sure. :D

[theboss]

6. Easy: It sells cans of beer, not bottles

Pittsburgh had a lot of bars like that.

Also, if there is a patio, it should be made of badly-placed cinder blocks.

[demnan]

7. When they beat the shit out of your boyfriend

and you leave with a marine.

[davidinalameda]

14. what if the marine leaves with your boyfriend

that means its a gay dive bar

[XNASA]

8. Blind Robin Snacks

Pickled eggs on the bar?

Yellow ceiling?

[Blue-Jay]

9. They feature Stag Beer.

In cans AND on draught.

[ewagner]

10. Peanut shells on the floor.........

....you ask for a "fancy" mixed drink (e.g. Tom Collins) for your date and the bartender ignores you and serves a whiskey and coke.....

[uncle ray]

36. ahh, you nailed it!

i was hopin nopbody would use the "whiskey and coke" example!

my favorite dive bar in MN, we smoked copious amounts of pot in the bathroom, and "back bar" during regular hours, with the bartender, who only made whiskey coke, no foofoo drinks. his eyes were so bad, he had to have patrons of the bar check the I.D. of questionable young persons, which was a rarity!

[ewagner]

40. True story...

Just after I achieved "drinking age", I was in a bar in Chicago...actually on Cicero Ave.....and I ordered a "fancy drink" (can't rmember what it was now)....the bartender shouted at me in a distinctly "mediterranean" accent: You ain't got tits!..that's a drink for women....you're gettin a shot and a beer...ya gotta problem with that???

[DontBlameMe]

48. Was it...

the "Bucket O' Suds"?

[yellowcanine]

11. They serve peanuts and everyone throws the shells on the floor.

[fishnfla]

12. You're in Daytona

'bout says it all. Motorcycles out front, pit bulls out back. Everyone tattoed,tobaccoed, toothless, body pierced and pony-tailed: men and woman. and armed.

[ewagner]

16. I KNOW that place!!!!

been there....got out alive!

[fishnfla]

21. The Last Resort is the prototype

closest bar to my house. Its where Eileen Wournos, the female serial killer, hung out, her name is on the wall and the couch she used to crash on the front porch. Word is she would do sexual favors for longneck beers (note: not why I go there)She was a tortured soul, that one. they made that movie on her recently

Next time you stop in tell "cannonball" the bartender I said hey.

Hope your heart recovered from all the turmoil ewagner

[DS1]

13. Chinese variety, my fav type of dive bar

The lights started clear, but are stained yellow from the years of cigarette smoke.

Greasy snacks on the menu

Polynesian decor

Tiny little glasses provided with beer, that nobody uses

Keno monitor is burned in

Table and chairs set up in front of fire exit

Bartender dealing stolen scratchoff tickets

[Sporadicus]

15. The Sign Out Front

is Snuffy Smith. His cartoon balloon says, 'I Ain't Here!' (the name of the place). SE Portland, Oregon.

[arwalden]

17. Bullet Holes In The Wall? Bartender Sells Boxes Of Bullets?

[trotsky]

18. A neon sign of a beer that's no longer made.

Wallpaper that defies scientific analysis.
I think the pool table is optional, though.

[dean_dem]

19. I don't know, when you ask for a shot of tequila...

...with a lime and some salt and the bartender just laughs?

EDIT: or maybe when this guy is working the bar:

[ewagner]

20. south Miami, circa 1969.....

bare light bulbs hanging from wire across dance floor....strippers/exotic dancers dancing on unstable, shaky bar,...sawdust floors, bouncer/minimum collector is locally well-known midget wrestler......bartender is ARMED!

[Boxer Rebel]

22. one of it's sign's neon letters should be burned out...

maybe two.
the bartender knows your Dad, but would never tell him that you've been closing the place every other night.
there's a little old lady at the end who wear's leopard prints from head to toe and tips exactly 40 cents every night, by balancing the nickle on the quarter and the dime on top of that.
it must have beer nuts.

[bugslsu9]

23. Cost of the Beer

That is the most important part. You know that you are in a dive bar when you get upset when the price goes up from $0.50 to $0.65 for a tap of PBR

[KamaAina]

24. Dice game going on openly right behind you

Cosimo's, lower French Quarter, late '80s.

Is it the crappy selection of beverages except that one really really good beer on tap?

A-yup: that'd be Abita beer, from right across Lake Pontchartrain.

[AngryAmish]

25. Where the drunks wear reflective vests

So they won't get hit by cars on the stagger home. (Mutiny, on Western, Chicago) Plus a HUGE urinal.

[hunter]

26. Women who ride big motorcycles...

Gotta be some of them around.

[Nailzberg]

27. I am playing darts

If you see me playing darts there, then you must be in a dive bar.

[EstimatedProphet]

28. My list

Peanut shells on the floor
Formica tables/bar/booths, with red plastic "upholstery"
Dark
Iron Man on the jukebox
Last call you can get a "to go" order of a 6 pack and a bag of ice
On edit: Forgot-urinal in mens room is a trench in the floor-The Landing, West Point MS

[sundog]

29. eau d'piss

[eyepaddle]

30. False ceiling panels

most of which are severely damged, or absent.

[miss_kitty]

31. Ok here's mine

You step inside the door for a minute to say hello to the bartender who is a friend, and you have to go home immediately and scrape the cig-and-beer stink off in the shower, and wash all clothing worn inside said establishment.... (Eastlake Zoo, Seattle)

[Magrittes Pipe]

32. Blood in the urinal.

Preferably someone else's.

[bif]

33. Free popcorn

To make you thirsty and drink more beer.

[BlueStateGirl]

34. Cans of PBR. No flavored Vodka in the building. Tom Waits is

on the juke box.

[MadHound]

35. Pool table has that "home court roll"

That all of the regulars know about, especially the league team.

[redqueen]

37. The flyers on the walls go back 3 years.

And no video poker!

[really-looney]

38. Drunk Bartenders

The Bartenders must drink with the patrons(They may even be their own best customers)and still do a great job of tending bar and entertaining the regulars and new customers at the same time. I reference the Irish Times in Washington DC as I have mentioned to LynnSin in the past.. It is one of the great bar/dive bars. Always a great time

Has the pool table
Has the great drafts
Has the sticky floors
Has the oder of stale beer and smoke
Has the old music on the juke box( Its digital so it has the new ones too)

The only downside for LynnSin is that it has a mens and Ladies room. (I like that because the ladies room is always much more disgusting than the mens room in the bars I have been in.

[beyurslf]

39. Something stronge on the ceiling. You're not sure what it is.

It's too dark and smoky to tell.

And of course, the nicest people you could ever meet in a bar...

[guitar man]

41. That's easy

The pickups trucks are parked out front. The motorcycles are parked inside. :)

[jburton]

42. Dead animals on the wall

Several deer heads mounted on the wall.

Bonus if they seem like they were stuffed by a drunk pal of the bartenders.

[ScreamingMeemie]

43. The old lady with the rhinestone ecrusted cats eye glasses smoking

a Pall Mall behind the bar.

[JimmyJazz]

44. When George Thorogood shows up unannounced and starts

playing! Deer Park Tavern - where the nachos are tasty and your feet stick to the floor. :hi:

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

45. You interrupt someone shooting up when you go to take a whiz. Star Bar,

downtown San Diego.

Oh, and half the people in there show signs of advanced cirrhosis of the liver.

[-..__...]

46. Some pub crawler in fishnets...

and stilletto high-heels giving blumpkins in the mens restroom.

[Withywindle]

47. Jar of pickled eggs

(Which I actually like, God help me!)

Bikini-babe calendar from 1994.


Spittoons.


Nobody under 50 sitting at the bar.