The Old Drunks Head for Hamilton South!

Enamoured as we are with urban decrepitude and concerned for the ongoing well-being of the American service industry in our post-industrial knowledge based economy the Old Drunks have settled upon Pittsburgh, PA as our sports trip destination for the fall of 2009.

Steel City USA shares a lot of history with its craptastic northern brother on Lake Ontario but has recently displayed a truly American plucky self-reliance, pulling itself up by the bootstraps, particularly in the assembly of winning sports franchises. We’re pretty excited to see the Pens and Steelers on home turf before heading the local bars for shots and beers. Based on some preliminary research, it would appear there are two major neighbourhoods to explore;

The Polish Hill/Strip District, an old school blue collar neighbourhood abutting a newly revitalized warehouse district:
Gooski’s, 3117 Brereton St. - a Polish local, perogi house and concert venue
31st Street Pub, 3101 Penn Ave. - a sweet looking Biker bar
Brillobox, 4104 Penn Ave. - a somewhat pretentious looking indie venue that offers vegetarian suppers to starving artists... on second thought, perhaps we should skip this place

And Southside/East Carson, which apparently boasts North America’s highest concentration of bars per square mile:
Jack Rose Bar, 1121 E. Carson St. - voted best "shot and beer bar" and best place to avoid hipsters in Pittsburgh's local alt-weekly
Brewski’s, 801 E Carson St. - famous for their foosball tables. At least they're famous for something
Smiling Moose, 1306 E. Carson St. - features a nice looking Coors sign in the window


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French Chicks and Facades

Good times in Montreal. Checked out a couple of new joints, most notably Le Belmont Sur Le Boulevard which was pretty sweet and has a nice open façade to scope the ladies on the main.

Some other pleasant discoveries;

1. L’ile Noire offers $5 pints of local microbrews for happy hour
2. Much like the Bronx bar in Detroit, The legendary Verres Stérilisés Tavern isn’t anywhere near as shitty as I’d imagined. It looks a bit foreboding from the street, but inside it’s actually reasonably clean and friendly. Cheap quarts of Coors, Bud and 50.
3. A (unjustifiably) deserted neighbourhood place called Bar Oliveira on Rachel that features$3 bottles and a pretty decent juke box.
4. I’ve never actually been to The Dominion (though I’ve endorsed it below). Turns out I was confusing it with McLeans Pub, which rules and features all of the sweet sweetness of being in business (in one form or another) for about a hundred years.