Girls Gone Mild
Cheap Shots (and Beer)
140 1st Ave. (betw. St. Marks Pl. & 9th St.)
212-254-6631
At 6:33 p.m. on a soggy weeknight, a girl wearing a shiny black shirt careens onto First Avenue's gum-stained sidewalk. "This ish th' wors' day ev'a!" she slurs, righting herself long enough to crumple like laundry into a powder-blue Volvo that peels away. I'm not surprised: She's the finished product of walking-disaster factory Cheap Shots (and Beer).
In drug-counselor parlance, Cheap Shots is an enabler. With seven-buck pitchers of Yuengling and two-dollar red-headed slut and kamikaze shots-favored liquor for 21-year-old boys greasing the path to sloppy sex-it takes King Kong willpower to exit this East Village bar enunciating razor-edged consonants like T or K.
In another life, Cheap Shots was known as First Avenue Meat Products. The store served plump kielbasa to Polish carnivores. Yet First Avenue Meat fell victim to changing East Village demographics. As the Polish left and pork demand declined, invading i-bankers increased. Hence a transition: meat shop to meathead bar.
During the day, Cheap Shots caters to men with livers so hard you can bounce a quarter off 'em. Not that wasting 25 cents is smart: Until 8 p.m., that's one-eighth a pint of domestic beer. After 8, barflies wobble into the night. They are replaced by Green Day?quality punkers (hey, St. Marks is the bar's cross street), J. Crew men and cleavage-baring women who saunter to the bathroom real slow, letting guys salivate as they once did over beautiful pieces of meat.
I visit Cheap Shots in two waves: day and night. My first outing begins at 5 p.m. It feels like last call. Ms. Wors' Day Ev'a will soon stumble away, and other patrons, with animated voices squiggling across the room, appear close behind. But this is hardly Holiday Cocktail's blunt-my-brain imbibing: This is Dionysian drinking in celebration of life's everyday hurdles. Like remembering to breathe.
In the corner, beneath one of four tv's that will soon broadcast Jeopardy, are several women downing, yes, cheap shots.
"Her boyfriend's not circumcised," one woman says to a man with a ponytail, pointing at her friend. She blushes, hiding inside a mixed-drink straw.
"Me? I can still ride 'em if they have the cap on."
When did inside voices become a lost art?
Two gentlemen, one blond and the other wearing a red flannel shirt, sit at the bar. They order the East Village special: Pabst and whiskey for $5. Instead of Kentucky Gentleman or other pig-grain whiskey, Cheap Shots serves Jim Beam.
Mr. Flannel is thirsty. His shot hits stomach as soon as it's poured.
"Take one more," says the bartender, refilling. "Join your friend."
They drink their medicine and wince.
"It's a good shot, that Jim Beam," the bartender says with a laugh. A few minutes later, he returns with more Beam. "Another?"
The gentlemen extend their glasses. He fills. They drain. In approximately 12 minutes, their eyes will go glassy. Mr. Blond will become angry when I solve the Wheel of Fortune puzzles. But for now, everything is boat drinks and Caribbean sunsets.
"This is the greatest bar ever," says Mr. Blond.
Before our Pat Sajak fallout, I enter a door chalked MEN. The insides are covered in circa-1977 subway graffiti. "I'll poop on yr. soil," "I like round men" and "Aussies do-" Lights go black. My pants are around my ankles: I am going to be gimped. I grab some toilet paper to defend myself, causing the lights to click back on. Motion-activated urinal flushing? Good idea. Motion-activated bathroom lights? Worst. Idea. Ever.
On a Friday night, I return to sample weekend action. The crowd is boisterous, with more low-cut women scoping men cradling Miller Light. The black-lit air-hockey table goes thwack-thwack-thwack. Darts slice the air. I sit at the graffiti-scratched picnic tables beside the MP3 jukebox. A couple college girls join me. Conversation lurches toward the inevitable.
"When I graduate," begins a gap-toothed girl with much gusto, "I'm going to be a counselor."
I nod. "That's?great. Helping people is, great."
Her eyes harden. Or maybe mine reflect. Reach a certain age, and cynicism is hard to shake. What's wrong with helping people? What's wrong with a bar thick not with pretension, but perfume, spilled suds and the potential for regretful behavior? Like gravity bongs, Cheez Whiz and, now, Cheap Shots, sometimes life presents things so glaringly ruinous they're irresistible.