A Recap of our joint birthday extravaganza on 6th Ave

Adam’s and my birthday are the 20th and 21st of November, respectively. This is perfect fodder for all sort of sordid and exciting joint birthdays in the future, but our first foray into this – celebrated a couple weeks ago across much of 6th Ave – was relatively tame all things considered. We convinced nearly 30 friends and relatives to join us on a crawl which started at Masa and ended in disarray, with 8 different restaurants visited in between. Each location had a “required” drink and food purchase. Whoever crossed the most items off their to-do list was crowned the unofficial GCF badass of the night. This write up is a recap of that evening with highlights, lowlights, and hopefully a few words of wisdom from one blogger who’s twenties are officially behind him.

Adam’s got a couple more year of irresponsibility and debauchery ahead of him however.

Masa

Rules: eat a taco, drink a margarita

Just look at all those empty salt-rimmed glasses.

The party kicked off at Masa. We like Masa. Solid food, decent drinks, lots of room, and  fairly inexpensive bar food. The tacos here come in plates of three for about $5. Tacos are soft-shelled and can have a multitude of different fillings consisting of standard meats well-paired with vegetables, seasonings, cheese and sauce. All of the fillings are good, but my personal fav is the smoked pork served with cilantro, spicy avocado sauce, radish, cotija, and onion. The fish was also very good.

The margaritas are standard.

I do hate their chips and salsa though. Hate. I know some people love the greasy thick triangles covered in paprika, and I give them kudos for trying to shake things up, but at least once per trip you run across a chewy chip and the salsa is watery and boring…just the opposite of any good family Mexican. That doesn’t mean I won’t eat them however.

The service was a bit slow, but we did have a gazillion people there. We had a few people waiting upwards of 45 min for food. Lame, although not amazingly so.

Red Hot

Rules: eat a dog, drink a beer

Looks like somebody ordered the Skagit River Helmet Pale.

It’s no secret that we at GCF are hot for the Red Hot, as you can clearly see in our write-up here, but even we were impressed with the way they handled our enormous crew. The hot dog bar was at about two-thirds capacity when we arrived; with our entourage added to the mix it was standing room only.

Hosmer Hound Dog

The line for dogs was long, but the red baskets were flying from the kitchen at a pretty good clip. I put down a Hosmer Hound Dog and a Firestone IPA. The Hosmer Dog was sadly overlooked at our last visit, and I gotta say, peanut butter and bacon make a fine addition to a hot dog. Not something I’m going to order again any time soon, but not a bad experience.

The tap selection tonight was up to regular Red Hot standard with perhaps one exception in the downright undrinkable Skagit River Helmet Pale. For whatever reason this beer lured several of our friends – and Adam – into a frowny-faced beer drinking experience. Firestone makes a damn tasty IPA however.

Crown Bar

Rule: drink a fancy drink

At this point in the evening our paths diverged. I jumped ship and went to Six Olives with my slightly less ambitious wife while Adam and most everybody else went to Crown bar. The drinks at Crown were reported to be as good as always, and the service too met the challenge offered up by our bloated gathering of party goers. Yay Crown.

Six Olives

Rule: drink the girliest drink you can, eat some Six Olive fries

A very literal Jello Shot

Six Olives has a distinctive taint. I’m not sure what it is, but when you’re in Six Olives you just feel dirty. Here, watch this commercial and tell me you don’t feel like you need a shower:

Sleazy huh? The usual soft Jazz was prevalent, although I must say it’s preferable to the Earth Wind and Fire reunion video the place used to show on a constant loop. There are several shadow boxes celebrating some of the worst fashion disasters of the 70′s and 80′s, which might be fine if it were tongue in cheek, but there is no tongue here. Tongue would imply taste, which is sufficiently lacking here. You didn’t know I was capable of that kind of bitchiness did you?

This sleazy lounge decor may have been well received if we were. I could get into the soft jazz and laugh appreciatively about the pink trimmed leather coat behind glass if we were in the right mood, but we were treated like ass at Six Olives. The owner has always been a bit cold, perhaps not overly appreciative of the younger clientele, but we honestly felt as though our business were inconveniencing her. A few people had Groupons, and that kind of started the debacle. We were seated at tables across the restaurant (so as not to violate the Groupon terms of service) where we waited for as long as 45 minutes for our drinks. We were the only people there. The place was empty after we left. There was a waitress, a chef in the kitchen, and the owner making drinks, yet the problem persisted. There were fewer people there than in the commercial you just saw. It doesn’t make sense. Boo Six Olives.

Bitching aside, the drinks were stiff and creative. The Jello-O shot is a bit steep at $7, but it’s stiff as hell, and it’s fun to inject your face with alcoholic goo. The food is pretty good. The fries are cheap, and you can choose as many house-made sauces to accompany them.

I used to come here a lot, and I think it might still be a good spot for small groups, but avoid the big group hassle at any cost. Ugh.

O’Malleys

Rule: drink the cheapest beer available, eat a party snack, play Big Buck Hunter

PBR tall boy and deep fried pickles. Perhaps no better midnight snack.

It’s no stretch to say that the highlight of the evening was O’Malley’s. The place was packed with rabid college kids and douchebags in trucker hats, but it was so much damn fun. The cheapest beer was a tie – Rainier and PBR tall boys were both $2.50. We opted for the blue ribbon winner ourselves.

O’Malleys was hopping. A band was playing Pogues covers, the pool tables were surrounded by off-duty military, and the line at the bar was at least four bleached blondes deep all night.  Two particularly adamant gentlemen were playing Big Buck Hunter non-stop so we unfortunately were relegated to the sadly neglected shuffleboard table. The table had more beer spills than sand so it didn’t make for very good shuffling.

One of the highlights of the evening was the shot-in-the-dark appetizer from O’Malleys. I was feeling cheap after Six Olives and I wanted something a bit off the wall so I went with the deep fried pickles. Damn good! I highly recommend them next time you’re out and feeling like you could use something to soak up the beer in your belly. Clean crunchy dill pickles lightly fried in fluffy batter and served with Ranch. Divey perfection.

D.O.A

Rule: drink a Moonshine shot, eat a unique meat

I had no idea how crazy things got at DOA after dark. The place was exploding with college kids. If you’re single and have low standards, this is the place to be on a Friday night.

I again parted from the O’Malley’s group early, as I had some family who were interested in moving on, and found myself in the way back of DOA at a seemingly secret table next the the kitchen bar. I ordered a shot of apple pie moonshine (flavored un-aged whiskey) and a cuban pork sandwich. I waited for Adam and the gang before drinking my shot, but after a half hour or so it became clear they were never going to make it so I ended up drinking it with my brother-in-law instead. It was ok, pretty sweet and sharply alcoholic. Kind of a letdown after the big build-up to be honest.

The cuban sandwich was amazing. The flavorful pork and light chewy bun was an awesome cap on the evening. Someone else at the table got the elk sliders and couldn’t stop talking about them. DOA is clearly serving some unique fare at all hours

Engine House No.9

I didn’t find out until the next day what ever happened to Adam. Apparently he came to DOA in search of me, but alas I was at the secret table in the back. Apparently turned off by the wait at the bar he and the rest of the stalwart troop made their way to E-9 where they karaoked it up until last call. I’m sure the stories don’t stop there, but my account surely does.

The Wrap

A fun night for sure, complete with highs and lows. No awesome lifelong stories, but maybe that’s a good thing. I’m 30 after all. I’ve got to keep things on the level.

We can only imagine what amazing things await us next year. If you have any ideas let us know. Perhaps a GCF meet up? Hmmmm….

As always, mention us and get…nothing! Especially at Six Olives. Don’t mention us there. Okay?

All the fine restaurants mentioned in this post are located on 6th Avenue in Tacoma.