Bar Tabs

Due to Rizzo's pending trial for the charge of hiring indenutred servants to work at his deli...your stuck with another TomO rate. But fear not, I actually went out and did some field research for once. The thing to be rated - Running Bar Tabs.

My God, can these things be deadly. Jerry Seinfeld has a standup skit about the tab at a restauraunt, how at the end when you get the bill everyone looks around at each other confused. "I'm not hungry now, why am I buying all this food?" He's got a good point - that does happen everytime. If you pay as you go you'll probably not spend as much, so its a brillaint plan by bars and restauraunts. They make more money and in the meantime you and the group you are with end up all getting pissed off at each other for one reason or another.

"Oh I didn't drink that much....I just had beer you had hard alcohol....I just got an appetizer...." etc. etc. Very rarely does a bill come where everyone says, "Oh man that's reasonable! I got this!" (Unless you go to the Spring Inn in Elmhurst, Illinois, where somehow the bill is always completely reasonable, but that's besides the point.)

So, Bar Tabs are overrated, right?

WRONG.

See, despite the inevitable bickering it may lead to, it does add something to the table - Unintentional comedy. While Urban Dictionary has a very specific definition for unintentional comedy, I feel it can apply to basically any situation that isn't funny in the 'classic' sense of the word, but for some reason it becomes hilarious. Let me try to explain it by giving you the details of my 'field research.'

Where:

Tilted Kilt - Chicago, Illinois. For those of you who may not have heard of Tilted Kilt, its a budding chain in the Chicago-land area, (possible the United States,) with waitresses that all dress like the women in the picture up top. It gives attractive females an opportunity to dress slutty on other nights besides Halloween, make a lot of money, and they can say to their parents, "I'm working at Tilted Kilt," instead of "I'm working at Hooters." The former just sounds a lot classier.

Why:

Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals. (See, Philly Sports Fans and F-ing with a Winning Streak...the Blackhawks have taken over this website as they have Chicago. ) Bottom line, a Saturday Night, a HUGE sporting event...these two things lend themselves to what the Irish refer to as a "heavy sesssion." (Aka lots of drinkin'.)

Who:

There were 13 of us at the table. One of the guys was going to 'stay sober' (what a loser!) and there were two women there. (Brave souls those girls were, walking into the hornets nest that was Tilted Kilt...although I suspect one of the girls went there to ensure her boyfriend didn't blatantly drool on every girl that walked past.) We didn't do the whole "seperate checks thing," I'm not even sure it was an option. Which meant the hour before the game and the two hours after the game...plus the 3 hours during the game, we all drank and ate on one massive bill.

The Tab:

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Here you go, the stat-line on the night, followed by some follow-up thoughts:

Green Line IPA - 7.00 (What the fuck is Green Line IPA? This must of been one of the girls doings.)

Jack Daniels (2 @9.00 double) - 18.00

Jack Daniels - 5.00 (Apparently someone wussed out on their third Jack and Coke and could only hanlde a single.)

Barton's Vodka (4 @5.50) - 22.00

Celtric Crush - 8.50 (What is Celtic Crush? This must have been the other girls drink. Or someones appetizer. I can't tell.)

Irish Nachos (2 @ 6.99) - 13.98 (I remember those...they weren't that good.)

Mozzarella Sticks ( 2 @6.99) - 13.98

Beef Nachos - 12.49 (Apparently "Irish Nachos" is slang for "poor person nachos".)

Traditional Pastrami Sand - 9.49 (Wait...someone ordered a sandwich?)

Rueben Pastrami - 8.99 (Wait...was I the only one who DIDN'T order food?)

Side of Two Pickles - .50 (...Too random to even put into thoughts....)

Crown Royal (43 @ 9.50) - 408.50 (I'll reserve my thoughts about this at the end...)

Big Arse Burger - 10.28 (Seriously, when did all these sandwiches show up?)

Spinach Artichoke Dip - 7.99 (I remember wanting to order that, now i'm concerned that I did, ate it, and didn't realize it because I was too focused on the Blackhawks..)

Jamesons (10 @5.00) 50.00 (Now we're talking...)

Rumpleminz (8 @ 7.50) 60.00 (Didn't think Rumpleminz was more expensive than Jameson....learn something new everyday.)

TK Lemon drop - 9.00 (Again....one of the girls was going rouge in what she was ordering.)

O Bomb (8 @ 10.50) 84.00 (I can't blame this one on the girls...)

Amaretto- 7.00

Bacardi - 6.50 (What the hell? Did someone do a flaming Dr. Pepper? I don't recall seeing fire.)

Southern Comfort (6 @ 8.50) 51.00 (If i've learned one thing out of this its that Jameson is my favorite shot that apparently isn't that expensive compared to everything else.)

Bud Light Bottle (55 @ 4.00) 220.00 (My friend is convinced we ordered more than 55, I think he's forgetting that we all drank a 40 on the train before we got to the Tilted Kilt.)

Subtotal: 1034.20

Tax: 116.35

Total: 1150.55

Gratuity: 186.16

Total: 1336.71

Server: Naomi

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Now, a couple of things. When we got the bill, some people had already left, and everyone else was a little too inebriated to actually look at it. All we could see was the bottom line. I do know one thing - There were not 43 Crown Royals ordered. In fact, i'm 99 percent sure there wasn't one Crown Royal ordered. However, i'm operating under the theory that Naomi got lazy and just started putting all the shots down as Crown Royal. Because if you take those 43 shots away that leaves 32 shots we bought - or just about 2.5 a person. That definitely didn't happen. There were shots flying all over the place. I know this because after every Hakws goal (there was six) a round of shots were ordered. After every period, a round of shots were ordered. And everytime anyone wearing a plad skirt walked by, shots were ordered.

I'm a little sad we didn't get more specific with what they were. But that's ok. Anyways, when I woke up Sunday morning, I remembered a few arguments pertaining to the bill. But then Sunday night when I actually looked at the bill again I realized something - it was funnier than anything I could write about on my own. (And if anyone wants to make me feel better and give me a big bar tab story, its more than welcome in the comments section.)

VERDICT:

UNDERRATED