Gabriel H.'s Profile

I was with a group of 8 people in Hayes on a Friday night, unable to find a cab. So we flagged down an off duty Super Shuttle, and told him to take us to Butter.

Have you ever gotten a ride to a bar in a Super Shuttle?

The configuration of the urinal in between the toilet and sink is one of the most awkward I've ever encountered. (A close 2nd would be that corner urinal at Casanova.) I'm fairly pee shy, but I'm incredibly drunk with a full bladder. I'm not longer pee shy.

(A bit of advice: If you do pee yourself, a tactic designed by my weak-bladdered friend is to take your pants off and douse them entirely with water. Then put them back on. The stain is now masked by the wetness of your entire pants, which now appears a darker shade than before.)

As I'm heading back to the bar, I notice 5 credits in the jukebox. I pick  Broken Social Scene,  Walkmen and a Ravonettes song. I leave 2 credits behind. Its the right thing to do.

I walk into Phone Booth and get a Vodka soda. I expect it to be stiff and it is (TWSS).

We are talking about our strategies for the zombie apocalypse again. I'm arguing mainly that guns are only useful if you have bullets and you'd need a lot of bullets, and that a crossbow is better since you can re-use and forge your own arrows. The swede didn't agree with me and apparently hoards bullets in his apartment. I think during this period someone orders a round of greyhounds. And then I think I order another round after that.

Steve gets up to order a round of whiskeys and the girl next to him orders a long island ice tea. After witnessing the bartender pour an avalanche of alcohol into a pint glass, Steve feels inadequate about the whisky order. A Cindy Lauper song is playing on the juke box, again.

The next round is long island ice teas. Steve is originally from Long Island, and this was his first long island iced tea. Ever.

We start talking about Friday and the "jorb" [sic] quitting party, and sharing before and after pictures of our latest karaoke debauchery. We were  fueling our friends FOMO (fear of missing out), since he totally missed out, spending time at home, with his girlfriend. Yup, missed out.

I always enter the food court from the Mission St. entrance so I can walk through Bloomingdales. Not because I would actually buy anything, but to imagine myself knocking over the large pieces of tacky glassware. I could get away with it if I made it look like a mistake.

This food court is one of the more depressing places to be, especially if you hate people or the zombies who stand around with trays of food samples. Who wants a small tiny shot of soup in a paper cup?

Speaking of zombies, I watched Dawn of the Dead again over the weekend. The only time I would ever go to this mall is if there was a zombie outbreak. Or to go to Loving Hut.

I always get the combo buffet with the sweet and sour thing and the potato curry thing. Every time. I've been there 5 times and I've never had anything else.

The "door" to the back room where they have shows has these clear plastic sheets (I think to keep the noise out). Navigating through this requires very deliberate arm motions. As I walk through, I keep thinking I'm about to enter an operating room at a psychiatric hospital. It keeps the sounds of the screaming from disturbing the patrons.

A girl here once told me how she wanted to run a marathon in every state. I think she was from the marina. Her hands looked very old.

My favorite thing about this place is the painting of the cat above the door to the smoking room. Its eyes seem to follow you. Sometimes I smoke in there but its pretty much impossible to make small talk with anyone. One time someone bummed a light off me and then we proceeded to not talk to each other for 5 minutes.

The layout is a bit strange with comfortable seating in the center. The people sitting here never look very happy. After ordering, no matter where I position myself, I'm always in the way.

While you wait for your coffee they have one of those TVs that display weather and the latest in popular culture news.

I never purposefully make eye contact with anyone in this place. For the longest time I thought it was a Peets. The password to the bathroom might be 12345.

Glitchcore gives me headaches sometimes but I still like it.

The current venue is the Goldern Trapper Keeper Lodge which is a residential space. We kind of stood outside for a bit wondering if we had the right address. We did.

Everything is setup in the kitchen, and the stove is going if you want to make yourself some vegan pancakes.

We saw 3 artists/groups. The first artist was pretty good, very listenable experimental heavyish droney ambient stuff. They had a projector setup with some good visuals, looked like some kind of data moshing thing involving smurfs. The second guy had some custom hardware all chained together with a bunch of wave generators and amps I'm guessing. That one lasted only 15 minutes cause it was a bit harsh. I can't remember what the 3rd group was like but they used an old analog phone to filter the vocals.

Its is a good mixture of art and tech and music and sound, some of it not really any good but I don't think that's really the point.

I was driving from Prineville to Portland and got hungry in Madras. I saw some billboards for this place. It looked really kitchy and I had to stop.

I was too "bearanoid" to try Bob's Big Bear Burger (3/4 pound) but they have a normal size version that includes the special seasoning. The special seasoning probably wouldn't have tasted as good had I known what was in it. Bear in mind, that there are lots of puns on the menu.

The service here was really excellent, the waiters and waitresses are on top of their game. Food came out fast, drinks were refilled many times.

Who is Tony? I don't know. Maybe I should ask. What I do know is that I eat a lot of cereal and this place has the widest selection of pretentious cereals (Kashi, Peace Cereal, etc) that you will find in a cornershop on 24th, as well as both regular and vanilla soy milks. I haven't even heard of Peace Cereal before this place. I guess some dirty hippies got into the cereal business.

You would think a person would get sick of cereal, but no its not possible. Just check the wikipedia page for 'List of breakfast cereals' (http://en.wikipedia.or...), which isn't even very exhaustive. Did you know there are 8 different kinds of Honey Bunches of Oats?

I thought hard about 4 staring this place, but even though this shop does fill in the cereal gap among markets on 24th, the selection isn't really there, and the prices seem a little bit higher than normal.

Other things going for this place: A near optimal use of space and a large selection of pasta / sauce, soda, liquor and beer.

Cheap, dive-y, booths, good old timey jukebox, sane bartender. Ladies with metal in their faces. A good local bar in southern mission. I vaguely remember ordering a round of 4 drinks here and it came out to $9.50 and then stopping by el farolito to inhale a quesadilla on the way home.