Lou's Official Complaint That the Bar Just Charged You for the Music (And the Music Was a Playlist Someone Made on Their Phone in 2019)

Lou's Official Complaint About THC Drinks at Home (Filed This Evening, Effective Immediately)

I want to talk about something that happened to me at a bar last Saturday, and I want to talk about it formally, because I am a formal man and this situation deserves paperwork. The bar charged me a five-dollar "atmosphere fee." That is what it said on the receipt. Atmosphere. Five dollars. For the air and the noise inside the building they already charged me twelve dollars per drink to stand in.

I asked what the atmosphere consisted of. The bartender, who introduced himself as a "beverage curator," told me it covered the music. I said, what music. He pointed at a speaker on the wall. I listened. It was "Somebody That I Used to Know" by Gotye. I know that song. It came out in 2012. Before that it was something with a lot of bass that I could not identify but that I am fairly certain was also not new. I pulled out my phone, I looked at the song, and the playlist it was sitting in had a last-updated date of 2019. Somebody made this playlist on their phone in 2019, connected it to a Bluetooth speaker, and the bar is charging me five dollars for it. I did not yell. I am a professional. But I want it on record that I thought about it.

The Official Breakdown of What You Are Actually Paying For

Let me audit this for you, because nobody else is going to. When you sit down at a bar on a Saturday night, here is what you are purchasing:

• The drink: reasonable. That is what you came for.
• The ice: weather. Ice is frozen weather. Weather is free. You are being charged for something the sky makes by accident.
• The garnish: a halved orange wheel on the rim of a glass that someone touched with their bare hand before they handed it to you. Complimentary, they say. I do not want it for free. I want it to stop existing.
• The atmosphere: a Spotify playlist that has not been updated since before the pandemic, playing through a speaker that is visibly dusty, curated by someone who left that job two and a half years ago and is now probably in graduate school for something that will not help anyone.

That is what twelve dollars buys you. Twelve dollars, plus five for the atmosphere, plus tip, plus the parking you paid for, plus the cost of getting there, plus whatever piece of your soul you hand over every time a man in an apron explains that the cocktail menu is "seasonal."

I am not cheap. I want to be clear about that. I sold pipe for thirty years. I understand margin. I understand overhead. I understand that a business has to make money. What I do not understand, and will not accept, is being charged a premium for someone else's old phone decisions.

What THC Drinks at Home Actually Cost (I Checked)

I am going to tell you something I discovered, and I am going to tell it to you plainly because that is how I operate.

I cracked a Lou's Damn Right I'm Old Fashioned when I got home that night. Four-pack is sixteen ninety-nine. That is four dollars and twenty-five cents a can. Eight milligrams of THC. Real cocktail flavor, the bitters and orange and oak, built from the same extracts actual bartenders use. No alcohol, no hangover, no beverage curator explaining the "tasting notes" to me while I try to pay my tab and leave. No atmosphere fee. My kitchen. My chair. My playlist, which I will tell you right now is better than whatever is coming out of that dusty speaker, and I have not updated it either, but at least I am not charging anyone for it.

Four twenty-five a can. That is the number. Write it down. Put it next to your next bar receipt and tell me that drive downtown was worth it.

And if you want to see everything we have got before you pick one, the Variety Pack is sixteen cans for sixty-one dollars, which my wife Jane pointed out is basic arithmetic that makes the bar look like a crime scene. She is right. She is usually right. I am not going to make a whole thing of it.

A Word About the Music, Since Nobody Asked Me and I Am Going to Say It Anyway

My watch stopped in 2009. I still wear it. People ask me about it and I tell them it is right twice a day, which is a better record than most people I know. The point is I understand the concept of something stopping and staying stopped. I respect it. The watch stopped and I made peace with that and we moved on together.

What I cannot respect is a watch that stopped in 2009 but is still being presented as a working timepiece that you are charging admission for. That is a different situation. That is the bar's Spotify playlist. It stopped in 2019. Possibly 2018. The last good song I heard in a bar was around that same time, and I cannot remember what it was, which tells you everything you need to know about how it made me feel.

Play what you want. Play it at whatever volume you want. Do not charge me for it. That is the whole complaint. I filed it. It is done. Moving on.

The Fridge Is Right There

I am not telling you to never go to a bar again. I am not your father. I am telling you that THC drinks at home exist, they cost four dollars and twenty-five cents, they hit in minutes because of how they are made, and your couch does not have a cover charge. That is all I am saying. The math is already done.

Lou's Damn Right I'm Old Fashioned is in the fridge right now, if you want to try the experiment yourself. Eight milligrams. Real old fashioned flavor. No one will ask you how you are "finding" it tonight.

And if you need something different, go look at what else we have got. Herb made a peach bellini that he insists on calling very manly, which is its own conversation. Mary's espresso martini is in there. Jane's cosmopolitan, which she named herself and which she is correct about. All of them four twenty-five a can, none of them charging you for the air.

The watch stopped in 2009. The playlist stopped in 2019. My complaints, for the record, have not stopped at all. That is what makes me right twice a day, at minimum.

Must be 21+ to purchase. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Hemp-derived THC. For use only where legal. Please drink responsibly.