McNally's

the service was really bad as bartender ignored me last Sunday. The beer was over priced and the place was just dirty. The bathrooms looked like they were not cleaned for over a week. There are many better alternatives within walking distance for a place like this to give this bad service. It really doesn't even look that good inside. Just a small dumphole

A four because I'm feeling friendly....

Seriously if this bar was around the corner from my place, my alcoholism would probably be much more raging.   $3.75 for a Jack and coke?  I'm all about that.  I can wrap my drunk, cuddly arms all around a price like that.  What I can't wrap my arms around is the person who picked out the hideous music we heard tonight.  Barf.  

Since I'm on the Young Adult Board at the Beverly Art Center you'll probably find me back at McNally's, but can someone hire a DJ or professional music chooser, please.

This was the year that I caved in to my friends' demands and came down to Chicago for the South Side Irish Parade.  I don't go for the big drinking holidays like St. Patty's, where just the occurrence of a certain day means you've got to get hammered.  There are of course the exceptions of Bockfest and the Great Taste every year in Madison, but these are more of a destination because of the beer served, not the other way around.  That said, I ended up eventually having a pretty good time down on Western in the company of many green-bedecked Chicagoans.  We spent the majority of the afternoon camped out at McNally's, where I was repeatedly assured (and I mean repeatedly) that this was the epitome of a South Side neighborhood bar.  

I believe we paid about $20 cover to get in about an hour before the parade.  The bar was completely packed - no room whatsoever.  There was a bar supposedly but the crush of the crowd kept me from even approaching that end of the bar.  Instead there were mobile tap stations set up selling the buckets of beer.  I made my way over to one and saw the choices were Budweiser and Bud Light.  You're not in Wisconsin anymore boy!  I'm sure there were at least seven micro taps at the bar, right?  I bite the bullet and get a bucket of Budweiser for $12.  It's not bad while cold but then quickly gets warm from the heat of the crowd.  I chase it down with nips off of the flask of Crown my buddy brought.  My first impression of McNally's is that it reminds me of some of the older blue-collar places on the east side of Madison or more accurately Milwaukee.  Nothing stands out as original or that unique, but I've also come on the one day a year that the place is out of character.  

As the parade goes past I try to station myself near the door so that I can at least see a bit of it, since I don't get many kilt-wearing firemen up my way.  We all occasionally duck out for a smoke and everyone but me risks the wrath of the CPD and piss in the alley.  I figure the cops can suss out a Sconnie like me no problem, so I wait in the interminable line for the restrooms.  Plus my red UW hoodie would be a dead giveaway.  I've been constantly dealing with the crush of the crowd and spilled beer on countless people by this point, so it feels great to go into the piss-stained alley for a smoke and the ability to extend my elbows straight out from my body.

As the afternoon wears on I manage to remain at least coherently sober and keep most of the group together.  I seem to be the only one.  I'm wearing the only green seasonally-appropriate article of clothing I own, which happens to be a Maccabi Haifa stocking cap I had recently bought in Israel.  I strike up a conversation with someone that recognizes the Hebrew on the cap, but then shit goes south when one of my friends becomes suspicious and goes off on a vaguely anti-Semitic diatribe, something about Lithuanians and I have no idea what else.  The ethnic identification in Chicago confuses me because there are no real ethnic neighborhoods where I'm from, and besides Madison is a yuppie/hippie/college dynamic surrounded by white-bread suburbs and farms.  Besides, isn't everyone supposed to be Irish today?  I'm in way over my head here.

A man who I was later told was an owner comes up to me and proceeds to insult both my Badgers and my Cubs for some time.  We kind of get into it.  I can understand that he correctly identified me as a Badger given my UW hoodie but how did he know I was a Cubs fan?  Would only a Cubbie be audacious enough to wear a green Israeli soccer cap to an Irish parade?  I learn later that my Sox fan friend tipped him off and asked him to take me down a peg.  I didn't know I was even up a peg.  Whatever - at this point I equate the South Side with Milwaukee, a place I've got to keep my head down or attract the wrath of the locals.  That's fine, because I'm able to take a bit of shit from the proles from time to time so long as i can get back to my base of arrogant self-righteousness in Madison.  The crowd started to thin out and we decided to call it a day.  Half of the group managed to get themselves locked out earlier, and when I leave I expect to get into another jawing match with the owner at the door.  Instead he's as nice as possible and my seething rage completely vanishes.  This is where I learn that you've apparently got to earn respect from these guys, and somehow I've done that.

Realistically I probably won't ever be back to McNally's.  I did the whole Parade thing but I don't think I'd make a special effort to go again.  The remaining 364 days a year aren't likely to find me on the south side of Chicago either - I just don't know anyone that still lives there.  Which is kind of a shame, because I wouldn't mind stopping in one night and cheering on my Cubs.