Mom's

A skinny middle-aged jockey-size guy nervously holds a cup of coffee until his name is called. He pulls wraparound shades from his inside jacket pocket, grabs a mike from the DJ, and sings a Presley song. His voice is pretty good, but he bumps into people, fidgets, falls down once, and misses a couple of lines. His song is done, and he literally runs out the door. The DJ bellows, "LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, NINETY POUNDS OF ELVIS."

Everyone here loves to sing, and everyone here loves to drink. The last time I was here, everyone loved to smoke, too, but in bars like this, everyone should be offered a pack of Kools or a blunt. Or a coupon for a dry cleaner because your clothes are really going to stink the next morning, but who cares because you are at Mom's and it's a cross-section of Troy's entire population flaunting the law, which is kind of like hanging out with all the aspiring extras who were rejected for 'Blade Runner" because they dressed for Burroughs, not Dick. If that scenario makes you a little too anxious, you can bury yourself in little tabletop videogames, or the DJ's enormous songbooks, or have the usual barfood, which I know I've sampled, but um can't recall. Everyone is drunken sailor Hey Buddy You Got a Good-Lookin' Girlfriend friendly, the barmaids are happy and if your singing is sub-par, they'll turn off your mike mid-song yet still politely applaud you.

It's not beyond possibility that you could get punched out here, but you'd have an enjoyable time.

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NOTE: Sadly, Mom's has recently been closed. Tax evasion.