A VISIT FROM DAP: THE VASMAY LOUNGE

Me, Himanshu, our friend Jizz and a bunch of people I've known in my boring life used to go here all the time, starting from around the time we were 18-19 and the bar had just opened (used to be Meow Mix, a famous lesbian bar that was open for 10 years, it was in Chasing Amy, so Ben Affleck was inside this space at some point, I guess). The manager was this awesome chick Amy (who once called the microbrews they had to stock in their new location "fag beer") and let us drink there underage for a very long time. There were also 3 OTHER BARTENDER CHICKS NAMED AMY/AIMEE WHO HAVE WORKED THERE SINCE 2005 (Government ID's checked, real names). The first was a red-haired Molly Ringwald looking chick named Aimee, who I would yell Molly Ringwald at when hell of bent, and when she got hammered with us would tell my 19 year old ass that I 'looked like her ex-boyfriend' and then I'd just sit there continuing to get bent. We knew all the local drunks who kicked it there on some 'old LES' shit or whatever, namely GERARD who used to yell 'JUH! JUH!" constantly. We'd always play Ram Jam's Black Betty or the Old 97s 'Timebomb'. otherwise it was either hardcore, doowop music, the Stooges or the fucking Pixies. When we'd run into him sober he would be the quietest alcoholic carpenter dude who could barely look you in the eye. Me and Jizz once got him a ten dollar gift certificate from Benny's Burritos for his birthday, the day he told us he was 'gonna go get some surf and turf' maybe 20 times. He had a life we referred to as the perfect triangle when I used to really glorify some next destructive lifestyle shit, point a) he lived a few blocks from the bar, b) went to work a few blocks away, c) and then proceeded every day to go the Vasmay after work and drink till maybe 1-2 A.M. (sometimes closing) and then walk back home. There was Francis, a fat dude with long hair who we used to make up ridiculous stories about (no tongue, saw him bash a dude's head in, etc.) when we brought people to Vas for the first time. Also, using your cigarettes as a timing device, like at any place that's 'your joint' was important. There was an apartment right next to the place around the corner, we'd always post up on the stoop right there to smoke cigarettes and there'd be these two weird dudes who lived in the building whose names we never learned (remembered, actually) who we called ANTHRAX (cause dude had that pointy 'stick-beard' joint) and THE USED (cause the other dude was just some nice, mopey long haired white kid that we assumed a member of the band THE USED would look like). These were some dudes who were like in their late 20s/early 30s we used to talk to about the bar and being a dirtbag and shit like that. One of those relationships where every sentence ends up in like group-wide giggling or like 'word, word' type shit.

Since I've been sitting around bored on Saturday night like a loser I decided to search flickr for pictures on some nostalgia shit and started looking through whatever I found. We all put down ungodly amounts of everything at this place when were younger and it's one of the very, very few places in the world I have nostalgic feelings about, even though at the end of the day, it was just some shitty bar. After it closed I was kind of fuck-all about nostalgia. The building's owner ended up forcing Vasmay out because they wanted to start their own bar (Local269, where Youwildin.com throws down a few times a month) and they ended up moving to 179 Essex, where Essex Ale House used to be. What's open now? Some fucking overpriced Gray's Papaya-like joint called Munchies. EAT A DICK, NEW YORK!