I found myself drinking gin from a cracked glass at Joe's Cellar on Saturday night. Like a lot of neighborhood dive bars in Portland, its usual clientele of crusty old salts have found themselves competing for stool space against an onslaught of hipsters 1/4 - 1/2 their age. The salts come in search of strong drink, their younger brethren for...the same? The ironic digs? The bar signs? The comfy vinyl booths? Because of the close proximity to their apartments? All of the above?

Whatever the motives of all involved, it's always interesting to kick back and watch both sides interact. On Saturday at Joe's, a Stan Lee lookalike found himself at the bar trying to tune out a booth full of cackling kids in hoodies. Meanwhile, in the other room, both sides mixed harmoniously in what appeared to be the final hours of a crashed wedding reception. Roses, a white table cloth and a singer calling himself "The Voice" did what they could to distract from the bar's "dank." They failed but Mr. "The Voice," dressed in a white tuxedo, did crank out a pretty decent set of chart-toppers from the '40s and '50s.

Interesting side note about Joe's Cellar: the panels on the ceiling are brown. They may have once been white but they're brown now. Don't let the anti-smoking zealots know about this. It would only further their cause. Keep it like a secret.

Labels: Booze