Welcome to Somerville, part 2: Sligo’s
Apparently there’s bill afoot to repeal the smoking ban in bars which make less than 10% of their income from food. The bill is doomed, and hardly worthy of notice, but the story in the Somerville Times is worth it all for this quote:
“I feel like the tips of my fingers are going to freeze and fall off. It’s colder than my ex-wife’s heart out here and, believe me, that’s pretty damn cold. That woman could turn her back on the baby Jesus and step over Mother Teresa’s dead body without missing a beat” said Michael Sindoni, a Sligo’s regular, who wholeheartedly supports Senator Shannon’s proposal.
Health concerns are not a good enough reason to ban smoking in a bar like Sligo’s, said Sindoni.
“If you’re in Sligo’s you ain’t worried about your health. I’ve seen a lot of things in this world but one thing I will never see is a person boozing in Sligo’s and complaining about second hand smoke,” said Sindoni before heading back into the pub to finish his drink.
Welcome to Somerville. Now, I swear I read something in The New Yorker just after his death about Daniel Patrick Moynihan frequenting Sligo’s while he taught at Harvard. I couldn’t have made that up, but I can’t find it now.
January 27th, 2005 at 10:22 am
Oh Sligo’s, where the old Somerville townies and new Somerville yuppies and students meet, and there is a bitter undercurrent between the two. They gentrified the front of it about two years ago, but walk inside and it’s still the same. I’ve been in there once since the smoking ban, and I swear there’s still a haze and a film within.
Surprisingly has a decent jukebox, although some of the townies were pissed that I insisted on playing the Pixies “U. Mass” like six times in a row after I had ingested perhaps a few too many of the Champagne of Beers.
Try the Sligo punch. You won’t be disappointed.
January 28th, 2005 at 12:33 am
Some friends were really into it for a while, so I ended up going a fair bit, but I have never really been a big fan. I guess people feel like it’s more keepin-it-real, and less yuppified than The Burren. But, you know, those accents at The Burren aren’t faked, and I lived in Ireland for a semester, and it’s pretty keepin-it-real.
Though I do like Sligo’s lovely Bud Clydesdale– what do you call it, a diorama?