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| - I'd really like to give this higher ratings, due the the $1.10 beers, decent bar food and friendly owner, but my last experience left a sour taste in my mouth.
A group of friends and I were there on a Thursday in March, having a few beers and eating some Polish food at the bar. Now, if you haven't been here before they have 2 TVs behind the bar, about 15 feet apart from each other.
It was like any other Thursday in March - cold and rainy, half empty bar - except it was the beginning of the NCAA basketball tournament. My friends and I were hoping to catch some of the games and we knew BBT would be a little iffy because the Penguins were playing (normal, regular season game), but we figured we'd ask the bartender if we could get a basketball game on one of the TVs. It couldn't hurt to ask, right? Wrong.
The conversation, with the female bartender, went a little like this:
Friend: "Excuse me, would it be possible to put the tournament on?"
Bartender: "Don't you know the Pens are playing? Aren't you a Pens fan?"
Friend: *looking down at his Phillies shirt* "No, I'm not from Pittsburgh."
Bartender: "We can't change the channel. We have paying customers who will leave if we change the channel."
Fair enough, we knew it might not happen. We even excused the bartender's terrible logic (inferring that we weren't paying customers; we certainly paid for our drinks and meals). And that was fine with us. We were perfectly content to continue hanging out and have a few more drinks before moving on.
However, that was not possible as the bartender refused to serve us for the rest of our time there. No, it wasn't an honest mistake; she knew we had empty beers and were trying to order more, but every time she came close to us she dipped her head or averted her eyes. It was quite obvious.
Eventually she had to come in front of where I was seated to make a drink for another customer, and that was when I was finally able to make eye contact to ask for another drink. She said OK and walked away, never to return.
And that's when I decided never to return.
No Ms. Bartender, what makes paying customers leave, contrary to your popular belief, is not changing a channel or the lack-thereof. It's disrespecting them.
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