Doghouse Saloon

I've been sitting on this picture of the pool table at Doghouse Saloon since around mid-October or so. The quick back story for you is that I had walked by a week or so earlier, noticed a new sportsbar-type sign posted outside and a couple construction guys standing by the entrance having a smoke. They were in the process of renovating Annex and transforming it into Doghouse. I asked by chance if there was to be a pool table and they confirmed this.

So several days later I was killing time on a Friday night before going out to a party in Williamsburg. As I recall it was quite early, maybe not even 6:30PM, when I went in. The only people there were a couple guys playing beer bong on the ground floor. I was happy to discover the pool table was in an upstairs game room area. I quickly grabbed a beer and played a solo game and that was that. The table was in excellent shape, although it cost two dollars per game to play on it. The space immediately reminded me of a double-wide, frattier version of The Skinny just up the street on Orchard. By the way, Doghouse is at 152 Orchard, a few doors above Rivington Street. Combined with Sixth Ward and Lucky Jack's, I'd definitely say this pretty much cements Orchard Street's status as the most pool-friendly street on the Lower East Side. For a more in-depth breakdown of the Annex-Doghouse transition, check out the excellent neighborhood blog Bowery Boogie. (Note: the image above is an assembled panoramic from two separate photographs)

Kick out of safety to 8-ball bankshot

I have to hand it to my opponent, Jay Transue, who made this amazing shot last night during our match at O'Hanlons Bar. Neither of us had our own cue, nor teammates, so we were sharing a house cue and marking our own innings. It was a race to three games and I think at this point we were tied one apiece. I was on the 8 ball and could have banked it cross side, but I decided to play a safety instead. So I hit into the 8 softly and had it come off the rail and stop perfectly between the 7 and the cue ball, leaving him no access to his 7 ball. So as I'm taking a sip from my beer thinking I've Got This In The Bag, he's looking over the kick shot. I thought he'd have little difficulty making contact with the 7, so I wasn't quite preparing for ball in hand. But not only did he make contact with the 7, he drilled it into the far corner. The cue ball rolled downtable and stopped across from the 8. My diagram might be off, I think the 8 might've been closer to the rail, but no matter because he made that shot, too. In the next game I had an early 8, losing the match 3-1. He bought me a consolation shot and I toasted something to the effect of "I'll lose like that any day of the week." Nice game, Jay.