Lilly Coogan's RIP?

Walked by Lilly Coogan's on First Avenue near Sixth Street last night several times... and, when I took this photo around 9:30, the gates were still down... And I called the bar to discover their number was not in service... One of the bars around here that I've never stepped foot in... maybe because it replaced one of my favorites, the Homestead, one of the great dives in the neighborhood. I reminisced about this in a comment on Eater... They had the crummy pool table that was about a foot from the north wall. I recall they had shorter sticks as a remedy.

Bye, bye Baraza

Baraza has closed. I walked by the Latin-themed joint on Avenue C between Eighth Street and Ninth Street last night. The door was open. The space had been gutted.



There's no note to patrons on the door ... and the Baraza Web site makes no mention of closing. However, Baraza's MySpace page confirms that the bar closed.

It opened in 1998. I've never been there... So I looked to see what I had missed via Yelp. Where I found this review:

If you go dancing without first putting on deoderant, I will go on Yelp and write about how everyone in the club smells like ass , and how fair is that to the club, really? I mean it's not like Baraza washed the deoderant off all these dudes as they were coming in the front door...at least, I don't think.

Let me explain something. There are a few things that I do without fail when I go out dancing. Actually, scratch that. When I leave the house. I brush my teeth. I put on clothes. I put on deoderant. Why, patrons of Baraza, do you not do the same? I was lucky enough to receive several offers to Latin dance throughout my evening there and it was good to know that I didn't need the cash-only bar to end the night passed out, since I was sure to pass out on the stench of body odor alone coming off my potential suitors. If you see someone tackling dudes as they come inside and rubbing them down with speedstick, that might be me. Watch out. Or wear deoderant. Your choice.