Sunday Night Revelries: Where To Go Out
By Steve McPherson
Maybe you had to work Friday and Saturday. Or maybe you just like to eke out every last drop of weekend. But whatever the reason, you're just not ready to pack it in and prepare for the inevitability of Monday morning. Not to worry: there's still plenty of fun to be had around the Twin Cities on a Sunday night.
Neighborhood Night
Sunday: 6 p.m.-2 a.m.
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The Bryant-Lake Bowl proves Sunday night is the ultimate happy hour with their Neighborhood Night. You can bowl for just $2 and the bar/bowling alley/theater keeps it local by giving discounts on local beer (you know, Surly, etc.), wine and appetizers, including organic chicken wings from Larry Schultz's farm in Owatonna and smoked trout fillet on grilled baguette from Star Prairie Trout Farm in Wisconsin. Plus, as always, if you bike to the BLB and bring in your helmet, you can get a tallboy for $2.
Chuck and Sean's Trivia
Sunday: 8 p.m.-close
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Trivia Mafia have slowly been extending their iron grip on trivia nights all over the Twin Cities for the last several years, but the first and best spot for their particular brand of trivia (which involves translating rap lyrics into "grandma talk" for the Rapadoo question and copious onstage profanity) is still the 331 Club on Sunday nights. Prizes range from bar tabs to gift cards from Common Good Books to CDs from the Electric Fetus to tickets to shows, but even if you can't win or even place, you can still enjoy two High Life tallboys for a cool $5.
Barbaric Yawp
Sunday: 6 p.m.-close
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Writers get a rep for being reclusive loners who drown their sorrows in alcohol, but on the last Sunday of every month, a whole bunch of them somehow manage to drag themselves away from their basement offices and bottles of bourbon to drink some coffee and read aloud at Falcon Heights' Coffee Grounds. There's a little stage, which lends an air of legitimacy to the proceedings and all are welcome to read or just come and listen. If drinking coffee at 6 p.m. will keep you up all night, you could always opt for ice cream.
Open Blues Jam with Moses Oakland
Sunday 10 a.m.-12 a.m.
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If you find your latest poem doesn't go over so well at the aforementioned Barbaric Yawp, you can always head over to Famous Dave's in Uptown and exorcise your demons with Moses Oakland at the open blues jam. The brave can get up there with whatever axe they specialize in and work it, the cowards can just sit there and mock them, and the hungry can enjoy wings and beer. If you can bear with the extensive credits, you can check out a bit of Moses Oakland doing his thing at Famous Dave's right here (things get cooking at 1:35).
Traditional Irish Music Session
Sunday: 12 p.m.-close
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It's clear by now that Sunday is all about participation, a time for getting over your weekend revelries by connecting with your fellow humans through the beauty of performing publicly with other hobbyists in your chosen genre. At Kieran's on Sunday afternoon you can hoist a pint alongside your guitar or mandolin or frame drum, belting out a stirring rendition of "Cliffs of Doneen" or "Roddy McCorley" or even that song from Cole's wake in The Wire, "Body of an American" by the Pogues.
Steve McPherson is a writer and musician who has lived in the Twin Cities since 2004, where he teaches writing and music at McNally Smith. His dog is named after both a drink and a guitar. He tweets from @steventurous.