The Pub — Restaurant in Kennewick

Abandon all hope ye who enter here. Where does the ritual of shame begin? Is it when I shout my drink order from across the room so everyone turns to stare? Not quite. Every morning while gagging through another breakfast and holding back hot tears while on the way to my dead-end job I tell myself last night was the last time. Yet night after night I am drawn back to the Pub. It is like the proverbial siren, singing to another miserable wretch, lost at sea. That’s us, adrift in an indifferent universe. We sad wanderers who make the Pub our second home. So there I am, last night, tonight, tomorrow night, stumbling in yet again: disheveled and with a bloated face only a mother could love. We who haunt the Pub are the miserable regulars in a grim cast of grotesque and bizarre characters.

What is the point of a qualitative assessment when our destinies are already locked in? We kill away the hours until the hours become days and then months and then years and finally our lives are so bereft of meaning that the nights where we are given a glass instead of a plastic cup are the only moments that contain any semblance of joy. Are the prices fair? That does not matter for we will pay regardless. Our wrecked souls call out for the true spirits, the ones that wash away the daily failure.

The service then? Truly excellent. Tip them well, they who maintain order at the bar and tables, prompt and smiling, remembering your name (even long after your name has ceased to truly mean anything except another word for “shame”) and remembering your drink preferences, always eager to tend to your self-loathing with the proper numbing agents. They are polite and tolerant, they read the room as they do the individual, conversational with some, more cordial with others. On the rare occasion you begin to sober up between drinks do not blame them.

Rather, consider the clientele: the anti-braincell crowd, the sweaty herds who are unable to master complex tasks such as standing in a line. We, who vomit our guts into the stained toilets as surely as we vomit our troubles out onto the stained bar. We, pathetic and threadbare, vulgar in our unwanted flirtations, profane in our drunken entitlement, reeking of peanut breath and undeodorized pits, the stench of failure and fast food rising from our pores and through our unwashed, unkempt clothes. Ever charming, we never cease to laugh at our own jokes, desperate for some sort of connection but gleefully self-sabotaging all the while. We lay ourselves bare at this glorious den of vice and sin.

Take a moment and look at yourself through the noble bartender’s eyes at last call when the floodlights go on and the music finally stops in that surreal passing of Saturday night into Sunday morning: see the sadness as I, you, all of us throw back one more (yes, please, just one more), as the trembling hand signs the bill and leaves it in a puddle of spilled booze and as we stumble out in the night, angry, confused, no closer to the answers for the questions which continually plague us, pushing away salvation while crying out for it. The only relief comes in resetting our mental clocks to count down the minutes until we can return once more and drink to forget ourselves all over again.

How I love this bar. The Pub achieves a raw purity to which very few places could even hope to aspire. It is the physical manifestation of our collective id. For the way it forces me to confront my filthy heart again every night I will raise my glass, I will toast the bar, and with a quivering joyless grin I will drink to good health and a long life as I gleefully down my glass of poison...

First bar I visited after moving to the area and I was extremely disappointed. I sat down at the bar and it took about 10 minutes for one of the bartenders to ask me if I wanted a drink and the only reason she asked was because a local sat next to me and it appeared as if she felt obligated to help me at that point. She took his order first and then mine, then proceeded to make his drink immediately, and mine about 3 minutes later. I then asked for a menu.

I opened my menu, found what I wanted to order, and closed my menu. It then took almost half an hour for the bartender to attempt to take my order even with me motioning towards her after about 15 minutes. By the time I was apparently worthy to be approached I was highly agitated and decided to go elsewhere for my drinks and meal.

Normally I would have waited and ordered my meal regardless of the time it took to order because i really was in no rush, but the bar was mildly occupied and there was 5 bartenders to about 50 people and the lack of service was in my opinion unacceptable. I must have done something very wrong upon entering because I have never had such an unpleasant experience.

Negatives aside the bar seemed like a very cool place to spend the night. There were pool tables, darts, and an assortment of other leisure activities that are sure to become more entertaining as the night goes on. There is also an outdoor area where you can drink and smoke.

I will most definitely not come back unless I am invited by a friend who absolutely insists that we come here. I am reluctant to recommend trying this pub because of my experience simply but it does seem to have some good potential. I would highly recommend that you go in a group as the bartenders seemed to favor that particular...

It's nice to be back at The Pub - after our second covid-19 vaccinations and waiting period, it was nice to "dine in" again! The food was great, as it has been in the past. The beer (and cider) on tap was also excellent.

Tonight's music was the only thing dragging down the evening, as they were playing angsty rap, which just doesn't seem to fit with a bar full of TVs showing various sports. I hope that was a one-off event. We'll give it another try (maybe not on a Monday?) and hope for either better music or TV audio.

[Months, and boosters, and variants of the %#$@ virus pass]

Things are pretty much back to normal. No masks, sitting inside, rock-n-roll music - oh yeah! Things are back to normal. The food, beer, and cider are all at their usual excellent standards (and actually, multiple ciders on tap tonight for my wife.)

The Mushroom burger and the fish and chips (tonight's dinner) were both done to perfection. The fries and fish were deep fried to a crispy but not greasy level. The burger was just right. I wish I could tip the cook separately, as he deserves a bonus for always making great food.

[More time passes - June 2022 update]: Taco Thursdays are wonderful! The tacos are great (crunchy, soft, not greasy) and cheap. Hard to beat for a buck ($1.50 for the soft), and probably reasonably healthy as well. The salsas are made in house, and the green tomatillo salsa is fantastic!

It turns out they do have a tip jar for the cook - please show your appreciation, as he does a great job on everything he touches! (And not to be outdone, our server, Tay, was wonderful - friendly, attentive, and seemed to actually be enjoying her shift - making the whole experience very...