A newish bar on the Upper West Side (alas, two blocks short of being in Morningside) has a novel concept, reports The Feedbag.

Show a receipt for your cab ride there and they'll pay for your ride-- in the form of a bar tab! Now, finally there's a reason to take a cab home after a long night downtown: Even more free drinks. Bwog can't imagine that this promo is permanent, so better take advantage of it while it lasts.

The Village Pourhouse is on Amsterdam between 108th and 109th. The Village location is at 3rd Avenue and 11th Street.

Bwog's previous review of the Pourhouse has much more information, lest we repeat ourselves.

Welcome back to the Best of series in which Bwog analyzes the best in a category of chosen food product!

There are few things that are as much fun and as thirst-quenching as a margarita. And after a weekend of being nice to your parents or studying for midterms, there are few things as much sought after as a good margarita. Here, Bwog's Best of returns with a non-definitive guide to Morningside Height's best margaritas.

Blockheads

Theoretically Blockheads should be the perfect place to get a margarita. The clientele is loud and rowdy; the decor is a kitschy amalgam of Christmas lights and party streamers; and the price is just right. But when you're paying just $3 for a margarita, something's got to to be missing. What's missing in a Blockheads margarita is enough alcohol and enough fresh lime juice. It's questionable whether there's any lime juice at all because these cocktails are so saturated with syrupy margarita mix. Instead of a nice icy crunch, the consistency of Blockhead's margaritas is a slushy, unsalty mess, which definitely comes out of a can. Given the low alcohol quotient, you'll need about nine dollars worth of margaritas to start feeling saucy. To add insult to injury, Blockheads serves up their drinks in cheapo six-ounce plastic cups with no mini-umbrellas, cocktail-stirrers or swivel sticks. Not even a fun straw.

Remember American hero and proud Business School alum ('97) Roy Den Hollander? The self-described antifeminist who sued Columbia for failing to offer a "men's studies" course? Whatever, anyway, he's back! And he's suing mad, specifically about ladies' nights at bars because what else?

This month, Hollander is arguing that when nightclubs offer all the ladies reduced-price drinks, they are discriminating. He then went on to conclude that since nightclubs get their liquor licences from the state, it's not only the clubs but New York that is discriminating against him, Roy Den Hollander, and all of his kind.

The lawsuit was dismissed and Hollander called the judge a "feminist." The end.

This past weekend, Inside New York threw a party to celebrate the release of its 2008-2009 edition. The party took place inside the new Village Pourhouse, the uptown counterpart to the popular original location, which caters to the villianous downtown adversaries of New York University. Bwog took along our camera and a notepad.

What we're cautiously optimistic about:

• It's huge, and by Columbia bar standards -- see: claustrophobia-inducing Heights and misanthropy-inducing 1020 -- it's the biggest place around. There's a smaller bar area with several TVs, and this area opens up into a larger room with a dance floor and many spacious booths.
• It's sportsy. Athletic types and their acolytes have about 1,000 fairly large TVs to enjoy, all of which were invariably tuned to games, matches, races, etc. This is also a nice change of pace if you're sick of watching 1020's steady rotation of whimsical kids movies and bizarre vintage pornography.
  
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You know what we haven't thought about in awhile? Mona. The bar. It closed last year after a crackdown or some such and then everyone headed to 1020 and pretty much forgot the whole thing. Anyway, Spec reported last year that it will be replaced by Pourhouse, a downtown beer and sports bar that caters to Washington Sq.-based archenemy New York University (right).

Real estate insider Joe Meyers has learned that it should be opening up in a matter of weeks. Reports Meyers: "14 flat screen TVs, two (really big) bars, late night food, tons of beer on tap." Rumors are also swirling of a "power hour" from 10-11 PM, during which Bud and Bud Light are $2, which is exciting!

Let's all go there an enjoy it before the Terrible 12s use their Facebook Events and "Maryland IDs" to destroy it forever.

Exterior shot of New Pourhouse after the jump.

Gawker is linking to Vanity Fair's just released "All Access Summer Guide," which features the city's best beaches, bars, restaurants, and pools. Second on VF's list of the Best Bars for Drinking Under the Stars? None other than everyone's favorite backup for when 1020 is just too crowded, the Heights. "Columbia students drink their cares away at this second story Morningside Heights bar," the guide truthfully (we guess?) points out.

So be on the lookout for an influx of hip forty-somethings with an inexplicable desire to drink their cares away with a bunch of "twenty-one-year-olds" under the stars.

If you're in search of a new Saturday night clubhouse for you and your crew - look no further, the Corner Bistro is just the place. Located at 331 W. 4th St in the West Village.

Sometimes you want to go, Where everybody knows your name, and they're always glad you came. Not happening at 1020? Well, it probably won't happen at the Corner Bistro either. I've been frequenting the bar for nearly four years now and to this day the bartender still refuses to know name, let alone my drink. But the Bistro cannot be written off as just another amateur haunt with a lax ID policy.

Located on the corner of Jane and West 4th Streets, the Bistro has inviting charm that lends itself to all occasions. Really there is never a wrong time to go to the Bistro. Whether you're pre-gaming, celebrating Saturday night, or just passing through for your night-cap, you'll always be glad you came. But stopping by for a weekend lunch, when the afternoon sunlight comes streaming through the bar's front windows, is hard to beat.

It seems Havana Central has gotten their hands on the email addresses of several Columbia student groups! Lately they've been spamming inboxes with invitations to celebrate New Years Eve with the good folks at the wholly unpopular M'side watering hole.

The flyer advertises "strong Cuban drinks PLUS New Years party favors" (emphasis ours). But wait! There's más.

For just $195 (a bargain given that they're providing the New Years party favors!), you can purchase one ticket to party during the 10pm shift at Havana Central's Times Sq. branch--what we're calling Havana Central Central. But worry not, cheapskates and early-birds: If you plan to ring in 2008 at 6pm, seating at Havana Central Central is just $125.

And thus concludes Havana Central (Central)'s completely brilliant plan to attract Columbia patrons by throwing a $200-per-ticket party in the middle of the University's 39-day winter break.

See you there, comrades!

While you're paying for drinks at 1020, or The Heights, or wherever, some people are actually being paid to go on dates at local Columbia bars. Lonely hearts, look to psych experiments for your next love. Who knew economics held the key to matters of the heart?

Bonus points to anyone who can tell Bwog what bar Ray Fisman used.

Last night, as the prickly first winds of autumn blew across Morningside Heights, the loveliest dive bar in the neighborhood sang its swan song. Dozens of devoted patrons pressed into the warmth of the Night Café to drink, reminisce, and take part in the bar's weekly trivia competition. The mood was somber, because everyone knew that this night might be the last: The bar's owners have announced that it will close sometime in the next two weeks.

The Night Café has occupied a long, narrow storefront at 106^th Street and Amsterdam since the early 1990s. Nestled next to a bustling laundromat, its red neon sign is nearly concealed behind a curtain of scaffolding. Inside, it's usually warm and bustling. Lou Reed's voice might be wavering out of a dilapidated jute box stacked with rock and roll, and a posse of pool sharks will surely be crowded around a game on the rundown table in the back. The nighttime bartender, a wild, wiry man who seems to like swigging drinks as much as making them, greets every person like a friend. He's been known to perform pushups on the bar (and pour free cocktails for impressed strangers).

A bouncer at one of the area bars that Bwog frequents tells us that all bars around campus are getting ID scanners within the next two weeks. Furthermore, according to the buzz: Columbia's footing the bill. They must really hate us...

Well, we heard whispers about this before, and three whispers makes a rumor: is Nacho's Kitchen closing? An Eater.com tipster tells of Health violations, while Wikicu confidently proclaims that Columbia's bar of second choice will be replaced by a Jamba Juice. We also know that Morningside Heights has become a dicey place to own a bar, what with the Man starting to care that the majority of the clientele should only be ordering diet Cokes.

We could hardly blame them for moving on to better pastures...but this means that Bwog needs a better fake.

Columbia-sponsored high school, created as Manhattanville quid pro quo, evicted, now homeless: ironic?

CU formally apologizes to Minutemen: reactions predictable

Barnard career services better than Columbia's...unless you want to be a bartender

Speaking of which: bars crack down on legal IDs, but hire illegal bouncers

Revelation of the day: "in certain cases drug use destroys lives, but in a lot of cases they help out a whole bunch"

Columbia's alphabet soup of schools: doomed to "sad and paradoxical reality" of awkward coexistence - forever. Which, according to this, is a good thing. We think.

On Friday night, I went on a bar-burning tour of every Columbia watering hole, roughly from south to north. I named this epic pub crawl the Boot n' Rally Rally. Here's how it works: I review my experience at the bar and assign a score using the facial expression I would make if you asked me, "Hey, Addison, you wanna go to [the bar in question]?" Then I give an explanatory quote that comes out of that face. These pictures were taken in order, so make a flipbook and watch me get faced. And no, I didn't have a drink at every bar because I would have died. I'm lil', and the doctor doesn't tell me my weight in pounds; he says I weigh a hundred and one gumdrops and half a lollipop. Now let's rally!

Here I am at the start of the night, with one black hoodie and negative one shower, the perfect look and smell for drinking a lot and alone. My adventures start after the jump!