Award-winning columnist, photographer and news writer Ellen Leahy is editor of the City Eagle in Syracuse, NY. She is the former editor of the Skaneateles Press and the Marcellus Observer, also in Central New York and is a freelance photographer and adjunct professor in food service at Onondaga Community College.
When you’re feeling like a limp lizard, where do you go? Luckily, in Syracuse that’s an easy – you meander over to the Limp Lizard Lounge –it’s right there on West Onondaga beyond Wegmans. I had never been, and beside the obvious – it is a cheap imitation of the Dino – it’s also a pretty good joint. This is how I measured: Good bartender, very good chicken tenders and clean beer.
On last Sunday the bartender was what my boyfriend would call, “Hot.” I called her “a–dore-able.” In that as physically attractive as she was, this young blonde was also very cordial, even lovely, making her a bit of a sweetheart. She had a bar full of guys thinking she was naughty, while I was thinking how nice. That’s an art. Often hot bartender chicks aren’t so kind to the ladies, not the case at the LL, which is smart because often the ladies decide where a couple is going.
Secondly, the chicken tenders were just that, freshly breaded, succulent and flavorful. Obviously care had gone into fashioning the simple dish.
On my third note, the draught Blue Moon tasted very fresh. It went down smooth garnished with a big old slice of orange. It was delicious and refreshing, too.
The one concern I had, which doesn’t really pertain to the Limp Lizard alone, is the camera. I noticed a big ol’ camera over the bar. The bartender said these were placed all over the building and that the owner could watch from his home computer or even his cell phone. When asked if this bothered her, the barkeep said, you just get used to it.
My boyfriend said if you aren’t doing anything wrong you don’t have anything to worry about.
But what worried me, and let me digress in that I know my life is an open book. For example, I know e-mail is much like sending a postcard, and that cell phone conversations are bouncing around up there in the sky saying “Listen to me, listen to me.” I also watched WCNY’s NOVA on the big building outside of Washington DC where they capture all this personal broadcast info and try to make sense out of it. But what bothers me is that I also have to contend with being watched; Make that recorded while I am out relaxing at a bar. It seems highly intrusive for a get away from it all type of experience.
For god’s sake, my boyfriend is an apple grower, and I, an editor of a small hands-on city newspaper/web site; the pair of us hadn’t had a real honest to goodness day off in two months. We finally had an afternoon free, we jet to the Lizard and now I’m on someone’s stage? And, I don’t even know my audience.
To make matters worse, we didn’t clean ourselves up. So my hair looked hideous, no make up, and well, you get the picture, it wasn’t purty. If I had known, I would have put on a ball gown or something low cut with some stick on the lips, and perhaps a tiara.
Flash: I can just see a black and white of us on the evening news shoveling chicken tenders and swilling beers with huge bags under our peepers.
I know we are a broadcast society, but even at our roadhouses, our gin mills? Is nothing sacred? I might have felt better if I had known there were cameras on premise. Perhaps if it was posted, because God knows we could use another sign!
Anyway, I did enjoy my maiden voyage to the Lizard, and I’m glad to report it wasn’t limp at all.
CATEGORY: General Society
TAGS: Limp Lizard Lounge,West Onondaga street syracuse, survaillence cameras,Dinosauer BarBQue,Good bartenders,Syracuse bars,roadhouses
