Death of Ernesto's

I'm still stunned and reeling from the news on Saturday that my beloved Ernesto's has abruptly closed its doors without warning.

Actually, "closed its doors" is something of a misnomer, because I was told yesterday that the place's doors went unlocked for three days, with all fixtures, food and booze just sitting there, like a ghost ship. Finally someone had to tell the landlord, "uh, do you know Ernesto's has apparently been abandoned?" I went out yesterday to the place to pay my last respects, like at a Wake. Took these pictures through the windows, getting a last look at the seats where 1,001 comedies and tragedies of Shakespearean and Biblical proportions played out, albeit on a microscopic and tequila-soaked level.

After falling in love with easily portable netbooks in 2010, I began camping out in earnest like a wi-fi desperado in Mexican restaurants, plying my trade as an alleged author. The majority of my play Son of Grimaldi was written at the bar there, as were many installments of my Kentucky Monthly magazine and KyForward columns.

Though Ern's was a fine Mexican restaurant as Mexican restaurants go, I was not there to eat burritos, I was there to work. And drink. But the longer I lingered within its salsa-scented walls, the more I became entertained by the Happy Hour social scene at the bar. Gradually I spent less time typing and more time yapping, flirting, shootin' the shit with my fellow louts and inebriants, and mercilessly haranguing Doug The Bartender, who seemed to actually exist on Earth solely for the specific noble dharma-purpose of playing straight-man to our comedic barbs.

There are plenty of other places for an East-end barfly to amuse himself, of course, and virtually all the cast of Ernesto's daytime drama can be found cluttering up Mr.G's, Carrabba's, Rumors, Havana Rumba Middletown, the local VFW hall, and The Swamp, but there could never be another Ernesto's. Or could there?