Continuing my recent discussion, in “Possibly unfortunate names”, of the business names Plumed Serpent, Pink Taco, and Tube Steak: Facebook friends have added Fat Cock Coffee in Austin TX (from Steve Wechsler) and Pussy Cafe in Chile (from Jennifer Arnold, who adds, “The Americans called it Café Coño.”); and I’ve been looking at names of gay bars.
Fat Cock Coffee comes with a visual pun:
The visual pun is all over the place. For example, Cafepress has a shop offering clothing (t-shirts in various styles, a trucker hat) with this logo on them:
The accompanying ad copy:
Do you love cock? Our clothing has I (heart) Cock on them (actually it’s a picture of a rooster, but a rooster is also known as a cock). Do you love cocks? If so, you should show it off to the world by wearing one of our shirts. We have them available on both men’s and women’s clothing, so whether you are a straight woman, a gay man, or are bi, we have the right shirt for you. Proudly display your love of cock wherever you go.
Meanwhile, there are a number of establishments named Old Log Inn, maintaining the name despite the antique dirty joke based on the question “How far is the Old Log Inn?”.
On the gay bar front, there are at least two playfully named gay bars in Thomas Pynchon’s fiction: The Greek Way in The Crying of Lot 49 and The Log Jam in Vineland (which started as a dive bar for lumberjacks but then turned into an upscale gay bar, preserving the name, since it was still appropriate, but in a different way).
In the real world, gay bars and clubs tend not to have sexually suggestive names. Leather bars named The Eagle are all over the place, but the name isn’t itself suggestive of anything beyond masculinity. Now, The Mineshaft (a famous gay bar in New York City, long closed, though the name has been taken by gay bars elsewhere), that’s a suggestive name. So is Stud Bar (we have one in San Francisco). Otherwise, you mostly get names like The Café, Mecca, The Edge, Apex, The Townhouse, The Midnight Sun, Julius, The Detour, and Woody’s (picking names from several cities and eras). And, of course, The Stonewall Inn.
December 7, 2010 at 10:46 am |
Another, more recently closed, suggestively-named bar in NYC: Dick’s Bar. It’s too bad that it closed; anywhere the Magnetic Fields’ Stephin Merritt hangs out (with or without pooch) is likely to be interesting,
http://nymag.com/listings/bar/dicks_bar/
December 7, 2010 at 5:25 pm |
[…] another notable business name: The Bun Boy Motel in Baker CA, seen here in the background of statuary at The Mad Greek, a diner […]
December 7, 2010 at 6:05 pm |
Er…”Woody’s” isn’t suggestive?
December 7, 2010 at 6:25 pm |
Ack. Maybe I’ve become deaf to these things!
For the record, Woody’s is a famous gay bar in Toronto.
December 7, 2010 at 6:17 pm |
[…] Offering a copy of Mary Roach’s Bonk, on science and sex (unclaimed in a previous contest because the winner already had it) to what I judge to be the most entertaining name for a gay bar, following on this posting. […]
December 8, 2010 at 11:23 am |
For a British-pub-themed gay bar: the Earl of Rochester or the Prince Albert.
For an Irish or Scotch themed gay bar: Hot Toddys
December 9, 2010 at 10:07 am |
[…] the topic of gay bar names, two stand out for the way they combine metaphorical sexual content (while also evoking […]
September 14, 2012 at 6:24 am |
[…] the tradition of “Possibly unfortunate names” [for businesses] and “More notable business names”, yesterday came a new one. Passed on by Jeff Shaumeyer on Facebook, this posting by Andy Hopkins of […]