There’s a rectangular room.
Inside that room, there are a couple of pool tables.
There is a dart board hanging on one of the walls, and a newfangled internet jukebox on another wall.
There are photos of local pool gods, favorite customers and the founder in full costume.
There is a bar that runs nearly the length of the building, where you can find friendly folks conversing over drinks and maybe some food.
Welcome to Spock’s Lounge, a small, old-school neighborhood bar in Firestone Park.
As contemporary bars become increasingly cavernous, noisy and diversified (“We have all gluten-free food, free-range liquor distilled in our basement and hot yogakaraoke!”), sometimes it’s nice to go to a low-key place where you can walk from one end to the other without needing to leave a trail of artisanal, organic bread crumbs, or having to carefully and apologetically scooch through a pack of inebriated, shot-sucking horn dogs just to get a beer or go to the bathroom.
Spock’s has been around since the mid-1980s when its late founder, Michael Shreffler, a veteran of the Marines, bought the bar and decided to use the nickname he’d earned from his fellow soldiers in Vietnam. Though the spot did change names once for a few years (you can still see the old new name on the door), it has since adroitly gone back to Spock’s Lounge. Its specialties are Saturday pool tournaments, hearty burgers, friendly patrons who all seemingly know each other, and, of course, the legendary Vulcan Water.
Now, I don’t know the exact chemical or hormonal compound of Vulcan Water, and I’d wager the original recipe is kept hidden away in a titanium vault stored at the bottom of Lake Erie. But Shalee Watkins, daughter of Shreffler and current co-owner with her mother, Merrilyn Shreffler, says, “There’s eight ingredients. Five of them are liquor,” so it’s got that going for it.
Besides, any alcohol-based beverage that looks like windshield wiper fluid as it’s being sloshed out of an old plastic jug is probably worth at least trying, isn’t it?
Well, it’s actually a pretty tasty blast of blue liquid. Despite its reputation, Vulcan Water goes down just a bit too easy. It’s the kind of shot that after a few and then a few more, you may find yourself slurring “Live long and may the force nanoo nanoo!” and wondering why everyone else is rolling their eyes at you while offering you a hand up from the floor, upon which your tuckus has surprisingly landed.
Spock’s is a no-frills joint and probably isn’t the place you’d bring someone you were trying to impress, unless your date is impressed by your sweet bank shot, awesome jukebox curation (no Vanilla Ice, please), vibrantly blue shots or uber-casual, chill bars that have little interest in furthering their brand penetration, aggressively expanding their market share or wooing millennials.
All that being said, everyone is welcome at Spock’s as long as you’re not a jerk.
“We get a group of college kids that’ll come in here every now and then and play pool, they fit right in. We welcome outsiders; we like to make new friends,” said Debbie Owens of Coventry Township.
Owens has been a regular at Spock’s for about 15 years, since she met her significant other, Vince Domonkas, who grew up just down the street from the bar. Domonkas and his five siblings were already regulars when he introduced himself to Owens, with that classic pickup line used by smooth-talking masters of seduction since cavemen began puffing their chests out and flexing, hoping to impress nearby cavewomen …
“You’re a little loud,” he said.
“I said, ‘Well … yeah’ and I started hanging out with him here after that,” Owens said.
Owens, an account manager for a North Carolina-based human resources software company, had just gotten off a plane from a business trip and decided to come to Spock’s before going home.
“It’s quaint. You know everybody. There’s no trouble, never any drama, till Ron comes in and Ricky,” she said, drawing vaguely devilish smiles from both of the troublemakers seated at the other end of the bar.
“It’s just our little hangout,” she said.
Domonkas has been walking to and occasionally “stumbling home” from Spock’s since it opened in 1985. “It’s really, really a good bar,” he said.
The menu is comfortably classic, with nearly everything under $10: small fried appetizers; a half-dozen varieties of burgers (no, I don’t know what is in the Vulcan Burger’s secret sauce); Owens’ favorite, wings; some hot dogs, chicken dishes, salads and sub sandwiches.
Likewise, the bar provides the basics with domestic brews and a few top-shelf liquor choices, but you ain’t getting a Luxardo cherry and oak-aged rye in your Manhattan, and nobody’s muddling anything for your mojito, Mr. Fancy Pants.
Watkins — who has worked at the bar “off-and-on” for 27 of its 32 years, makes the Vulcan Water and the food, knows everyone’s standard drink order and generally keeps the place open and running — has a simple motto that makes places like this a destination for lovers of the atmospheric pleasures of a simple bar.
“We do what we do.”
Malcolm X Abram can be reached at mabram@thebeaconjournal.com or 330-996-3758. Follow him on Facebook at http://on.fb.me/1lNgxml or on Twitter @malcolmabramABJ .