The Nightlife Blogger: Why Returning To Bars & Restaurants With Social Distancing Not Appealing

Bars Are For Socializing, Not Social Distancing 

By Kevin Wilkerson, The Nightlife Blogger

With restaurants and bars re-opening across the USA and other places around the world, you might think I’m going to charge out the door like a high school student at the start of the summer break.

But not so fast.

The prospect of sitting in a half-empty bar or restaurant, having to stay six feet away from the next-closest person and wearing a mask, is not very appealing to me.

After all, bars are all about socializing, not social distancing. The entire premise of PubClub.com is to provide readers with information on the busiest, most crowded bars each night of the week. And that goes counter to what we are going to experience, at least in the early days of the re-openings.

We avoid the empty bars.

How many times have you walked around an area looking for a happening bar and said, “oh, nobody’s in that place!?” Now, tho, we might be saying “oh look, the place is half full. It’s packed!”

But there’s another reason I won’t be racing to the bars like Jimmy Johnson at a NASCAR race.

Let’s say there’s an attractive girl at the bar. Normally, I would be chomping at the bit to go introduce myself to her. And I would, too.

But now what? She’s six feet away and it would be an awkward approach to say the least. And what do I say to her – “nice mask??” Anyone out is not likely to be in the mood for conversations from strangers anyway, for fear of catching coronavirus. Girls sometimes have a protective shield around them anyway; in the “new” bars, they are wearing one.

If pretty girls are sitting a bar and I can’t talk to them, it’s like going window shopping. And I don’t like to browse, I like to get a closer look at the merchandise, so to speak.

So while I am thrilled to see restaurants and bars opening up again, it’s going to be a while that I’ll be excited to spend a #nightout in one of them.