The Irishman Pub

I still can’t quite put my finger on what it was about this place, but I did enjoy it.
Maybe it was the very-​regular-​looking regulars, who cocked their heads askance at your entrance and definitely sized you up, but were nonetheless by no means unwelcoming. Maybe it was the glittering gloam, which glazed across the window, inviting ease – amongst you, and your friends, and them, and their friends – as you all, all of you, had your simple, corn-​mashed shots: as you washed them down and out with the palest, poorest flaxen pints of bubbling, barleyed waters. Maybe it was that same Iowa sun you’d descried for days, now sinking low unto the Omaha you’d left behind, reminding that, as brief as Nebraska was, Iowa’s time was at this limpid moment running just as thin.
Normally we like dirty dives, but something about this place definitely held a unique, barely calculable, perhaps ineffable appeal. It had the usual pool table and video slots, but it just felt blithe and fitting. We decided to linger on our drinks, to sit, for a second round, and to make no hurry out, even as the ends of our journeys hurried near.

We were visiting from Kansas City and working our way around the town square. Every place we visited, anyone we talked to, all reacted with disgust when we mentioned The Irishman as being on our list of planned stops.
Normally we like dirty dives, but something about this place was definitely off. It had the usual pool table and video slots, but it just felt bland and unfriendly. We decided to chug our drinks and hurry out.
I still can’t quite put my finger on what it was about this place, but I didn’t enjoy it.