Wellcome Bar & Restaurant

I’m so surprised that no one was smoking inside.
So very surprised.

Good food and beverage choices for a very good price. :-))

If you’ve made it past the SRO-​dwelling loiterers, drug dealers, wheelchair-​bound homeless folks who hang out on the street outside this place, you’ve got sufficient balls to drink here. This is not a hating or classist post, it’s just the truth. Though I’ve not yet tried the food, I’d recommend you spend your time here drinking cheap bottled beers and marveling at the clientele.
So much character and so many characters. Come once, just to see how «wellcome» you can feel.

In the brightly lit bar music played in the background at a volume that was acceptable by bar standards but not so loud that you couldn’t hold a conversation. A rattling thud punctuated the ambiance before I received a quick punch in the arm by Henry sitting next to me.
I had arrived in a rush an hour earlier, when my need for a restroom overtook me and I had to race three blocks from 19^th to Wellcome Bar between 16^th and 17^th. Deciding whether or not Wellcome Bar (the double ll is not a typo) and restaurant qualified for Mission on Mission was easy. After navigating around the handful of questionable characters lingering outside — some tweaking out, others begging for money — with the exception of a family near the front of the bar having dinner I could see that the rest of tables were empty — a solid indication that the patrons didn’t come here for the food.
For more check out:

Smells like feet.

A little too bright? I seem to remember this place being lit up like a bookstore!
The bartender was out for a smoke when we stopped in front of Wellcome Bar & Restaurant. And yes, that’s exactly how it’s spelled. Inspired by those most renown of all fermented grape products, Thunderbird and Nighttrain (Express, at that!), and the success of our previous «news» stop, we decided to pop in on the way to find friends elsewhere. The bartender stamped out her cigarette and marched in ahead of us. A few patrons looked us over as we came in, but a shot each for us and twenty-​plus dollars later (really? that much?) and they patrons didn’t seem to be paying us any further heed.
And for the record, I was not running for the door. I was vaguely and absent-​mindedly following while carrying around a Costco-​sized flat of chips, granola bars, sinkers bars, and lollipops in my arms. Yeah, it was that kind of night.
I would definitely go back. Probably after more Thunderbird. Or Nighttrain. Or both. Maybe even to try to discover what the restaurant portion of Wellcome’s is.

Restaurant? I only saw a bunch of people drinking at the bar that was tended by a woman who obviously had a rougher life than myself or anyone reading this review.
This place is eerie and a little too bright and the music is the bad 80s variety set to a volume that pours out onto the sidewalk as it unsuccessfully attempts to lure in the passersby. There are vacant tables and a bar spattered with an odd variety of people who have drinking in common and probably little else.
I tried to befriend the super fly dude who was doing a little James Brownesque jig but every time I said something to him he just stared at me blankly. I kept trying, me being the me I become when I drink fortified wine, which eventually led to me thinking he might snap and kick my ass, so I apologized for bothering him and then he actually did get mad. Apparently I should never say I am sorry, even if someone is staring at me like I am the anti-​Christ for saying hello. It worked though, because immediately after he gave me the fist to fist «bump» that meant we were pals and offered up his bar stool.
I would have taken it but my three male friends who accompanied me were already running for the door and I had to go catch up.