Although colleges are now in many different cities (what a time to be alive!), each college town has pretty much the same types of bars. Here’s a handy guide for how to tell them apart.

Distinguishing characteristics: Lots of shitty prints of foxhunting scenes on the walls, lots of imports on tap, lots of Catholics on tap
House specialty: Pint of Guinness, bare-knuckle boxing (sometimes against a kangaroo)
Clientele: Upper-middle-class white college students, Irishmen, balding thirty-somethings who like to tell the other guys in the mail room how many college chicks they talk to, guys who know Golden Tee is great when you want to go to a bar and not talk to women
Unfortunately: To the Irish, the drink name “Irish Car Bomb” is about as clever as sucking down a “Your Mom Has Terminal Cancer” on the rocks

Distinguishing characteristics: Cheap beer, cheap women, bad lighting, lots of menthol smoke, and denim
House specialty: Anything in a can, including tuna
Clientele: Blue-collar industrial workers college students look down at, college kids trying to get drunk cheaply before moving on to a better bar
Unfortunately: Pretty much anyone in the bar can kick your ass while remaining seated.

Distinguishing characteristics: For the price of a martini, you could buy several houses in Belize—not very nice houses, but they’ve got four walls and a roof. And they’ll get you fucked up.
House specialty: Pretentious conversation, voting Republican
Clientele: People with name-brand undershirts that match their socks
Unfortunately: You’re not rich, and trying to pay for those drinks with chocolate gold coins isn’t fooling anyone.

Distinguishing characteristics: Long line to get in, ridiculous cover, music by DJ Adjective-Letter-Verb
House specialty: Making you realize you’re not a very good dancer
Clientele: Girls who don’t like to wear much clothing, and the hair-gelled men who love them
Unfortunately: The floors get pretty slippery when ballers dump Cristal on them; dancing is only fun for the 3 percent of the population that’s good at it.

Distinguishing characteristics: Eat wings for just nickels; seven screens of explosive, fast-paced WNBA action!
House specialty: Pitchers of anything light, classmate waitresses that get increasingly attractive as the night progresses
Clientele: Boys heading out to watch the game, girls who feign interest in sports to curry boys’ attention
Unfortunately: No matter where you go, you meet a Yankees fan.