Una Menos Fantasma Este Año
The Chupacabra has been tearing shit up all over the Americas for almost 15 years now. What was originally an isolated Puerto Rican problem became all of our problems when the little fucker mobilized and came onto the mainland to terrorize North and South America. Goats, cows, dogs and chickens were exsanguinated and left lying all around Latin America as a visual F.U. to anyone stupid enough to look for what eyewitnesses described as a red-eyed, hopping, hissing thing with a long snout and wings.
Then the bastard came to America …and Los Angeles, specifically. As if life isn’t hard enough! Walking to the corner mercado involves looking out for desgraciados, sin verguenzas, cabrones, babosos, and payasos…not to mention El Cucui and La Llorona! We didn’t need this shit.
…and speaking of scary, it was a long time before I found anyone brave enough to have a beer with me at Bar Costeña. Luckily, last weekend the fools at Losanjealous were brave (drunk / stupid???) enough to drink $3.00 Tecates, watch baseball and soccer simultaneously and stare at some shady bar patrons who stared right back. This is not a place to dick around. Imagine that bar in Desperado, but instead of Cheech Marin spitting in your beer, you’ve got 2 barmaids that will fuck you up if you act the fool. …Even if you’re the Chupacabra. No more sucky sucky, holmes.
(That’s right…you don’t have to lock your goats up anymore.)
BAR COSTENA
271 S Main St.
Los Angeles 90012
213-680-9455
UPDATE: Reply from Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker, noted English Cryptozoologist, on the matter of the creature hanging at the bar:
Hi Jeannette, Thanks for your email and interesting picture. The creature in it is what is generally termed a devil fish – I have a very similar exhibit in my study here. It is not a genuine creature, but is in fact a skilfully manufactured fake and is commonly seen for sale at seaside resorts, antique fairs, secondhand shops, etc. What it actually is is a marine skate or ray, whose wide pectoral fins and tail fin have been carefully sliced to produce wing-like or leg-like structures, after which the now-much-modified fish is dried and sometimes varnished, and thereafter nicknamed a devil fish. Sometimes, a skate or ray will be even more extensively modified, to yield a four-legged dragon-like monster, which is usually known as a Jenny Haniver. They are popular tourist novelties because of their strange and puzzling appearance, and one in Mexico was even passed off by its crafty seller as a grounded extraterrestrial alien corpse! Yours is a particularly nice specimen to have, as great care has been taken in sculpting the wings. I notice from your photo that you have a porcupine fish too – again, I have one of these, another popular (but this time totally real) exhibit. Thanks for your email once again, and for showing me your fine specimen of a devil fish.
