"The mornings aren't all that bad," Wombacher, 51, told me. "It's nights that get difficult sometimes. . . .
Some nights I probably would rather stay home."
So, why did he set such a difficult challenge?
"I kind of thought it would be fun," he said. "And besides, I've always liked beer."
Wombacher, who is unmarried and has no children, earns a living working for a graphic-arts company. He's a prolific writer of journals and blogs. A few years ago, he wrote a book called "99 Beers Off the Wall: A Crazed Guide and Twisted Travelogue of One Man's Journey to 99 Bars in New York City in 7 Days."
As any barfly could tell you, though, it's not just about drinking.
"The one thing I learned, which I never thought about, is that a bar is a bar," Wombacher said. "They all have different themes, or no theme at all, but that doesn't matter because it's mostly about the people inside who define a bar for me.
"Some bars are friendly. It's like a party inside. Other places, no one wants to talk to you. They're just in there to drink and they want to be left alone."
He continued: "I try to mix it up. If I go to a dive bar one night, I go to a lounge the next, then maybe an Irish bar."
The names alone suggest both the excitement and banality of barhopping:
Otto's Shrunken Head . . .
Johnny Utah's . . . Bongo . . .
Mama's. Do they host poetry slams at the Limerick House? Might you run into Elizabeth Taylor at Butterfield 8? Do you have to wear a beret at the Art Bar?
I've visited a few of the places: the Ginger Man, which boasts about 70 taps of outstanding ales and lagers; the White Horse, where poet Dylan Thomas drank himself to death; McSorley's Old Ale House, the oldest tavern in the city.
But, after reading Wombacher's blog, I've found some new destinations, including:
_ No Idea, in the Flatiron District, which claims that both the book "Last of the Mohicans" and Chastity Bono were conceived in its rooms.
