Gower Gulch

As special as Sport Shots were, the place I bought them was more special still.

When I lived in Hollywood, there was this little shopping center called Gower Gulch, which looked like a leftover set for a C-grade western. This shopping center contained everything you'd expect--a locksmith, an Indonesian sushi/karaoke bar, a Japanese Mexican seafood restaurant, a Denny's, an optometrist's office that never opened, and a Baskin Robbins/Starbucks/Togo's.

But the whole thing was anchored by Gower Gulch Liquor, the greatest store in the history of the liquor/convenience/drugstore/deli genre.

Gower Gulch Liquor made great sandwiches. They stocked the largest selection of impossible-to-find sodas in the world, from the only Triple Cola west of New York City to the last 300 bottles or RC Draft in existence. They had weird candy from Australia (ever had a Jaffa?) and imitation Japanese junk food from Malaysia. They had 4 more flavors of Spam than normally exist outside of Guam. They even claimed they could get me a can of Pocari Sweat, but that never panned out. (I finally had some this year in Singapore--it's basically Gatorade with a silly name. Oh well.)

Of course, being a liquor store, the variety of alcohol was really the central point. From $60-a-bottle Canadian rye that was worth every penny to all flavors of Cisco in existence. But the crowning achievement was Sport Shots, which I never saw anywhere else.

As sad as it was when Sport Shots disappeared, it was even sadder a few months later when Gower Gulch Liquor disappeared. It was replaced by another Starbucks, two doors from the original one, but not saddled with a Baskin Robbins and a Togo's.

You'd think this would be the death of the hybrid Starbucks, but years later, both were still going strong. (Just like the Starbucks a mile down the road that failed to kill off the Burger King/Starbucks and the laundromat/Starbucks in the same 3-storefront building.)

Neither one, of course, had Sport Shots.