Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

The Horseshoe replaced Kildare's Irish Pub in the summer of 2014, and is the most recent of a long line of bars and restaurants in this spot (going back, at least, to Kester's Bamboo House). The building is now for sale, so we will have to see what happens.

According to The State, this place is a casualty of a work to rule enforcement of SC's liquor laws, which has hit a number of college bars in Five Points. It strikes me that it may be a case of killing the golden goose, but the scene had been getting out of hand, sometimes fatally, in recent years.

I believe at one time this hole in the wall rib joint in an old house on Decker may have updated its slogan to Slap Yo Mama Good! but I can't verify it (and I suppose they were lucky Mick Jagger never drove by..). This was apparently a one man operation, and got pretty good reviews on Yelp, though apparently there was no indoor seating.

I was going through some old pictures and noticed that I never did a closing for Carolina Window & Millwork on Laurel Street. I don't actually know anything about the place other than Google suggests it was an auto glass place (although, just from the name that sounds wrong..), and that the storefront is now Distinctive Surfaces kitchen and bath store.

They listed in the February 2014 phonebook, but not the February 2015 one, so I'm putting the closing date as 2014.

K-9 Coature is a dog grooming business that moved into this building following the the closure of Conumdrum in late 2015. I noticed today when I drove by that the the building was empty again (and that the facade is undergoing work).

It turns out that K9-Coature outgrew the space and has moved down the street to 832 Meeting Street in late April.

As far as I can tell, this space is not on the market. I don't know if that means that something is already lined up, or if they want to work more on the building or what.

UPDATE 22 September 2020 -- Now Weco Bottle And Biergarten:

I like the idea of breakfast, and the foods of breakfast. I just don't like the *time* of breakfast, so I never got to the Famous Toastery on Sparkleberry. This place was the follow-on operation to McAlister's Deli, which moved kind of around the corner and down to front onto Two Notch.

The State records the place as having opened on 20 January 2017, so they had a run of about two and a half years. If I can detect a trend in the Yelp reviews it would be that the place may have been struggling a bit towards the end.

The State also reported that the downtown location which was supposed to open last year in the Main Street Atlanta Bread location was cancelled.

I wonder if the Spring Valley High School morning traffic was a factor here? The location doesn't seem that bad to me (though Carrabba's would beg to differ), but I don't go by when school is starting or letting out.

(Hat tip to commenter Bobby)

UPDATE 1 September 2021 -- Now Allena's Southern Kitchen:

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I was unaware of this newish pizza joint until commenter Heath mentioned that it was closing. It's down the section of Sumter Street north of Elmwood, someplace I hardly ever go. Apparently a co-owner made himself notorious on social media recently and that hurt business, or at least that's the take at The State. Well, I don't do social media, so I missed all that, and anyway apparently that gentleman is no longer involved with the restaurant, so I decided I would check it out before it closes on Saturday.

It's a very small place, with only one lowtop table that I would pick as a favorite, but there is also some bar and hightop seating. You order at the counter, but they do bring the food to the table. They are fancy enough that they don't have pepperoni as an ingredient, so I ordered the Pizza Margherita (pictured above). I thought it was pretty good. The crust could have been a little crisper, and I whould have preferred a basil leaf on each slice, but it was quite tasty. I could never be a regular here because they do not have fresh brewed tea, but they do have some beer, wine and bottled drinks.

Here are stories on the closing from The Free Times and Cola Daily

(Hat tip to commenter Heath)

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Wristwatch Doc used to be in Forest Acres where Marco's Pizza is now, but moved to Knox Abbott in April of 2014.

When the old Oscar de la Renta watch my father gave me in the 1980s started losing time, I took it here and they fixed it pretty quickly. (Well, I think they just replaced the guts, but that's fine with me, I'm a George Washington's Hatchet kind of guy.)

Unfortunately, I dropped it again a few months ago, and it's losing time again. Not sure where I'll take it this time.

Several folks in Have Your Say talking about watch batteries. If I'm in town, I take mine to Roof's on Forest Drive, and have never had a problem.

The wierdest time I ever had replacing a battery was when my watch stopped while I was spending a week working in DC. There's a big mall on the, um, blue, I think, line, Pentagon City or Crystal City, something like that. I metro-ed down to that and found a jeweler who told me: No problem! We'll send it off and have it back to you in two weeks. I asked if anyone had, in fact, ever taken them up on that, and apparently the answer was no.

Looking further there, I found something like the Watch & Sunglasses Hut, which did not inspire confidence, but I was there and didn't have any better options. The guy took the back off easily, and replaced the battery fine. Then he was having a dickens of a time getting the back on again, and I started to worry that he was going to bend it, or break the crystal with all the pounding he was doing. Finally he turns around to his counter and says, I guess I'm going to have to use this thingamajig that puts the puts the backs back on. He puts the watch in it, works a screw and presto: the back is on. I'm like, well, I dunno, but if I had a device for putting the backs of watches on, that might have been my first option..

(Hat tip to commenter badger)

While I was at Landmark Square the other day, I noticed an empty storefront near the anchor.

Somehow I missed the story a few years ago, but Shepherd's Corner Christian book store closed in May of 2017 when the owner moved back to West Virginia.

The store started in Cedar Terrace, and moved to this spot in 2002, for a total of just under 40 years of service.