First Call is a weekly Voracious feature in which we walk into a bar and ask the bartender to make us his or her favorite drink.Watering Hole: The Copper Gate (6301 24th Ave NW Seattle). A well known north end bistro cum cocktail lounge, the Copper Gate is a brick and mortar tribute to Ballard’s town fathers, who were Scandinavian and apparently randy as all hell. Barkeep: Perryn Wright, admitted hospitality industry lifer. The Booze: The Negroni. A classic, it’s equal parts Compari, gin and sweet vermouth. Sweet on the uptake. Bitter on the finish. And aromatic all the way down. According to Wright, it’s one of the “most widely screwed up cocktails in existence.”Full Disclosure: Long before our trusty food editor ambled over to my desk to talk First Calls, nature designated me for this assignment. When sperm penetrated egg, when the long strands of my DNA code were written, that was the moment. Sure, he gave me a choice of locales. But as I’m writing this I can’t for the life of me remember what the other options were. I’d like to think that I considered them, but then the heavy-browed men of the family Coleman have always been a bit self-deluding. In truth, there was no choice. I was always going to the Copper Gate. Actually, that’s only half-true. I was always going to see the Pussy Room.On my way out the office, a colleague and I tried to come up with the word for an object that implies the physical shape of a vagina–the antonym of “phallic.” We couldn’t think anything. Still can’t, actually. And we’re journalists. Language fails in the face of the Pussy Room. But we’ll get to that in a second.After arriving, the barkeep and I conversed about cocktails and Swedish culture, which the Copper Gate, with its sundry nudie pics and wall hangings, is an unabashed ode to. Wright is exactly the guy you want making your craft cocktail: knowledgeable with an easy demeanor and a hint of pretension that’s noticeable only when the conversation turns to booze. “Any cocktail worth drinking is worth sipping,’ he says. The Negroni, his favorite, is evidence of that. After gulping the first half, I immediately began to regret skipping lunch. A well heeled older gent in a fedora sat at the end of the copper plated bar. Seats: 7 or so. The middle-aged guy two stools down was busied himself with appetizer of pickled herring. His wife joined him later, only to turn her nose up at his leftovers. Regulars, they pay no mind to talk of the Pussy Room other than to smile knowingly and tell me that I’ve a great job. The ownership asks that you please refrain from staringAnd then he lead the way over to the entrance of the Pussy Room, which is open only on designated occasions. It’s a private space. One has to make an appointment to enjoy it. I stood before the entrance, kinda tipsy. Warm pink light emanated from behind the doors. The promise of what awaited inside was intoxicating. Being young and full of vigor, I’d gone down this path before. Disappointment usually followed, but booze negates bad memories as well as sound judgment. You can’t see the Pussy Room, and not venture in. The Pussy Room has room for 30. Inside is a (ahem) large organ, plush pink seating and a loose at the fastenings stripper pole, though Wright isn’t sure if that was its intended function. Someday very soon, some member of a bachlorette party will quit her friends to try out the pole and fall right on into a penis shaped cake. Too much sociallubrication. Two! Two! Two vices in one!Wright says that the owners have been wanting to do something special with the extra space for some time. “Back in the day, everything Scandinavian had a sexual connotation to it,” he says. And because it’s Ballard, the owners wanted to pay tribute to the neighborhood’s father culture, hence the vagina motif. It’s a gimmick, but an impressive one. Of course, I might be somewhat biased, being hard wired to enjoy such things and all.