If you’re heading to the Yum! Center for the Pink concert tonight, consider making a stop before or after at the new Down One Bourbon Bar, 321 W. Main St. Created in a space that was once a parking garage, it’s a cozy place to have a drink, one that with a few tweaks could be elevated to something really special.

The first thing you’ll see as you descend the stairs from street level is the “whiskey window,” featuring many of Down One’s more than 100 brands. On the menu, they are cleverly arranged by “epochs.” The First Generation, pre-Prohibition section (1792-Oct. 28, 1919) includes brands like Ancient Ancient Age, Early Times 354 and J.W. Dant. Second Generation, post-Prohibition (Dec. 5, 1933-1980) offerings include Baker’s, Blanton’s and Wild Turkey 101. The Modern Era (1980-today) includes Angel’s Envy, Bulleit and Noah’s Mill.

Down One also offers a full complement of cocktails. I tried the Manhattan, which is made with Down One Single Barrel (the bar’s proprietary bottling of 10-year-old Knob Creek), Amaro and chocolate bitters, with a chocolate-doused cherry ($10).

The bar at Down One is distinguished by art glass salvaged from the Brennan Building on South Fourth Street that once housed the elegant Art Nouveau-style Vienna Restaurant.

When the building was demolished in 1982, a Down One employee told me, owner Al Schneider loaded up the glass windows in his pickup truck and saved them. The Al J. Schneider Co., developer of Down One, has also used the Brennan glass as “skylights” in a private speakeasy room that you enter through an old telephone booth.

But as right as Down One gets these delightful details, it falls down on others. The ugly chairs, apparently salvaged from the old Executive Inn, mar the otherwise posh atmosphere. And while the menu offers an interesting twist on bar food - particularly the Three Little Pigs sandwich ($7), which combines roasted pork belly, pulled pork and bacon with mustard barbecue, slaw and pickles - the presentation in plastic baskets and paper seems jarringly cheap. Upgrading to actual plates is a small touch that would make a big difference.

Overall, though, Down One is a welcome addition to Louisville’s Bourbon Row.

Counting down to the season premiere of HBO’s “True Blood” at 9 and contemplating which beverage will make the best accompaniment. A Bloody Mary would be an obvious choice, but I’d rather face the True Death than drink tomato juice, so I think I’ll pour a nice big glass of red wine. In fact, I’m positive that’s what I’ll do. O positive.

As an unrepentant lover of puns, I would have noted this piece in The New York Times just for its headline: “The Wrath of Grapes.” 

It’s a provocative examination of whether a president’s attitude toward the consumption of alcoholic beverages has any bearing on his success in office. Some cases in point: Jimmy Carter, Herbert Hoover, William Howard Taft and George W. Bush, all abstainers (at least while in office, in that latter case); George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and FDR, all fond of their drink.

“Franklin D. Roosevelt was a martini drinker, much to Eleanor’s displeasure, and an extraordinary president,” Timothy Egan writes. “Again, was there a connection? Solving a Great Depression and crushing the Nazi war machine — aided by the oft-besotted Winston Churchill — is a pretty strong brief.

“In his younger days, F.D.R. knew how to plan ahead. He had four cases of Old Reserve delivered to his town house on East 65th Street just before Prohibition went into effect.”      

Mitt Romney’s faith prohibits drinking alcohol; in 2009, Barack Obama held a Beer Summit with Henry Louis Gates Jr. and police Sgt. James Crowley. Does any of this have any bearing on the upcoming presidential election? Probably not. Then again, people have certainly been known to base their votes on dumber factors.