An empty bar is best. You just pick a seat where there's light enough to read, and the bartender comes right over. Then there are the busy nights, when people crush around the bar three deep and getting a drink seems impossible. What kind of supernatural skills are necessary for getting a cocktail on a Saturday night?

Have you ever wanted to extract all human interaction from your drinking sessions? Me too. Luckily, spirited engineers are locked in an arms race to create the world's best mechanical booze-jockey. Choose your new robotic enabler inside.

Follow these instructions to get the most bang for your buck the next time you're at the bar.

Meet the "Prestwich Crew," touted on YouTube as "Record-breaking Cockail Geniuses". Tricks featured here: the "Six-setting Throw" and the old "Seven-flaming-Saumbuccas-in-8-seconds" trick. Are we to believe this staff has nothing better to do with their time?

What are unemployed bankers doing to pay the bills these days? Meet Bryan Gunderson. He lost his job analyzing structured-equity investments at JPMorgan a few months ago. Now he's learning how to mix up Purple Hooters as a student at the New York Bartending School. Yes, it appears a growing number of people who, just a few months ago, were dropping thousands on bottle service at the city's clubs are the same ones who are now learning how to serve up drinks to other people.