Day 46 - Cheese Steaks and Bloody Beers

Today is noteworthy because it's Presidents Day. However today is also noteworthy because it marks a change in the hours of Jack's Bar & Lounge, which is to say Jack's is now open 11 a.m. to 2 a.m., Monday through Friday

There wasn't any talk about presidents in the bar when I was there. In fact I didn't think about presidents at all during my whole trip to and from the greatest bar ever to exist in all of space time.

Anyway, it was such a beautiful day outside and my truck was almost out of gas, so fate was practically telling me to take a walk in lieu of driving.

On my walk I noticed that many of the trees and bushes that bloomed with flowers in the first part of February were just starting to shed their petals. I could see little puddles made of flowery lavender and purple colored rain all up and down the streets that I walked past on my way to the bar.

I arrived around 3:45 pm-ish to find the bar smelling good. Aimee and Travis (kiss or otherwise fondle the cook, btw) were behind the bar and Aimee served me up a PBR. There were laptops sitting on the bar and I thought to myself this looks like an internet cafe.

I sat down at the bar next to Wes and could see a wide, flat metal grill sitting above the beer cabinet behind the bar, just opposite of where I was sitting. This, then, was the source of that awesome smell and the device that would be used to make Cheese Steaks behind the bar for the foreseeable future.

Wes ordered up a Cheese Steak and Aimee went about making Wes a bloody beer. I watched as she squeezed several lemons, pored in some spices and tabasco and mixed it with beer.

As Aimee worked I couldn't quite tell if she'd colored her hair or done something different....maybe it was how the pattern of her clothes matched her hair and mixed with the sun shining into the bar from outside such that it all combined to make her seem positively radiant (or perhaps sunny or just yellow in a good way). Her bright red lipstick somehow kept everything in focus.

Wes is a far braver man than I. They said bloody beer is good for hangovers, but I don't think I've got the fortitude to take on that kind of drink in the midst of a hangover.

Travis dropped some meat on the grill and my gut growled as the smell of cooked meat, onions and peppers drifted to my nostrils (my gut's growling again as I type). As he worked he talked with Aimee about doing summertime barbecue out on the back patio of the bar. Damn good idea if you as me.

Travis served Wes his food on a square yellow sheet of paper/plastic/something and Jason stopped by the bar not long after.

Aimee got zapped by Patrick Dempsey Cologne and soon after the innaugural Let's Smoke A Cigarette Summit was held out front of the bar. This meeting produced the historic Dempsey Truce peace agreement, binding all participating bartenders and freeing them from smelling like "an old man's balls" in the words of one bartender.

As I understand it, customers are excluded from this truce. Beware, unless old man's balls smell is your thing. ;)

My beer disappeared real fast so I said goodbye, waived to Jason as I walked past and headed for the door and a nice walk home in the sunshine.

Back to Jack's tomorrow after work!