Pickled Eggs

Flirtatious: "Hey Millie! Let's get a pitcher of Bud over here!"

Real Mood: Feeling old again

Prediction: Tom Gleason will eat at Kyle's next week. He will order Iced Tea.

Jacqui is still back. I won't be taking anything granted for a while. She is wearing a pretty casual outfit. She has on brownish, almost plaid like slacks that appear to be sporting a pleat down the middle of the leg. Up top she is covered by a black blouse with a squared off neckline. The blouse looks like it might be muslin with a little braided string hanging down off the front. I've got a picture, but it's not a very good one (couldn't get rid of the morning glare on the screen) so I'll make it picture 2. Nothing new to report on my "who is in" and "who is out" and "why?" investigation. I'm working it.

I had lunch with Tom Gleason this week. Tom's a pretty dynamic  guy who's worn some pretty expensive ties in his day. He's been a mouth piece for the likes of Senator Gary Hart, and Transportation Secretary Federico Pena when Pena was a legislator and mayor. He may be just as proud of his role managing Coors field until it was turned over to the baseball team. Maybe he is just as proud of his management role of a big mess following the shut down of Stapleton International Airport. Now he's a big wig with Forest City Development, which is managing what I believe has been touted as the largest in-fill land development in the country. I tell you all this NOT because Tom is about to run for office and needs a little "Publicity."  No I tell you this to let you enjoy exposing a little piece of Tom we all hope he never loses.

Over the years I've had a few lunches with Tom.  Let's see we've broken bread at Cool  River, an up-scale, "waiter puts your cloth napkin in your lap," establishment. I think Susan Kelly and I joined Tom at My Brother's Bar, a place where everybody connected, goes and pretends they're the only ones who've discovered it. (Great unique hamburgers if you haven't been there.) I know the three of us (Susan included) met at one of those sports bars that fills up on game day and runs a shuttle bus to the stadium. I know I've run into Tom at a slick Irish pub and restaurant downtown.

But twice now since I've retired Tom has insisted we eat at Kyle's. (See the sign above) One of the reasons I'm getting into this is 'cause Tom thinks they're a saloon and eatery thatdeserves to survive.  Well, he's not alone in that assessment. When all the "Kyles" are gone, our generation will have gone with them. Places like Kyle's are already mighty hard to find.  I purposely didn't take any  pictures inside 'cause I want to try my hand at a little word picture painting.

First? You gotta know how to get there. Kyle's sits on Ulster just North of the railroad tracks. Ulster ends at Kyle's. There's a bunch of small and very old industrial operations surrounding it.  These little mini factories all have tall chain link fences around them and old rusting cars or machinery lying about.( You'll find it if you're looking for it.)

 The men (very few women) coming and going at these little businesses, are in "honestly aged"  Levis and tee or sweat shirts. They've all got big arms, generally exceeded in size by the circumferences of their  well-fed stomachs. Actually they typically follow that up with small waists.  (I believe they are the original body prototypes that led to these pants where the psuedo  waist line is down around the knees. Plumbers made that style come alive I believe.) Anyway, to cut to the chase that's how you get there.

 I'm sure some of these Levi guys lunch at Kyle's.  Don't even think about trying to place a cloth napkin in anybodys' lap at Kyle's. That's just fair warning.

You walk in the creaky front door and you see wood of all ages everywhere. There is a big long bar where patrons really do sit. The many times lacquered timber is not in very good focus. That's  because there is a layer of combined cigarette and kitchen smoke hovering about chest high. That wafting combination produces a familiar scent that's slowly disappearing from the American Bar Scape.

The food. There's char broiled! There's bar broiled! Chips. A pickle. Sourdough. Horse radish. Spicy mustard without  fancy name. No sprouts.  Uhm....it's all so good. (and wonderful for you if you don't care much about your cholesterol level, and every functioning organ in your body.) 

The walls are full of very colorful posters and  neon signs advertising beer,  or old cars , or sports, or other things of traditional male interest.

There are old metal tables with oddly patterned formica tops. The chairs at the tables are striped bare of adornment.  For some reason, even with their mostly metal frameworks, they seem more accepting of our aging back sides than the padded perches we find in contemporary saloons.  

There is a good portion of the place devoted to a pool table, a must at a place like Kyle's.  I'm reminded of a place called Joe Jost's in Long Beach, California,  where I really started getting pretty good at most of the table games.  I got so good that I stupidly began to believe in myself.  So, many years later, I'm in a Kyle's look-a-like bar in Meade, Kansas after doing some basketball play by play.  I've put a dent in a pitcher of something, and this shy behaving woman walks up and flirtingly says, "can I play?"  What she meant was, "can I play with your wallet?" Man did I get taken.

You will find a big TV screen at Kyle's and it's clones. (don't even whisper anything about a video or electronic game.) What I don't see right off at Kyle's, but would be appropriate and common to see, is a juke box. (that's a mechanical contraption, not digital or electronic, that plays records, music, old music.) Expect the selections available to include some old Elvis or Willie Nelson, or in Tom's case, "Sweet Molly Malone."

Up at the bar you'll find a wide selection of mostly men plucked from just about every segment of America's religious, racial, educational, political and socio-economic structures. I can picture Red Foxx, Archie Bunker, Alan Greenspan, Bruce Binns, Godfrey Cambridge, Mort Sahl, Frank Ward, Dan Hopkins, Henry Kissenger, Sue O'brien, Chuck Cannon, Jim Weis, me and Tom Gleason all shouting out our personal perspectives at the same time.  (Adam Schrager and Karen Morales could join us, but they'd have to be respectful of our ages.)  Each of us pauses in sequence to say, "Millie, let's get another one up here."

For some reason they run out of stools when George W walks in. "Sorry kid, we're saving that one for your "ol man."

So these are the givens in this "who should go to Kyle's formula." You just gotta be a little bit older, pretty un-tight, like yummy (probably not good for you) fried food,  enjoy free flowing irreverant  mostly sexist conversation, appreciate beer from a pitcher,  and be unafraid to dip into some nostaglia once in a while.

Tom and I talked about the story we did together trying  to sell World Leaders,  coming to town  for the "Summit of The Eight", into using the old United Airlines hangar as their meeting venue.

"I mean it IS right next to the shut down United Kitchen's building. These are people used to airline food?"

Look, if you're not uppity, and you've got enough rings in your trunk to allow you to remember most of this stuff, give Kyle's a shot. You'll be welcome.

"How'd I do Tom? Maybe we could get Jacqui Jeras and Bonnnie Schneider to sling some beer for us?"

You know what I didn't see? I didn't see the pickle jar, or more importantly, the pickled egg jar.