Gillane’s
my field trip was to gillane’s in ardmore. i had called them a few weeks back asking if they could accomodate us and they were like “yeah totally we like money and you’ll probably give us some of that”. I didn’t make a reservation (silly me). the morning of the trip, i called at 8:55 to make sure they still wanted our money and the lady who answered sounded grouchy and told me that there was no way they could accomodate all of us, since two huge parties booked their dining room for 11:00 today (what a coincidence!). also she yelled at me for calling before 9:00 (what am i, crazy?). so i called sam (or actually he called me but i was about to call him) and told him the bad news. we decided that we’d meet in the general area of gillane’s, throw a few eggs at the place out of spite (not true) and then find another place to eat. i was thinking maybe rittenhouse deli since that place is pretty tasty and has always been a favorite of mine, plus they have an awful wide selection of different sandwiches.
scott muller called me at this point and said “hey man i want to come but i want to drive cuz i have to leave early” so i told him to meet us in the area, since we didnt know where we were going. i was worried because my phone was dying and i knew that i might need to be in touch with scott, sam, or both.
anyway, sam, harrell, and duncan got there before us and apparently used the charm that i lack to convince gillane’s to let us in… catastrophe averted! when the other 8 of us arrived (myself, alex fossi, ellen freeman, nate ndosi, robin riskin, lindsey kieffaber, and corey norcross [i think there was someone else and i feel bad that i don't remember who... but let me know if you were there! {was it laura?}]), we went into gillanes and started chatting up the lady who had answered the phone in the morning. i was scared that she’d recognize my voice and chastise me for being awake and calling before 9:00. she didn’t. we found out a little about the clowns that are scattered around the place. apparently people just started bringing them and then other people saw and brought more clowns and there’s no clear explanation as to why it started. weird.
the two alleged parties the lady who answered the phone had said would be there weren’t, unless the 4 guys in the corner were one or both of those parties. this made me a little bit angry but not too much cuz hey, it’s water under the bridge! then we sat down and started looking at the menus. scott muller called me and i let him know that we were, in fact, at gillanes. he spent about 8 minutes trying to find the place even though he was on the right road because he went the wrong direction, but he made it eventually. i ordered a club sandwich, but asked if someone in the group would please get the ardmore. i don’t like mushrooms, so it would’ve been a bad choice for me. someone did get it, and he or she liked it.
my club sandwich was good. i was hoping it would come with fries but it came with chips. i tried to pull the trick on corey where you say “hey, look over there!” then steal some fries but she doesn’t like clowns so she was intently focusing on everything not clownish, and her fries weren’t clownish, so that strategy failed. but she’s nice enough and offered me some fries. i ate a bunch of corey’s fries but even though i was craving fries and she had some left at the end, i was too full to eat any more. we thought that our waitress was a lady who we often see at Roache’s, a bar on lancaster (closer to bryn mawr). Fossi, Lindsey, Corey and I all recognized her and asked her if she was, indeed, the one we see at Roache’s. she responded in the affirmative. it made us happy to see her when she wasn’t totally smashed.
we got some coasters as souvenirs. i was hoping they’d say gillane’s on them, but they didn’t. that was ok because they have the name of some obscure brand of beer i’ve never heard of that gillane’s doesn’t even serve, so it was sort of funny in that sense. plus now i won’t get rings on the table in my common room. so it was practical and funny, sort of like political cartoons.
i think everyone enjoyed themselves, as did i, especially because we all got a meal out of it. go among friends!
i’ll post a scan of the souvenir and also a scan of my poster when i get a chance. cool!