I know a woman who is a dedicated day drinker. She is always trying to get me to hit the bars in the afternoon. Her rationing is simple: get your drink on before nightfall and go to bed early. With plenty of hydration, according to her, you are less likely to get a hangover.
I can’t do it. I don’t drink before 6 p.m. I have a calling, as Kevin O’Leary would say, to make money during the day. My options for supporting myself with night hours are gone.
Yesterday I walked into the Midway Point at 3 p.m. The room was cold and dark. I recognized the bartender. She’s been around as long as I have. Maybe she was at the Point location near Lovers and Greenville in the mid-70s when it was the post-game hangout for Dallas Blackhawk Fans. Or maybe she was behind the bar at the joint on Maple Avenue. Perhaps I remember her from the former Midway Point spot before they were forced to move up the road closer to Belt Line. Dallas used to have a lot of Point locations. They were mysterious. The burgers were huge; the drinks were strong. Everybody looked good in the low-lit bar.
I took a seat at the bar to wait for my order. My eyes finally adjusted to the light and I scanned the long bar where about 10 sixty-something men were cocktailing. I thought about calling my friend and inviting her to join me. Maybe I’d break my day drinking rules and hang with these guys for the afternoon. If I had, maybe I’d be typing a different story right now. But I stuck to my rules, and left with my fries.
Here is what I love about Midway Point: they offer you three types of fries with every sandwich. Four if you count sweet potato fries. The choices are fresh cut, curly-q, and cottage fries. I ordered fresh cut for test purposes and an order of cottage for fun.
I opened the unventilated Styrofoam containers in the car. I was unhappy to find the temperature of the fresh cut fries rapidly approaching dead cold. If I had been a real customer, I’d have taken them back in and shared a gin and tonic with the silver hairs at the bar. Instead, I headed home.
By the time I pulled in my garage, my steering wheel was covered with greasy finger prints. I realize my French fry testing methods are not scientific, but this was the first time this has happened to me so who is to say my system is without merit.
There was very little, if any, salt on these fries. If I’d been eating in the restaurant, I’d have added a hefty shake of salt. The size of the fries ranged from 3 inches to 5-and-a-half inches. No delicious crunchy nubs. The skin on fries had good potato flavor even when cold, but they were limp from grease.
The cottage fries, circles of fried potatoes, didn’t fare much better. These need to be eaten in the restaurant. I saved them because I have big plans to use them in a vegetable lasagna.
