I’ve just formed a new luncheon group with some like-minded lunchers and we’re calling ourselves, “The Olive Loafers.” Our goal is to enjoy unusual lunches, have some lively conversation and devote ourselves to truth, justice and the occasional slice of American cheese. Fools will not be suffered gladly (except for yours fooly) and beans will never be tolerated! Okay, on to our first luncheon outing which is going to take place downtown at the local food carts. We’ll call this episode, “Food Cart A-Go-Go,” and so away we go-go!
Okay, we're scheduled to meet everyone here in front of George’s Shoeshine Parlor, but as usual, I’m about a half an hour early. Which actually is late for me—I’m so weird about being early, I had an anxiety attack on the way here because I realized I wasn’t going to be forty minutes early. And yes, I saw a shrink years ago...apparently it didn’t work. Might as well go and say hi to George...
Hello, George!
Okay, back outside I noticed this fellow selling something, let’s go see what he’s got for sale at his stand.
His name is Robert Good and he’s a real cool guy. He’s selling books that he’s written, so I bought one and he autographed it for me. This is why I come to places early, it forces you to do extra!
Here’s the book, “The Meat Is In The Nut.” I never knew this...oh the things we learn here at MBIP!
And here we are, The Olive Loafers, together again for the very first time! All for one and nuns for funs! From left, Scott, Yours Fooly, Stacy, Carl, Chris, Matt and Adam. Here is the order of the arrival of the various members of the group: Scott showed up ten minutes early, proving that he’s just about half as fucked up as I am; Stacy and Carl both showed up on time, which shows they may just be the sane portion of this group, but it’s highly doubtful; Matt and Chris not only showed up unshaven and looking like hobo’s, they arrived on hobo time, being about 13 minutes late and rounding out the group, Adam arrived in Bizarro World John Cameron Swayze fashion by being 17 minutes late. Hike!
We decided to split up and hit the carts separately and then meet in fifteen minutes with some food from the carts. I probably should have had the others take pictures, but I didn’t really think about what we were going to do till everyone showed up. In fact we didn’t even become a luncheon group until about five days after this happened—it’s a long story, but then aren’t they all? Anyway, here’s the ones I hit in a fifteen minute period.
Just like in 1981, the lines are long. And yes, Virginia, that’s a cocaine reference for those three of you that weren’t all fucked up on cocaine back in 1981 from my old-age group.
I started out at Willie’s Tamale’s cart. This brings back POP memories of myself, Mike “Make A Fish Foundation” Foster and Tim Slevin eating at Willie’s cart and drinking from a twelve pack in my car on a rainy afternoon. Memories...
As you can see, it’s a popular and busy cart.
This pretty young woman took my order and grabbed me two bags of Kitchen Cooked potato chips. A true multi-tasker!
It smells amazing here, I got the pork chop sandwich.
Hey look, here’s a living, lunching flashback sighting: Erik Reader! I had lunch with Erik last April and he showed us a house on the South Side he had bought and was fixing up to sell. I’m actually having lunch with Erik tomorrow and you can read about that next week. Stay tuned! The man on the left told me his name, but I didn’t write it down, so till I find out, we’ll call him, Zaz. As in Zaz Turned Blue.
Okay, I next moved on to the Peking cart. The Peking restaurant has been on Main Street as long as I can remember but I haven’t eaten there in years.
Smile, you're on MBIP camera! Now what should I order?
Since there's a couple of vegetarians in the group, I got two orders of fried rice with string beans. And I told her to hold the nuts (insert your own, "hold the nuts" joke here) because as we've all learned, the meat is in the nut.
Andy Warhol predicted way back when that we'd all have fifteen minutes to order from carts in downtown Peoria and my time was just about up, so I decided to stop at this Haddad's cart for a last minute falafel and a hot dog.
And here's the Haddad's man serving them up in a timely fashion. Hooray!
The falafel is being duly sauced up, so it's time to go and meet the other Olive Loafers and see what kind of food we've collected on today's journey.
We all agreed to meet over there at that statue...
And we ended up over here at this ledge in the shade. There's a nice sampling of food here from the carts.
I've looked at lunch from both sides now, so let the eating begin!
Generic yellow mustard...sheesh!
Just like Alan Alda, Stacy likes the string bean.
Matt strikes a Travis Bickle-like pose as Adam and Chris smile as only a purple t-shirted wearer can smile.
This photo of Adam bites the big one.
Uh oh, looks like we need to put in a "no texting" rule here!
Everything was great and we had a lot of fun but I declare the pork chop sandwich from Willie's to be the best of the day.
And here's Scott finishing that delicious sandwich off.
That was a lot of fun and we'll be meeting again at the end of September, so stay tuned for that. But till then please remember one thing, the meat is in the nut! And hey, let's be careful out there! See you all tomorrow.
Related Posts: El Zarape, Hofbrau House and Mr. G’s.
