Text 29684, 121 rader
Skriven 2009-10-10 11:15:38 av Michael Loo (1:18/200)
Ärende: end williamsport 255
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Franco's. The Lamades had borrowed Billy's SUV for a week while
Charlie's car was being repaired (he has a tendency to run into
things and apparently has destroyed his housekeeper's car three
times over the last few years) and had given Annie and Billy a
gift certificate to this place. It was for a hundred bucks, food
only, excluding booze, tax, and tip, so we did an estimate and
decided that we had to invite our friend Holly, otherwise we'd
never make the Benjy.

We started with four appetizers: almond-crusted duck tenders in
raspberry sauce was a reminder that there's a culinary school
nearby. Why crust up and fry duck tenders until they could just
as well be anything else tehders? Well, I could tell that there
was duck inside the breading (nutting? though it should have
been nothing), but I'd bet that 95% of the population would have
been just as happy with slices of chicken thigh meat. The
coating prevented the duck from becoming dry during frying, and
I ordered the sauce on the side, which is a good thing. Wild
chili was a thin soup whose bison and venison gave a robust
flavor; there weren't too many beans, which was good, but there
wasn't much seasoning, which was bad. Tomato was the main
secondary presence. Tomato bruschetta looked pretty good but
had large quantities of provolone on it, which I didn't like.
Fried calamari were of a good standard - better than when I
made it this time, less good than when I made it last time
(the difference - last time I wiped the squids dry before
putting them in the batter - this trip I was in a hurry and
made both this and garlic noodles without proper care,
resulting in suboptimal product - nothing I'd send back at a
restaurant, but far from perfect); there were wigglies, many
points in favor.

The owner's son came over a few times - a friend of Annie's
brother or something.

Perfectly decent bread comes with (the owner's sister runs a
bakery), but it was a redundancy with the bruschetta.

The specialty is homemade noodles, which go under the very
original name of "homemades." I find them a little mushy, but
not al dente anymore seems to be the local fashion. We had
three sauces -

Annie is hot for the white clam sauce, which seems to me to be
just like any other clam sauce made with canned clams. It was
fine, of course, but not to go ooh aah about;

Holly's white shrimp and scallops sauce was pretty normal, the
shellfish good (fresh frozen I guess), plenty of garlic, nice;

I had shrimp Gaeta, which is a peculiar dish - perfectly good
shrimp fried in egg-Parmesan batter and then tossed with red wine,
which gives the dish an interesting tang. The egg batter is notably
soggy and takes on this ugly purple-black aspect from the wine.

My notes don't indicate what Billy had, so he might have had
one of the above, either that or something unnotable like chicken.

Verdicchio di Castelli Jesi was your usual light fruity white,
going well with shellfish, only it doesn't come in that
pleasantly tacky green fish-shaped bottle any more, which is a
bummer.

Next day, off to the airport, which has 1 gate: originally it
must have had enough seats in the gate area for a plane, but
now the TSA has taken over a third of the room, and if the
flight on this tiny tube had been full, some passengers would
have had to stand.

I had my carryon stuffed with electronic junk and my briefcase
stuffed with electronic junk, and what did they choose to do
the secondary search on? Answer at the end of this post.

As we were in fairly close quarters, everyone could overhear
everyone else's conversations, so I had a few yuks with a
couple of the other frequent travellers.

This is how small the airport is - the staff (2 people, neither
of whom was at the ticket counter when I arrived - a TSA girl
was standing in for them while they did something else; so I
waited a few minutes for my boarding pass) go around the room
collecting all the gate-tagged bags and take them out to the
plane themselves, during which time nothing else can be taken
care of, as the agents are busy.

US4118 IPT PHL 1206 1300 DH8 4A

The flight was pretty bumpy, as announced over the intercom;
luckily I slept through most of it.

The shuttle from the commuter terminal to the main was timely
and quick, so I had time to check my e-mail at the club.

US 767 PHL BOS 1415 1535 E90 3F

I wish this flight were on a 767, rather than the little regional
jet ... I got into it with the flight attendant, as I was one of
the last to board, and there wasn't much overhead space left. You'll
have to gate check that, sir. What? I'm in first class, you harridan
(I thought to myself). I indicated I would put the carryon under the
seat in front of me. She said, it won't fit. I slid it into the
space, much to the detriment of my legroom, but it fit fine. I gave
her the thumbs up. She scowled (for which I believe she could have
been reported to the airline) and said, it's your life, not mine
(for which I believe she could have been reported to the FAA).
During the course of this flight, she kept looking amazed at my
foot space, noting that my carryon actually fit where it was supposed
to fit. No apologies, but she did keep me afloat in Glenlivet and
gave me a big smile (like, "please don't report me to the FAA") when
I left.

Answer: the TSA guy grabbed my 1-quart resealable plastic container,
which had nail clippers, a toothbrush, a BIC shaver, a travel-size
Colgate, a travel-size Scope, and that's it! And he swabbed it all
over in and out and put the probe into the antiterror machine, which
registered clean. He and I were both laughing about it throughout,
and what that silliness was for, and under whose instructions, I
have no idea.
___ Blue Wave/386 v2.30
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