The words immediately caught my eye when I entered the room.
It wasn't a penetrating gaze -- just the kind of casual head-swivel you throw in the direction of a tinted car window to check your reflection. I don't know why I even bothered; my gut had already told me exactly what I would find.
Plastered across the dry-erase board on the Tavern's far-side wall were a series of big, capital letters exclaiming the news in fluorescent fashion: "PANCAKE OF THE MONTH -- GINGERBREAD -- $4.75."
My No. 1 breakfast food makes its first appearance on the dry-erase board since February 2005 -- for just 31 precious days -- and I had already wasted the first 23 of them, diddling my thumbs and saying, "Man, I haven't been to the Tavern at all this semester."
I knew that conversation with my roommate was going to jinx me!
Just 10 minutes before, as the Tavern train was picking up steam to leave our house, he had mentioned the remote possibility that it may be gingerbread's turn on that damn board.
"Dude, what if the 'Pancake of the Month' has been your favorite all month, and you didn't even know? Hahaha!"
I didn't appreciate his tone -- as if Jamison was trying to see me get upset.
"I swear to God," I threatened, "if it's Gingerbread Month, and I've already missed 23 days of it ..."
I was interrupted before I could finish my thought. The man who knows how to push my buttons found the words for me.
"Then what -- you're going to write a column about it?" Jamison quipped from the driver's seat, a sardonic smirk taunting me in the rearview mirror.
"No," I snapped, proper annoyed. "I'm going to convince the owner to make gingerbread pancakes part of the permanent menu."
"So, you're going to write a column about it," he said.
Some people just know me too well.
I wish I could say the reverse about my new friend Shelly Gordon.
You've got to hand it to the man who bought the Tavern in the early '80s simply because he "really liked the beef 'n' onion pancakes." Shelly is incredibly laid back about people trying to tell him how to run his own restaurant.
Take my attempts to solve this problem the democratic way. Not only did he let me tape a piece of paper entitled "The Tavern Should Make Gingerbread Pancakes Permanent Petition" to the counter beside the register, but he also left it there all month (despite never agreeing to capitulate, even if I got John Hancock himself to sign).
So give the man some more credit: He definitely sticks to his guns.
Shelly just won't budge. I've tried asking him, straight up, if he would put the most popular "Pancake of the Month" on the permanent menu.
"Who wants to eat gingerbread in June?" he retorted.
"Shelly," I said, "it's not like drinking hot chocolate in 100-degree weather. Everyone likes gingerbread, whether 'tis the season or not."
It took some prodding, but soon he came clean -- he would eat gingerbread on any day of the year.
Sensing that I was not going to be deterred so easily, Shelly tried throwing a dog a bone to keep him from going after what's on the dinner table.
"I'll tell you what," he said. "How about I extend gingerbread's run as 'Pancake of the Month' into February?"
Quite a generous concession, which I wholeheartedly appreciated -- but I know how to play this game, too.
"Shelly," I persisted, "I speak for all of Gingerbread Nation when I say this: Permanent menu status today, permanent menu status tomorrow, permanent menu status forever!"
It was then that he confessed: The real roadblock to gingerbread's admission has nothing to do with "being seasonal."
It's that the physical menus are simply not big enough. That's it. That's what we're arguing about.
To double space, or not to double space -- that is the question.
The answer, Shelly, is here: I will make you an entire slew of new menus, unchanged save for one small addition made under the "Pancakes" header.
You don't have to do anything. Just give me a template menu, sit back, and watch me go elementary school on a giant stack of orange construction paper. I'll even laminate them, too -- free of charge.
But there is one small string attached...
You have to rename the gingerbread pancakes the "Bayless Parsley Special."
Hell, I don't even need that much. I'll settle for "Gingerbread Pancakes brought to you by Bayless Parsley." And if you really want to split hairs, I am perfectly fine with a small footnote at the bottom: "*Gingerbread Pancakes made permanent by Bayless Parsley."
I'm not alone in this crusade, either. Check the petition -- Helen, Lorraine and Brandi may work for you, Shelly, but they're on my side. The same goes for Lindsay, the cook with the jerry curl and white chef's hat and the face of the restaurant.
"I'm gonna convince him to put it on the menu, for you," he said. "For real."
The people have spoken, Shelly. Now let's eat.
Bayless' column runs biweekly on Thursdays. He can be reached at bayless@cavalierdaily.com.
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