Jimmy Kelly's is lost -- or I am!

Last night (Thursday, 2 December) the Nashville Area LCA Alumni had our monthly meeting, at a place called Jimmy Kelly's. As is typical of our Alum-Brotherhood functions, the food was delicious and the fellowship terrific.

Once I found the place.

The name was known to me from my previous residence in Music City, 1984-91. I had a picture in my memory of it being somewhere close to the intersection of 25th Ave. No, with Elliston Pl. and West End. Very near Centennial Park.

The e-mail invitation I'd received gave the address as 217 Louise Ave. A glance at Google indicated that it wasn't exactly where my memory was telling me, but not terribly distant. Nor terribly distant from where I was -- a library on the Vanderbilt campus -- as the time approached.

So I left the stacks (actually the terminals, as I was working on-line), got in my "new" Integra (new to me, but year 1995) and drove to the area between West End and Church near Baptist Hospital. I searched and searched the night-darkened streets in vain.

And then I remembered that it was supposedly off Elliston Place, not Church! So west I drove, and made a guess as to where Louise was. Over a half hour later and a stop at a drugstore for directions (but nobody knew) I finally found Jimmy Kelly's! I realized that I'd actually passed by it earlier, because there was no lighted or well-lit sing.

So it was after 7:00 when I sat down with my Brothers in the Bond. But from then on it was a wonderful evening. A few of the alumni even brought their wives with them -- lately our get-togethers have generally been open to "significant others".

We were seated upstairs, in an elegant room that had a fireplace (unused, alas), some large formal portraits on the wall -- including the best known painting of Commodore Vanderbilt himself -- and white cloth tablecloths and black cloth napkins. Apparently Jimmy Kelly's free appetizers are dollar-size pancakes (or pones) -- and these were de-e-e-e-elicious!

I think I could have made a meal out of just eating those little cakes. But that would have been dull, you know. I did have baked salmon along with a salad and baked potato. Yum, yum!

So what threatened to turn into a disaster of an evening jaunt turned out okay in the end. And NOW I know exactly where Jimmy Kelly's is!