Oh my gosh, hi! My name is mercy and I like to drink a lot! I have joined the ranks of Dane101 to bring you the best news from the best part about Madison: the alcohol! I think we've all faced the endless beer and cheese-based humor from our out-of-town friends, family and parole officers, but now it's time to show those jerks that we know how to drink ALL sorts of liquor, not just ales. My purpose around Dane101 will be to, well, basically, get drunk sometimes, and tell you guys all about it. And while I do enjoy a 40 oz. of Mickey's on occasion, my main topics will range in the cocktail variety. So let's get to it!

Last Thursday, after a marvelous night at the Monona Pool's Adult Swim (from 8:30 - 9:30 on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, which totally RULES and is only $3.00 if you say you're from Monona, $4.00 if you don't lie), my friends and I were not only thirsty but quite hungry, but once we were all dried off and dressed, it was well past 10:00. So we decided on The Glass Nickel, a late-night snacky staple and the site of many a long evening, among me and my friends (one day I'll tell you all about the Bloody Martini Fiasco, but we don't know each other that well yet). Their food is tasty, and they've got a nice drink menu that features some nice-sounding, classy-ish sorts of drinks.

Now, typically on a Thursday night at TGN I would suggest you get wine, because it's on special ($1.00 off a glass and $5.00 off a bottle), but since I was on assignment I asked Danielle, one of their night managers, what she thought was their best mixed drink. She was quick to reply that she made the best Key Lime Martinis ever, but since I had just been talking in the car about how gross I thought Key Lime Martinis were, I took her second suggestion, The Get Nutty. For $6.25, you wanna sort of live up to the implied class of the drink, which, to be honest, I don't always do. Lucky for me I was wearing this super-cute early sixties black and white mod dress that I got on a trip to Minneapolis over the 4th, and I had on a lot of black eyeliner, so I felt readily equipped.

The Get Nutty (I do feel like the name is kinda dorky) is a mixture of Frangelico (a hazelnut liqueur from Italy), dark crème de cacao, vodka, Bailey's and amaretto. So it is not at a loss for booziness, which is good for a six-dollar cocktail. The presentation was adorable, with cute chocolate shavings and an iced martini glass, which, however, seemed so teeny! But as my Nutty was poured into its glass, it was filled to the brim, so I felt better.

The first sip left me with that warm-all-the-way-down sort of feeling that almost all martinis will give you. I could taste the vodka jostling for position among the other boozes, and it is a stiff drink, albeit sweet and nutty as well. The shaved chocolate melted in my mouth as I drank, which made it go down smooth and made me keep my pinky up while I was drinking. Like any martini, it's a nursing sort of drink, so slow and steady wins the race. Don't overdo it. And by the end of it I was certainly feeling a bit blushy and ate my chicken fingers a bit, um, sloppily? Let's just leave it at that.

This is a for SURE cute after dinner drink, and I would advise against drinking it on an empty stomach, ahem, for fear of table dancing later in the evening. One caution though about mixed drinks at TGN: it all depends on your bartender. The same cocktail can taste completely different on two different days of the week, so keep that in mind. For $6.25, The Get Nutty wants to be a rich drink, and I suppose it could be, but I won't lie: After dinner, I had a PBR. I'm just street like that.