By Chuck Martin
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Wednesday night is still the night for dinner-on-the-town for Bill Frase and the boys.

In September, we told you how every Wednesday night, a half dozen friends of Mr. Frase take him out to dinner. The group began the weekly routine 13 years ago, after Mr. Frase, who lives in Finneytown, was diagnosed with progressive multiple sclerosis, a disease that attacks the central nervous system and often robs people of muscular coordination.

The men have been friends for nearly 20 years and most lived in the same Finneytown neighborhood.

Their children went to school together and belonged to the same scout troops. They maintain their Wednesday night dining ritual to support Mr. Frase, a 59-year-old former college professor who taught chemistry and biology, and to stay in touch with each other.

When they began their weekly adventures, the men took Mr. Frase to restaurants across town. But as his health declined - he has lost use of his legs and much of the use of his arms - the friends stay closer to his home. They wheel him into a van and take him to favorite dining spots, such as Haudi's Home Cooking in Reading, where owner Haudi Makris loves to dote on Mr. Frase. Recently though, the band of buddies checked out the new Perkins Family Restaurant in College Hill. And Mr. Frase was evidently impressed.

"As long as Bill can get a bacon cheeseburger, fries and no greens, the guy's usually in great shape," says Buzz Volz of Finneytown. (Mr. Frase has a notorious aversion to eating green vegetables.)

Mr. Volz, who serves as the unofficial social secretary of the group, recording their restaurant likes and dislikes, says two strangers recently approached them while they were eating at a barbecue restaurant.

"They asked if we were the people they read about in the newspaper,'' he says. "I guess we do stick out."

Other than severe leg and hip pain, Mr. Frase remains in relative good health, according to his wife, Barbara.

"He's up one week and down the next,'' says Ms. Frase, who teaches language arts at North Middle School in Mount Healthy.

Depending on how he feels, Mr. Frase is able to communicate. And when he feels strongly about something, he responds clearly. He always has.

"Someone asked him what his favorite day of the week was,'' Ms. Frase says. "He just said: Wednesday."

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