I’M FEELING IN A MAGNANIMOUS MOOD TODAY.
I feel like reaching
out to my fellow bipeds and seeing if I can be of help. So, I have declared that today is officially:
FREE BAD ADVICE DAY!
For today – and today only – I will be dispensing free bad advice on a wide range of topics.
Let the games begin!
WHY I THINK OF SUCH THINGS I DO NOT KNOW. I certainly could find a better use for my remaining brain cells. There are days when I worry that my gray matter is slipping away by the cup full. Those days are usually Mondays.
The substance of my obsessive thoughts for today is: Lunch
IT WAS JUST THE OTHER DAY as I was driving down the avenue when I noticed that the neighborhood Taco Bell was undergoing some remodeling. I don’t know if they were merely repainting or going full tilt and adding a branch of the Poison Control Center.
While I am not a fan of Taco Bell (I prefer Mexican Food) they are very popular worldwide. The latest figure I could find said that there are 6, 849 Taco Bell restaurants strewn about the globe.
Doing a little (very little) follow-up research I have learned that the number of Taco Bells has grown by one. Last week the first of a planned 40 Thai restaurants opened in Bangkok. And it was a rip roaring success.
I’D SAY THAT CONGRATULATIONS ARE IN ORDER. I noticed while driving about the neighborhood yesterday that there was a new announcement on the sign at the Taco Bell.
“Employee of the month is ‘Nay Nay’.”
Yes, Yes – it’s Nay Nay.
I know that appears to be somewhat contradictory, but it’s not. Yes, it is not.
I don’t know Nay Nay. I don’t know if Nay Nay is a He-Nay or a she-Nay. All I know for sure is that Nay Nay is a good employee at Taco Bell.
If I worked at Taco Bell and I wanted to become the Employee of the Month I’m sure that the Boss would say nay. I’m not Taco Bell material. In my heart I know that I’m not. I’m no Nay Nay. No way am I a Nay Nay. I am closer to a “No Way” than I am to a Nay Nay.
Way to go Nay Nay! Yea for Nay Nay!
LET’S HAVE A SHOW OF HANDS. How many of you have eaten in a restaurant this week? (Pause while I count digital hands)
OK, that’s about average. According to my in depth research I have learned that approximately (statistical wiggle room) 58% of us eat out at least once a week. The other 42% are still waiting for a table at the Texas Roadhouse.
I have to admit that we eat out more than we should. It is expensive, time consuming, not always healthy/nutritious, and leads us all into eating more than we should. But it is fun and I think that is why we do it so often. Let somebody else do all the hard work and the cleanup. Oh, yeah.
Throwback Thursday From 2015
“One Person’s Trivia Is Another Person’s McRib”
SOMETIMES THERE IS A BENEFIT when the conversation takes a turn to something boring. This morning over coffee one of the Usual Suspects started to talk politics. My brain glazed over and my eyes began to wander. It was then that I saw a teeny-tiny online mention of no import.
“McDonald’s opens restaurant in 120th country.”
Sonovagun. I never would have guessed it was that many.
While voices muffled by politics faded in the background I read on.
The newest nation to allow Ronald the Clown to cross their borders is – (Fanfare!)
Fiction Saturday
Chapter 36 Continued
Outside, the sun was beginning to go down and an offshore breeze was finally cutting through the hot and hectic city. The shopping-mad tourists were heading home and the drinking-mad tourists were arriving. The mood in Tijuana was changing, like it did everyday at this time, from commercial cordiality to alcoholic depravity. The zebra-painted donkeys that pulled small carts along the avenidas so tourists could have some unusual pictures to take home to Iowa, were being replaced by other donkeys for another kind of entertainment that Tijuana was famous for.
Fiction Saturday
Chapter 31 – Continued
“That’s two Egg McMuffins’ with cheese and two coffees, and thank you for visiting McDonald’s, Buenos dias.”
“And buon giorno to you.”
Laura picked up the tray and turned around to look for Davis. He had found them a table by the wall. The restaurant was already half filled and would soon be packed, just as Vivian had predicted.
“Here we go,” she said. “Oh, could we switch seats? I want to be able to look out of the window.”
“Sure, no problem,” said Davis. They traded places. Davis could see the side door that opened onto the small parking lot and Laura could scan the entire plaza.
As she poured a pink envelope of sweetener into her coffee, Laura’s eyes picked out the good guys and the wise guys.
“Vivian was right. This plaza is overloaded with cops and I see three guys that might be Dominic’s boys and two more over on that bench back by the train. He must have called in reinforcements. I don’t recognize them. Damn!”
SOMETIMES THERE IS A BENEFIT when the conversation takes a turn to something boring. This morning over coffee one of the Usual Suspects started to talk politics. My brain glazed over and my eyes began to wander. It was then that I saw a teeny-tiny mention of no import.
“McDonald’s opens restaurant in 120th country.”
Sonovagun. I never would have guessed it was that many.
While voices muffled by politics faded in the background I read on.
The newest nation to allow Ronald the Clown to cross their borders is – (Fanfare!)
KAZAKHSTAN.
I do have to admit that my knowledge of Kazakhstan is rather limited, but as a McDonald’s stockholder for the last 30+ years I feel obligated to learn what I can. So, here goes.
Nursultan Bazarbayev
Kazakhstan is the largest landlocked nation on earth (ergo: not much of a navy).
It has a population of about 18 million souls, and now, 1 McDonald’s. The Capital city is Astana. The President of Kazakhstan is Nursultan Bazarbayev. He is generally considered to be an authoritarian ruler (read “dictator”). It is unknown at this time whether or not he likes the McRib 
Sandwich.
That’s it. That’s all of the relevant information about Kazakhstan I could dig up.
McDonald’s, with its new restaurant in Kazakhstan, has well over 36,000 sets of Golden Arches worldwide. They employ 1.9 million people. I would wager that most of them are either teenagers, senior citizens, or people who were just not Taco Bell material. I may be wrong, but my personal observation of the McD’s here in Terre Haute (That’s Kazakh for “Where’s my Shamrock Shake?”) tell me that I’m not wrong.
In my own personal experience I have been in McDonald’s all over this country and in Ireland. I have no intention of trying to visit all of them. There are people who try to do that, traveling all over the map in a quest to visit them all. These are people who will eventually work at McDonald’s. Who else would hire them after looking at a resume with a twenty year gap during which they ate breakfast, lunch and dinner next to Ronald the Clown.
In an effort to gather information for this snippet of reality I went to the McDonald’s Corporate website to learn more about their worldwide operations. Fascinating.
McDonald’s has blanketed Europe. There are more than 50 Mickey D’s in Ireland. While I’m there (leaving for Dublin in just a few days) I may visit one to satisfy my need for fries (chips), but I think we will eat at home most days.
I learned that there are 11 McD’s in Lithuania, ancestral home of my mother’s side of the family. Europe is definitely well served.
The one glaring gap on the world map is on the continent of Africa.
There are about 23 McDonald’s in Egypt – more than I expected.
There are 200 stores in South Africa. That is way more than I would have guessed.
That’s it. Egypt on the north coast of the continent and South Africa at the other end. In between – nada.
If you live, let’s say in Burkina Faso (another landlocked country) and you have a craving for an order of Chicken McNuggets – you are SOL – Snack Out of Luck. You are going to have to hoof 
it across the Sahara to Egypt or, if you’re not in a hurry, pack a sandwich and head south, way south.
I admit that I have not delved deep into the subject to determine if there might be a Burger King or even a Subway (Sans Jarrod) in Burkina Faso. If there is – all I can say is “You deserve a break today. Boy, do you ever.”
WHO SAYS WE DON’T KNOW HOW TO BE SOCIABLE? We can be just as sociable as any other group of semi-civilized men who spend their Golden Years discussing the important issues of the day: Which was better – “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.” or “The Bionic Woman?”
The “Usual Suspects” as I call them, or my “Play Group” as my wife, the lovely and sarcastically fine tuned, Dawn, calls them, hold our meetings in the Chapel at St. Arbucks almost every morning over coffee.
HAPPY! HAPPY! JOY! JOY!
The sun is back rising in the east. Up is up. Down is down and Baseball is soon to reappear and…
My favorite little hole in the wall Chinese restaurant is open again. It was closed last August when two “youths” decided to burn down the Dollar Store next door. A brilliant move it was not. Not only did the fire gut the Dollar Store, but smoke and water damage destroyed my favorite little family run restaurant. All of this just a bagel’s thrown from St. Arbucks. But now…
THE WEATHER IS BEAUTIFUL RIGHT NOW and I am longing for Springtime. You know what they say – “Springtime when a young man’s fancy turns to thoughts of Chimichangas.” No, that’s not right, but then again…
Las Vegas, the Disneyland for Adults, is always striving to top itself. It all started out as a dusty desert gas station and has transformed itself into the tangible definition of “Will you look at that!” It is the only town where Elvis, Howard Hughes, and Liberace all felt at home. And they’re all dead.
Throwback Thursday from January 2015
I SAW THE FOLLOWING news item yesterday and I thought that it might have repercussions beyond just traffic problems.
“ROCKY MOUNT, N.C. — Authorities closed all southbound lanes of Interstate 95 north of Rocky Mount early Wednesday after a tractor-trailer carrying ramen noodles wrecked near N.C. Highway 4.
No other information about the wreck has been released, but boxes of noodles were spilled over a larger portion of the highway.
The state Department of Transportation said the closure could last all morning. Lanes are expected to reopen by 3:30 p.m.”
I thought that when the word of this crash got out all hell would break loose.
My brain created its own little movie of college students all over the South dropping their textbooks and i-phones and rushing to the accident scene.
The first reel, even under the opening credits, would show speeding traffic along Interstate 95, and then the Semi in question loosing traction and slamming into a bridge abutment. Next comes a slo-mo following shot of thousands of those little cellophane packets of the Ramen Noodles spreading out across all lanes like little flavored migratory butterflies.
Music comes up: Paul McCartney and Wings – reunited to sing: “Food on the run.” I can almost smell an Oscar nomination coming for the soundtrack.
The next shot cuts to hordes of skinny underclassmen and women sensing the possibility of free meals, scattering across the landscape, heading toward the Interstate. It is meals just ripe for the picking. An overturned truckload of gold bullion (not bouillon cubes) would not draw such a response.
Those Ramen Noodles don’t grow on trees, y’know. One must strike while the saucepan is hot.
In my collegiate days (Pre-Ramen) we were limited to making grilled cheese sandwiches with a steam iron or instant soups that tasted like flavored sea water. If an accident like this had happened back in the late 1960s I would have been moving with all imprudent speed to scoop up as many free and easy meals as I could stuff into my backpack.
Most days I can look at news stories and just yawn. Things don’t vary all that much from Six O’clock News to Six O’clock News. If you want to get my attention you’ve got to do something original, or at least really dumb. Spreading several tons of Ramen Noodles across an Interstate highway gets my attention. It also makes me hungry.
Talk amongst yourselves for a while. I’m going out to get some lunch.
NO MATTER HOW MUCH PEOPLE HAVE, THEY WANT MORE. No matter what people have, they want something different. That behavior pattern may be deep seated in our DNA going back millions of years – back to the days of our “Hunter-Gatherer” subsistence world. If we hunted and gathered the same things millennium after millennium we might like a change. Given the odds that we might starve to death – we would want more. Of course, one does not expect to such behaviors exhibited today.
Oh, yeah? Have you been to a salad bar lately?
I’LL BE THE FIRST TO ADMIT IT – I HAVE A BRAIN TO MOUTH DISCONNECT. Something will pop into my head and before I can do anything about it – Boing! It rockets out of my mouth and into play.
It happened again last night, and even though it wasn’t in the best of taste, it was funny.
After dinner, my wife, the lovely and ever tolerant, Dawn, said that we needed to go grocery shopping. I’m all in favor of that because, without it, I’d wither away to a mere shadow of myself. My doctors have suggested that my shadow could use a little whittling down.
SOME PEOPLE NEED TO GET OUT MORE OFTEN, and others need to just stay home. I was scanning the newspaper the other day and saw a small item about a lawsuit underway in California.
There is a chap out there in the Golden State, a lawyer himself, who is suing Krispy Kreme Donuts. It seems that he became royally upset with the donut chain when he learned that his Chocolate Iced Raspberry Donut did not have any real Raspberries in it.
Oh, the humanity!
Wait until he learns that The Golden Arches are not really made of gold. He may just faint away.
WHAT’S FOR LUNCH TODAY? If you’re anything like me it is a last minute decision about some form of organic matter on a plate. After a quick scouting mission through the kitchen I usually end up with something that falls under the general heading of “Leftovers” – also known as “Muzgos,” – as in “If we don’t eat this today – it Muz Go.”
This morning while driving down to St. Arbucks Sunrise Service/Brewing I heard something on the radio that might change the concept of Lunch for millions of people.
I STOPPED IN AT THE LOCAL GAS STATION/MINI-MART the other day. I was on a mission from Dawn. My objective was your standard 739 oz. size Dr. Pepper.
As I stood there waiting for the cup to fill my attention wandered like a fruit fly. Down near the bottom of the large cooler case, alongside all of the cold beverages, I spotted something I had never seen before – a display offering me a snack item that promised me that it was, “The perfect junk food alternative with no calories, no carbs, no cholesterol, gluten-free, and absolutely no fat!”
I’ve been hearing that ever since my carefree days as a fetus. I was about 7 lb. 6 oz. at birth (I checked my birth certificate) and that’s not too bad in most circles, but a lot of babies born with health issues tend to come in as featherweights. This makes me think that if everything had been OK healthwise I might have tipped the scales at 180 lbs at birth.
I know that my father was 12 lbs. – and he was born at home – to a mother who was barely 5 feet tall and under 100lbs.
Needless to say, he was an only child and my grandfather started smoking.
IT IS AUGUST IN THE MIDWEST. That can mean only one thing: State Fairs and Deep Fried Food. OK, I guess that’s two things, but who’s counting?
When the gates to the fairgrounds open some people will head to the livestock exhibits, some will rush to get their seats for the entertainment shows, but thousands will head right to the food midway so they can see what’s new on this year’s menu – and there is always something new.
If there is a way to deep fry it – into the fryer it will go.
Down the Hall on Your Left 