Counter culture.

It seems like there are more and more small kitchen appliances on the market all the time, and less and less counter territory for them to occupy. I've blogged before about the preponderance of small appliances and the value of kitchen real estate. Appliances of this sort, in my experience, are ranked into one of four categories, and their category (and even rank within their category) are crucial to their survival:

1) Constant Companions 

2) Close Advisors 

3) Occasional Agents 

4) Whuh?

Constant Companions are always on deck, ready for action. In our house, we have five appliances on permanent display, and no one who knows us would be surprised that three of the five are coffee related: coffee grinder, coffeemaker, coffee pod machine (for Kcups, of course). The other two are used almost daily, those being the toaster oven and the microwave oven. Except in the cold months, I hate to use the big ol' oven if I can avoid it. 

Close Advisors are appliances whose location you always know, because while they don't rate permanent residence, they are used a lot. For me those include the slow cookers (Fat Man and Little Boy) and not much else. Some people have really gotten into the Instant Pot, and I can understand its appeal as it has many functions that take the place of other appliances--pressure cooker, slow cooker, steamer, fryer, rice cooker, and such. I don't know that it does any of them as well as the originals. I do know that Instant Pot recipes always look more complicated than slow cooker recipes. ("Set pot to Sauté. Sauté onions for five minutes. Add spices. Add chicken. Set vent to Sealing. Avoid death-dealing steam as you do a quick pressure release." Etc. Etc. Versus "Throw everything in the crock and set to Low for five hours to six days.")

Occasional Agents usually make appearances for special events, like the stand mixer for birthdays or the food processor for particular recipes. I don't always know where they are, but I can find them without too much trouble. Some Agents are other people's Constant Companions, which says something about them. If a blender has Favored Nation Status on your counter and no one in the house likes smoothies, maybe your rum consumption is a wee bit high. 

The Whuh?, of course, are the things you used for a while and gave up on but figured you'd get back to. Sometimes these appliances, sold to make jobs easier, involve so much cleaning that the net work benefit is canceled. But mostly, you get tired of the novelty quickly. Things like the pasta machine or the George Foreman Grill or the espresso pot or the or the electric grill or the sausage maker or the sandwich press or... You know what they are. You'll see them again at the yard sale. 

In thinking about this topic today, I realized that among our Close Advisors are the backup coffeemaker, the backup coffee grinder, and the tiny coffeemaker for rare times when one person wants more coffee than the pod machine will dispense when needed. That does not even count the Melita cones to make coffee if the power goes out. I'm starting to think we have a drinking problem around here -- a coffee drinking problem. 

Halloween in mid-September.

boo

I know, the candy has been out for more than a month already. It was displacing back to school stuff in New York before the kids even went, you know, back to school. But that's no reason for the rest of us to get hysterical over Halloween, when it's not even autumn yet. 

That is, unless you're the people who live down the street from me, who already started decorating. 

They put out a tremendous lawn display, but that's just for starters. After I took this picture, the inflatables started to appear, plus a giant skeleton in a stand-up coffin of some kind. Last year they were so laden with lights and other electrical effects that their power bill for October was probably larger than the other eleven months of the year combined. It becomes the kind of house where parents of small children wonder if letting the little one go to the door is worth the candy, lest Li'l Iron Man soil his armor. 

Technically lawnmowing season isn't over for the rest of us, but they've called it. However, I was amused to see that they've put a skeleton and a suitable toy to use for lawn work. 

Lawn work in hell -- even worse than in Florida.

Many memes are getting involved in this year's display. 

I hope to get some good shots when the whole thing is up and running. I can tell you that walking the dog in the dark morning and coming across their display is really a little unnerving. 

Hell, if I were a creepy monster and I wanted to hide somewhere, I'd hang in their yard until November. No one would know. 

P.S.: It's not just candy anymore! Scrub Daddy, the finest dish cleaning sponge available, has come out with a Halloween line this year. And remember, cleanliness is next to -- spookiness? 

Security, Fredcoin style!

Oh, dear -- another terrible crime centered around cryptocurrency. This one was no hacker or pyramid-scheming bamboozler at work. In this case, 12 violent punks were sentenced for home invasions in an attempt to steal cryptocurrency -- and while they were at it, maybe some cash and nice watches, too. 

These jerks! They're ruining everything good about cryptocurrency -- that is to say, it's not real and you can't carry it around! Its value comes from pretending it has value. If this kind of thing goes on, people won't even bother with cryptocurrency. They'll just go back that boring old regular currency. And who wants that? 

Not you, my friend! Therefore you need to invest your crummy US dollars in the crypto that has the best security around: Fredcoin! 

But, you ask, why should I expect a rinky-dink outfit like Fredcoin to have better security than the "big name" cryptos?

I'm glad you asked! Allow me to present my company's 10-Point Security Assurance Points that explain why our security is second to none! Or second only to nuns, maybe.

1) At Fredcoin, your assets are not contained in some easily found safe deposit box or something. No, no! We keep them right -- wait a sec, I thought I left them here. Must be my other pants.

2) Our crack security staff is always on high alert. 

3) Point 3 is temporarily out of order. Please try again later. 

4) We know that the weakest link in cybersecurity is the meat puppet who pushes the buttons. So we reduce exposure by keeping the interaction with the computers to a minimum. The less we work, the safer you are! Safety through laziness. QED!

5) Louisville Slugger, amirite?

6) REDACTED 

7) No one ever thinks to look in the bathtub.

8) Our alarm system from Stiiv's Hacienda of Security is top-rated! Call 1-800-ECURITY (leave off the S for Security!).  

9) We're totally experts in crime prevention. We've studied the classic texts.

10) They can only get the password out of you if you remember the password! 

So you see, Fredcoin is clearly the winners' choice, the only cryptocurrency for you. But don't take my word for it! Ask our security team.

Is Coke on coke?

I saw a picture of this online, and assumed it was just some more AI nonsense. Surely no one would think to make a soft drink using a cookie flavor, right? That's just...

And here we are. (Please ignore the yellow dog toy in the photo -- all our dogs have ignored it already.)

Yep, Oreo Coca-Cola is a real thing, and man does it sound like a bad idea. But it gets worse! As part of their Besties promotion, for a limited time we have Oreo flavored Coke AND Coke flavored Oreos. What brave new world blah blah blah. 

So the gang at Mondelēz is all in on this with Coke. There's a sweepstakes involved, a trip for your best friend and you to go to London, because -- well, I don't know why London. Because they like Coke and Oreos there, too? (Since when did Oreos become best friends with Coke? What happened to Oreos and Milk? Did they have a fight? How much sugar can you consume in one snack, anyway? Why not throw in a Milky Way too? I have questions.)

I mentioned all this to my wife, and while she thought the Coke Oreos might be okay, the Oreo Coke would probably be poor. So we did a taste test on the soda to find out. 

Our verdict: You can just barely make out a hints of chocolate and Oreo creme in the soda. I was impressed the flavor was there at all. Aside from that, it just makes a sweet drink a little sweeter. There seems to be an odd aftertaste in the Zero version that I've not noticed before in Coke Zero. So, a novelty act, and not one that improves the product. 

Will we try the Coke Oreos? I don't know. There's just the two of us here right now, not counting the dog, and a box of dicey cookies is a big investment for two adults, calorically speaking. You can bet you'll hear about it in this space if we do. Have you tried either of these products? 

And what mashups would YOU like to see? Coke and Entenmann's Coffee Cake? RC and Cap'n Crunch? Pepsi and King Oscar Sardines? Let your taste bud imagination roam free. Although maybe Pepsi and King Oscar is only found in A Fridge Too Far. 

Wear your colors.

I was a regular listener of Don Imus and the Imus in the Morning radio program in the nineties and into the oughts. It was one reason, and not the most important one, that my wife bought me a denim jacket for Christmas 2001. 

By that year, Don Imus had started marketing Imus-branded products with his brother Fred (no relation) branded through Fred's company, Auto Body Express. They sold Imus-branded coffee, hats, and other things to raise money for children's charities. As such, they were not cheap. 

Shortly after 9/11, Imus was selling a patriotic-themed denim jacket, and I wanted one. I needed a casual coat for mid-chilly temperatures, and I loved the one Imus was selling, but I didn't want to spend the dough. She completely surprised me with it. 

I still have it. 

I've worn it ever since, and in turn it has become quite worn. I saw another guy in Midtown wearing one a couple of years after 2001; he looked like a grumpy tourist who had had quite enough of New York, and I was dressed for work and did not have my jacket so I couldn't go "Twinsies!" So I let him be. But he did look mighty sharp in that jacket. 

I believe Imus, who started out as a typical hippie but was more thoughtful than that, really did love America. He was falsely accused of racism at one point in his show because of a bit that went too far. People forgot the theme of his program, which basically was: We Hate Everybody. Their self-proclaimed slogan was, "We're not happy until you're not happy." 

Still, I stopped listening regularly after longtime sidekick and newscaster Chuck McCord retired in 2011. Charles had been a counterbalance to Imus's weenie hippie tendencies and the "normal" in the room (although he wrote a lot of their sketch material). It was a less funny show after that, to my ear. But I was still sad to hear that Don himself retired in 2018, and two years later died of lung problems -- which he'd had quite a few of long before COVID. 

My favorite feature of the jacket is on the back. It's a replica of the flag that flew over Fort McHenry in the War of 1812, the flag that inspired the poem of Francis Scott Key (no relation) that became our national anthem. 

I remember seeing the actual flag itself in the Smithsonian when I was young, and being flabbergasted: "THAT? THAT's the ACTUAL FLAG?" It was not only like meeting a celebrity; it was like meeting one whom you loved and thought was dead. 

One time I was going with a friend to McDonald's for breakfast. A crusty old-timer with his veteran's cap told me that the number of stars was wrong on my jacket. I explained that the flag was supposed to look like the Fort McHenry flag, but he still objected. Maybe because there were 15 stripes and 15 stars in 1814, but the damaged flag (and thus the replica) only has 14 stars. There is a hole where one of the stars should be. Or perhaps he knew that there were actually 18 states in 1814 -- but the Fort McHenry flag never had more than 15. It was not until 1818 that Congress decided to increase the stars to match the number of states, and make more room for the field by decreasing the number of stripes to 13. The old vet was wrong, but I didn't know why at the time, and we parted amicably. 

I'd like to close this memory with a meme I think is suitable to the occasion: 

I think Imus would have liked that. 

The last call.

On September 11, 2001, Aaron McLamb captured a picture of a lone fire truck going toward disaster while most of us fled. Ladder 118 from Engine Company 205, 74 Middagh Street, Brooklyn, crossing the Brooklyn Bridge. None of the six men on that truck would return. 

I'll have something different to say about the date tomorrow. All my thoughts seem pretty insignificant today somehow. 

A toilet tale.

Few things in the ordinary course of home life will catch your attention as sharply as an overflowing toilet. 

It happens a lot, and more so now that our toilets flush with low amounts of water. The newer low-flow cans are better than the first generation, but there's still not a lot of oomph there. On the other hand, if the clog is a real banger, there's that much less water to go spilling out all over the floor. 

I had a pretty good clog the other day. I won't bother you with details except to say that neither of my first two tricks worked. Those are:

#1: Leave the toilet and hope it resolves itself. Sometimes it does. If you have a second toilet you can use, sometimes it pays to let the water do its magic. When you return, the bowl is almost empty, and most likely the clog has moved along.

#2: Try to use the plunger for one good shot. Nine times out of ten, one nudge with a good plunger is all it takes. 

No, my can chose option #3: Start spilling water all over the place. 

I did get it cleared up, fortunately, although it required a load of towels to be washed with Lysol Laundry Sanitizer and the floor to be sanitized as well, just in case. No damage was done to the ceiling below, so I have to consider it a success. 

But that's a small problem. There are larger problems afoot. 

A couple of months ago, the town sent out an alert about our collective garbage use. When the town makes a contract with a private collection firm, it estimates regular household use to come to a certain quantity per household--no more than four big cans' worth a week. That's a huge amount for the average home. However, I can't help but notice that some houses nearby, including one right across the street, put an awful lot more than that out quite often. Which is why we got the alert: Our overall garbage disposing has gone over the upper limit of our contract. 

If you live in America and you are not blinkered, you know why: Houses in residential areas, even here in the exurbs, are being rented out and stuffed with grown-ups who come from distant lands without following expected protocols. 

When the houses were built in our development, we had to sign a covenant that said we would not rent it out. Well, that was nice while it lasted. The former neighbor who sold his house told me he had no idea it was going to be used this way. An old expression about one being born every minute comes to mind. Well, he doesn't have to live near it.  

But it all brings us back to plumbing. A friend of mine who would know says that while the town (supposedly) figures our the growing population for water and sewer needs, it still only calculates based on two or three adults and maybe as many as four children per household. When you have eight or more adults under a roof, repeated in house after house, there's going to be a shock to the system. We're not there yet, but if current trends continue, we may be in for a surprise one day. We may flush that toilet and the sewer may say, "Your flush is important to us. We are experiencing higher than normal flush volume right now. Please enjoy this backed up sewage while you wait." 

This is what we can expect in a country where our "leaders" think it's a great idea to let millions upon millions of unknowns enter and spread out to every city, hamlet, village, and town. Johann Friedrich von Schiller famously wrote, “Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain.” So what chance do civil engineers have?

Cheesesteaks vs. Cheeseheads.

I'm still not following football much, because football continues to impoverish its fans, promote degenerate gambling, and employ wokester-in-chief Roger Goodell as commissioner of the NFL. Dumdum Goodell was doubtless the brains behind the decision to put the first game of the season, between strong contenders from Green Bay and Philly, in South America, and force North Americans who wanted to watch the game to use Peacock, NBC's streaming service, which is somewhere in popularity between endodontic surgery and CNN+. 

Old habits die hard, though, and I had to check in this morning, hoping to see that the Eagles had lost. Alas, that was not the case. 

Still, I have some fellow feeling for the citizens of Philadelphia. In 2022, recall, they lost the Super Bowl by 3 points to the Kansas City Chiefs, and then in October lost the World Series to the Houston Shenanigans. 

But the year was actually even worse. The Philadelphia Union, the city's soccer team, also made it to the championship match and also lost, to Los Angeles. The Flyers finished dead last in the Metropolitan Division of the NHL, which means eighth out of eight, and accomplished the impressive feat of missing the NHL playoffs, which takes some doing. The 76ers got to the second round of the NBA playoffs but lost to Miami. One might look in vain for joy from the Wings (lacrosse) or the Soul (arena football, off and on), but no joy was to be had in 2022. 

The Phillies are having another great season currently, and one can only hope that they get overconfident and crap out soon. As for football, the NFL can move all their games to Peacock and have them played in other parts of the world for all I care, places where they think footballs are round and it's okay to pretend to be hurt when you aren't. I don't care.

Unless the Cowboys are good this year. Then I'll have a rooting interest -- against someone. 

Skunk, tables, books.

Three topics weighing heavily on me this morning: Skunks, Tables, and Books. 

Let's go.

The dog groomer sent this around, and I repost it here as a public service. I do not know if this is the best advice, but I sure would be willing to give it a try. As longtime readers will recall, the late Tralfaz had a couple of memorable tussles with skunks and lost both, because with a skunk, as with porcupines and wasps, even if you win, you lose. When we tried to de-skunk the boy we started by spraying him with water, and I can tell you it did not help. I think the water may have just spread the skunk juice around, or helped it penetrate his skin. 

I think the method from the groomer -- who has probably de-skunked dozens of dogs -- is worth a try. If you are a dog owner, I hope you will not need it. Still, better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it. 

I did see a skunk waddle into the road the other morning while walking Izzy. Fortunately we were not crossing his path nor vice-versa, and he still had the good sense to go back the way he came.  

As for tables: You know also if you read this site that I am grateful for our trashmen, who make life much cleaner for the rest of us. Our local service is willing to pick up one (1) large item a week from each household, and in past years that has meant a mattress or an old easy chair. Last week it meant the kitchen table that my mother gave my wife and me as a wedding gift. 

We have had this set a long time. My wife never much liked it. We tried to replace it with another set more than ten years ago when elevated pub-type tables were in vogue, and she wound up liking that one less -- so that was relegated to the dining room and the old set came out again. A new new set has finally landed, and so the old table's time was up. 

That table lasted as long as it did because it was solid. It weighed a ton. I only got it to the street last Friday because it was circular and, with the legs off, I could roll it. Took out the legs and the leaf too. I was not sure the boys would carry it away, but they did, God bless ‘em. 

We still have the six chairs, which can go out in installments. No big rush. After all, a chair without a table is still a chair, but a table without a chair is a sideboard.

Finally, books. 

Just a quick announcement that Hans G. Schantz has rounded up a bunch of authors again to submit ebooks to the Based Book Sale. All books are 99 cents or less until September 11! Stock up on your reading to help you get through the anxiety of the election season and the stress of the holidays. I've got two books involved. Which ones? You'll have to look at the list and find out! 

Working through Labor Day.

Happy Labor Day! I'll be working all day, thanks very much. Someone has to keep the engine of commerce running. YOU'RE WELCOME.

Alas, the life of the freelancer. Assignments come in at random and deadlines are deadly. But it's all right; I had no social plans for today. Working on a holiday never bothered me unless I was missing a party I wanted to attend, and as I've gotten older, I have found precious few events that meet that particular criterion. 

Pardon me if I've told this story in this space before: When I was in college I worked for a time as a general dogsbody for a small midtown office that did a lot of mailings, and I mean a lot. They did not observe Columbus Day, but the post office certainly did. However, in Manhattan at least, the post office itself did not sleep; its windows were shuttered and its postmen were at rest, but the big sorting offices were still open. If a company wanted to get a dozen sacks of mail into the system that day, they just had to bring it to the loading dock and it would be cheerfully accepted. All they needed were the sacks, a big dolly, and a dopey college student who needed the money.

Well, if you've ever done this kind of work, you discover quickly that getting the four wheels of a dolly to play nicely together is like getting the band into the studio after the third album flopped and the tour disintegrated into fistfights. You also discover that, as smooth as they look in most places, the sidewalks of Manhattan are in fact pitted and furrowed as a centenarian's face; that the smallest amounts of litter can jam a little wheel; that the curb cuts may be and should be perfect for wheelchairs but are not wide enough for dollies; that mailbags love nothing better than to swing freely from the handle to which you tied them and drag on the ground or at least throw off the dolly's forward impetus; that the sewer grates are sinking everywhere and love nothing better than to reach out and take a bite out of a small and errant wheel. I don't remember how many blocks it was, but it was too many. Still, I got there, and delivered the goods, and the dolly and I made it back safely. 

So it's not a bad thing to work on the holidays. But it's a lot easier to do it at home, doing research on your laptop for pay, than to be shoving an uncooperative dolly through the pitiless streets of the naked city to deliver pamphlets to be mailed, most of which would be thrown away upon reception.

I still maintain that everyone in college should have a job like that. Or at food service or delivery, or something else low-paying and unexpectedly challenging. It teaches humility, but also self-respect, which is far better than ballooned-up pride that contains a deep sense of inadequacy. Plus, you might get a funny story out it. 

Start your engines!

I was very sorry to hear that WCBS News Radio 880 in New York City is no more. The AM station had been broadcasting in an all-news format for 57 years. My father was an early riser and would sit at the kitchen table, smoking and drinking coffee and listening to the news on 880. I would hear about the news events of the day before I'd gotten my Rice Krispies. Through blackouts and rampages and killings and war, 880 was there to lead you into the riot of the world. And you'd get traffic and weather on the eights, 12:08, 12:18, 12:28, all around the clock. 

Now 880 is an all-sports station, of which we have enough as it is.

Some kids grow up in houses where National Public Radio is on in the mornings, and I pity them. NPR does nothing to educate you in the ways of the world. It's all soft tones and soft-pedaled socialism. As on PBS, commercials (oops! "thank-yous" to our sponsors) are gentle and intellectual and vacuous. "this program brought to you by the frankfurt school foundation, leading american children today into the bright future of the proletariat tomorrow."

You're going to work or school in the trenches? You needed AM radio. Even the commercials gave it to you straight, like a cup of hot, black coffee. 

THIS SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY ONLY AT AUTOPLANET! TOYOTAS! CHEVYS! FORDS! HONDAS! OVERSTOCK CAR DEALS YOU WILL NOT BELIEVE! GOT A TRADE-IN? IS IT GARBAGE? WE DON'T CARE! DRAG IT IN ON A DOLLY AND WE'LL MAKE YOU A DEAL! NO TRADE-IN? NO DOWNPAYMENT? NO INSURANCE? NO LICENSE? NO PROBLEM! THIS SUNDAY ONLY! WE WILL GET YOU BEHIND THE WHEEL OF SOMETHING AT AUTOPLANET!!!

Your hair almost blew back like from a fan. AM was the real world, where people worked hard and made deals and had to be sharp. NPR was pabulum for people with trust funds who could be bailed out when things went sideways. 

Anyone who listened to real radio in New York before 2018 will remember the extremely aggressive ads for the extremely aggressive dragster shows at Raceway Park in Englishtown, New Jersey. This would wake you up over your toast:

I never went -- not the kind of thing my dad would bother with -- but it sounded like these guys were having a good time. If the internal combustion engine is successfully replaced by batteries (not looking likely right now), it will be a quieter and less fun world. 

Dragzine (not that kind of drag) reported that Raceway Park closed in 2018 after 52 years, which means it was started almost the same year as News Radio 880. I don't know if drag racing has lost some of its thrill for the motorheads. I wouldn't be surprised if insurance costs were somehow involved. 

Fortunately, not everything has changed. The manly love for motors is not dead, as I saw this poster for an upcoming event:

Look at that! Stunts! Demo derby! BUS RACE! And not a Prius in sight. I can hear the ad on the radio in my mind:

SATURDAY NIGHT! SEPTEMBER 21st ONLY! It's the EVE OF DESTRUCTION!!!! Enduro race! Trailer race! Demo derby! BUS race! FIREWORKS! If it combusts, WE HAVE IT! It's the EVE OF DESTRUCTION and GATES OPEN at 4:30! BE THERE!!!

But alas, I won't hear the ad on News Radio 880.