Aisle be passing by.

I would like to thank Gloriam Marketing, a Catholic PR firm, for the following chart.

A better explanation of Catholicsthenics I have not seen. It would apply, of course to any Christian church that has kneeling, and to a lesser degree to anyplace humans congregate that involves the dreaded aisles. 

Getting past seated people is no fun in movie theaters, which is why people often like to sit on the end of a row (as in Mass as well). It is better to be put upon than to be embarrassed as the put-uponer. This is complicated by people carrying enormous buckets of popcorn and a soda large enough to hydrate a derby winner, either of which may be worn by the put-uponee if things go sideways (literally). At least that's one peril one hopes to not see in church. Church can have its entertainment value, but please -- no snacking. 

Aisle passings are even worse at live theater or sporting events. The immediacy of the performance makes everything more dramatic. You don't want a view of some guy's butt as he passes by to cause you to miss Hamlet stabbing Polonius (oops, spoiler!) or a thrilling game-tying steal of home plate. You can't get those moments back. 

The worst has to be the airplane, though. Crammed into a seat not on the aisle -- perhaps at the window or, God love you, the center -- you had better be able to contain your bodily fluids for the length of the trip. Otherwise I promise the aisle seat will be occupied by a large human who does not want to get up to let people in or out and will definitely make that opinion known. With almost zero headroom, you couldn't even leap over him. It makes for a travel experience packed with grumbling, recriminations, and discomfort. 

I usually think of people who enjoyed the COVID lockdowns as being kind of loony, but when I think of aisles, it makes more sense. 

Anyway, I showed the illustration above to my wife, and she thought it would be great to incorporate such workout techniques into Mass officially. She thought the choir could start with something cheery for stretching and warmups, then sing a dirge at the end for cooldowns. You'd shower after church rather than before. I think I'll mention it to the Cardinal; like me, he could stand to take off a few pounds.  

Reports from the road.

We took a li'l road trip recently, which is why blogging has been even spottier than usual. Just a few days to visit family out of state. It was delightful, but that's not my topic today. Actually, I have two:

1) Dog-gone

We were not staying with family, but rather in a hotel in town, and we were bringing oversize puppy Izzy with us. This by far would be the longest road trip he's ever experienced, and since he's not one of those dog that loves car rides, I was worried about how he'd fare. Would he freak out? Get carsick? Whine to stop every ten miles? And what of the hotel? Sure, they claimed they were pet-friendly, but were they? Would Izzy test the bounds of their hospitality? Bark at random hours? Establish dominance by peeing all over the room? Anything could happen. 

Well, it all went off far better than I had hoped. Izzy was perfect -- the ride out was stressful for him, but he settled down and took it easy. We made one pit stop on the way (for me as much as him) and he was fine. He was beloved by the extended family and only barked exactly one (1) time on the whole trip -- the morning we were leaving, as we were packing, when some kids were running and shouting in the hotel hallway. Then he slept pretty much all the way home.

I'd like to thank Embassy Suites for being as good as their word about pets. They are very clear about the ground rules, which are hardly onerous -- use the rear lot for his trips out, clean up after him, don't bring the dog into the dining area, and so on. These requests came in a bag (with very 70's style art) that was full of dog treats -- a spoonful of sugar and all that, you know. 

2) Fire!

When I got home, loaded with bags and trailed by dog as I walked up the porch steps, I was disquieted to hear the fire alarms going off in the house. No smoke inside; no clouds of particulate matter. These are alarms wired into the ceiling, and there's a dozen all over the house, and when one goes off they all go off -- so no telling where it started. I ran from room to room, pulling them off the ceiling as I went, because it was obvious right away there was no real emergency. The next-to-last one was the culprit, in the ceiling of a storage room. My guess is that some bold spider, hearing the empty house, made his move to take over the joint; he knocked some dust into the detector, fried himself on the wire, and set the alarm off. It could have been peeping for days.

You could hear the sound from a couple of houses away. It must have annoyed the neighbors. Especially the lying sack of lies who lives next door. 

So, that's a plus, anyway. 

On the whole, a great trip, but it's nice to be home. I hope I'll be able to pass along more bloggy goodness this upcoming week. 

Having a X time.

This one's kicked around the Internet for a while, and I went looking for its source.

It's a clever take of the early-to-mid twentieth century type -- using the forms of the new era (in both senses of the word) to poke fun at the stuffiness of the formal letter-writing era and the current mania for speed and efficiency, while at the same time affecting the gladhanding merriment of the man on the go. But is it real?

I wondered, because while most of the slangese seemed American (all wet, dough-re-mi), needing "a pint" seemed more British. However, a man in American desiring a pint would normally be looking for a 16-ounce bottle of booze to carry him along rather than a pint of beer in the pub, so that might fit.

And I was right, in the end. Thanks to eBay, I found other cards of this type. What we see here is just half of the front of the card; here's a whole card.

The seller included a photo of the card's back, which told me the thing was made by Dexter Press of West Nyack, New York, a half hour drive from where I'm sitting as I type this.

The Postcard History site has helpful information on Dexter, founded by Thomas Dexter as a one-man press in 1920. It's well known among postcard buffs for the "natural color" postcards like the one above, which were printed after 1952. Another postcard-interest site tells us that Dexter closed its operations in New York in 1984, and moved to Aurora, Missouri: "As a subsidiary, they now print religious material under the MWM Dexter name." But that entry was from 2017; an attempt to follow the link to the MWM Dexter site came up blank. At some point they became (in whole or part) Dexter Hospitality, but now it looks like that's gone too. I fear for the current state of Mr. Dexter's company.

As for the Indian-themed card above, the Postcard History site dates it to 1962. That makes sense. The language in the oh-so-snappy checklist is just a little dated. It doesn't sound like the way the kids talked in 1962 ("pep" and "helluva" sound more forties to me), but probably the way a breezy guy who'd been a kid ten or twenty years earlier would talk.

So that's what I found out about a little slice of Americana. If anyone knows more about the fate of Mr. Dexter's company, drop me a line. I'm always curious about publishing. 

Bygone favorites.

Calvin Trillin is still kicking. He's always been a terrific writer, great at the long-form feature, but like most people I was drawn to his short humor pieces. One I remember well was the essay pondering the disappearance of Chicken à la King. Chicken à la King was once a mighty dish that crossed the continent, then suddenly vanished. To quote from the piece:

There must be billions of gallons of chicken à la king somewhere. There was a time--in the 1950s, say--when the whole country seemed to be awash in chicken à la king. Thousands of Kiwanians ate it at Kiwanis luncheons. Kiwanians ate so much chicken à la king that whenever I heard them sing their song, "I'd Rather be a Kiwanian Than in Any Other Club," I expected to hear a few lines in there about the health-giving qualities of the dish that was giving strength and succor to all Kiwanians everywhere:

There's nothing can defeat us, 

Whatever life may bring. 

'Cause we can go and eat us 

Some chicken à la king. 

So I'd rather be a Kiwanian than in any other club.

It may be small succor to the Kiwanians and others that Swanson still makes a canned variety of the stuff, but perhaps it's cold comfort. The canned stuff cannot match the majesty of Chicken à la King in the wild!

Just in the time I've been hanging around the earth being a nuisance, I have seen ubiquitous foods vanishing into obscurity. Once exotic or high-falutin', these popular meals became a symbol of American yahooism and were discarded. Or maybe everyone just got bored. Also, following the Kingsley Amis rule of More will mean worse, the more popular a food becomes, the less likely it will be prepared well. 

Here are some that have gone the way of the dodo, Howard Johnson's, and the Automat:

Beef Stroganoff: Such a delight when done well! Which means, you can't go cheap on the beef. And no mushrooms. So simple, yet so many ways to screw it up, and oh so many did.

Chicken Chow Mein: The staple of every Chinese restaurant in America, now shuffled off to the side like a poor relation. I once saw it in a buffet. It was the only remotely Asian dish there. 

Duck à l'Orange: Duck was much more a mainstay of the American diet in the past. This fancy dish was a great way to serve it, the citrus counteracting the fattiness of the duck.

Turkey Tetrazzini: Once a popular way to get rid of leftover Thanksgiving turkey. No one ever asked "How do Italians know how to cook turkey?" Just eat it, kid. Santa's watching.

Chicken Cacciatore: Another beloved Italian dish, barely seen outside of Grandma's kitchen now. That Corningware casserole of hers must be at least 80 years old, right?  

Salisbury Steak: Did they ever eat this in Salisbury? Who cares? If you didn't get it from Mom or Grandma, you got it from Swanson, and were glad to get it. 

Fondue: Children, the legend says that once upon a time, if you got married, you got a Crock-Pot and a fondue set. Maybe a blender. The slow-cooker might become a real life-saver for busy families, and Dad might have fun on the weekends with the blender, but the fondue set? Used five times the first year and never after. 

Boeuf Bourguignon: The sign of high-class cooking in the mid-seventies, boeuf bourguignon was even a favorite of Superman's. 

But by the mid-1980s, for fine dining, zee boeuf was not considered enoeuf. Also in the boozy French meat department:

Coq au Vin: One cup of wine for the chicken, three cups for the chef...

Coquilles Saint Jacques: A fantastic way to cook scallops, but a good bit of work. Plus, scallops are excellent with very little frou-frou stuff, so why bother?

Salad Bars: As a food class, the American salad bar of the seventies was an amazing leap forward in food service. It actually got Americans of the era to eat some raw vegetables, although probably most of them also took five rolls and some chow mein.

Fried Oysters: This one goes way back, but people still alive remember when oysters were no big deal and frying them a perfectly reasonable way to eat them. Snobs might go the Oysters Rockefeller route, which is to oysters what Clams Casino is to clams. Come to think of it:

Clams Casino: There.

Veal Oscar: A shockingly complicated dish with crabmeat, asparagus, demi-glace, clarified butter, Béarnaise sauce, and so on -- no wonder restaurants don't want to bother with it. 

Lobster Newburg: I had it once in Maine, and it was really salty. I ate lobster at almost every meal and this was the only thing I didn't like. Sorry, Mr. Newburg (or Wenburg); probably just a bum cook that day. Also on the lobster end of obscurity: Lobster Thermidor. 

Shrimp Cocktail: Sure, you see it around, but not like in times past. Why, we had hot-and-cold running shrimp cocktail! Meaning, boiled and chilled or fried. Excellent either way.

Baked Alaska: The king of desserts! A spectacular presentation of fire (browned meringue, often done by setting booze ablaze) and ice cream! 

Time passes, and yesterday's snobby dish becomes today's nouveau riche garbage. Prime rib and chateaubriand may hang around thanks to wedding caterers, but the trendsetters have gone somewhere else. Lately they're snacking on whatever they find in the dirt or traveling to countries with very poor sanitation to pester the natives and eat there. I think I'd rather stick with Salisbury steak, tell you the truth.

Escape from winter with Fredcoin!

Look at this illustration of happy natives enjoying themselves in the sun! Ah, wouldn't it be nice to be among them? 

But nooo, you had to stick your money in those crooked crypto-scams, the ones that get people arrested in the Bahamas before they have to testify in front on Congress. You should have put your dough in Fredcoin! 

Yes, friends, Fredcoin is the cryptocurrency for you! You know how that guy with the accordion above got his instrument? Did you guess Fredcoin? Well, no, but it could have been! And look at how the happy people frolic to the beautiful music of his theoretically-possible-Fredcoin-funded instrument!

Now, as we approach the end of 2022, you may be mulling it over. Mull mull mull. I can hear it now. Should I put my money in nice, safe Fredcoin, or should I set fire to it in the backyard? Which is virtually the same as any other investment these days. And I sympathize with your plight. You who have no Fredcoin are in a world of confusion, a world that for the investor is like being stuck in a room full of broken glass (inflation) and nails (overregulation) and a stupid, unhappy rhinoceros (the U.S. government). Any possible move the rhino makes is going to hurt and cause more damage to you, and none of them will get you out of this mess. But oh, if only you'd gotten some delightful Fredcoin!

Oh, sure, I know some of you have doubts. You hear that a thousand cryptocurrencies sank to Davy Jones's Locker just since January. You've heard that the market cap for cryptos has shrunk by 72% since November '21. You figure that putting money in Fredcoin is just another way to watch your cash disintegrate. At least if you burned it in the backyard you'd get some warmth for a while. 

Well, knock off that kind of defeatism! We don't believe it that here. What some people call "an inability to let go of anything" and "a hobgoblin of little minds" we call "loyalty." And we're not going to let our loyal investors down. 

So send your money to me, Fred, where it can be converted into the world's most up-and-coming cryptocurrency (according to me). Who knows? Next year maybe you'll find yourself wintering in some sunny spot instead of sinking into the ice and snow. It's worth a shot!

Airline mysteries.

1975: Less than a year after its introduction, Ringling Brothers' ClownAir passenger service
was discontinued for reasons unknown to this day. 

 

In my row, no doubt.

"I be done seen about everything when I see an elephant fly business class."

 

Battle of the Cup Cakes!

Way back in 2019 I reviewed Kodiak Cakes' Flapjack in a Cup, the microwaveable breakfast-on-the-go. TLDR version: Weird but I liked it. Probably most things I like can be reviewed that way.

Since then some things have changed. In 2021 Kodiak Cakes was acquired for a big pile o' undisclosed dough by L. Catterton, a private equity firm that also owns very unrelated outfits like Birkenstock, Alliance Animal Health, West Marine, and Boll & Branch. 

Also since 2019 a new old competitor has entered the pancake-on-the-go war: The Artist Formerly Known As Aunt Jemima (TAFKAAJ). Yes, I refer to the Pepsi-owned Pearl Milling Company, which dropped Aunt Jemima in 2020 and now everything is racial harmony and lollipops in America. They've now climbed into the ring with a very similar and similarly priced nukeable pancake in a disposable cup. 

Today we face two important questions: 1) Is Kodiak still good, or has the small family company been ruined by evil capitalist investors? And 2) Who has the better pancake in a cup? 

We'll sample the challenger first. 

The challenger comes up strong--by coming up strong. The little bit of dry ingredients and quarter-cup of water has baked up into this fluffy structure. Includes a delicious pancake scent to help wake up the kiddies. 

Tough sponge shown here, as is common with microwave baking generally. It easily clumps off the spoon. But the taste is very good, totally pancakeish, and this blueberry variety contains little blueberry bits that rehydrated nicely during the 70-second nuke. It is rather dry, though, and like normal pancakes cries out for some kind of syrup. The cup helpfully recommends using some Pearl Milling Co. fake maple syrup, but that defeats the whole "pancake to go" concept, especially if you drop a clump off your spoon as I did. You'd wind up with a sticky mess all over the inside of your Corolla. 

And now the reigning champ: 

Oooh, not nearly as much rising on the Kodiak flapjack. Could be a result of the higher protein that Kodiak advertises in its products. Might this be a problem?

No, the champ looks good coming out of the cup. Still, the proof of the pudding, etc. How does it taste?

Result: For road pancakes (and I don't mean crushed squirrels), the Kodiak is superior. This product has little maple nubs in it that take the place of syrup, so you get a moist and flavorful bite. Nutritionally (and does anyone really care if he's eating pancakes?) the Kodiak is higher in calories, but does have more than double the protein, which may make you feel less logy than pancakes normally do. (Just for the record, I did not eat both of these products on the same day. I have enough trouble staying awake during work.)

The winner and still champion of the mobile pancake is... Kodiak!

Beep, honk.

It's been said about Illinois and Massachusetts and New York and I guess anywhere that winter is an issue: There are three seasons here -- fall, winter, and construction. 

Well, yesterday I had to make a drive to Pennsylvania, and on the way I found that here in New York, construction season is in high gear. And I haven't put up any of my decorations yet!

I tend to be a lot more patient with construction delays than other causes of traffic jams, partly because I sympathize with the guys working, but also because there's a feeling that things are ordered and not in horrible chaos. An accident with blood and heads rolling on the pavement -- well, that's going to take a while to clean up. A crime scene where a meth addict ran into a school bus while being chased by the troopers is going to require everyone and his brother on the scene for medical help and to make sure the evidence against the guilty idiot is preserved. A massive road failure like the collapse of an overpass? Might as well hunker down and take a nap, drivers.

But regularly scheduled constructions projects with flagmen and drivers doing a courteous zipper merge? May take a while, but we'll get there. We just hope we don't have to pee while we're waiting....

Drinking (breakfast) and driving.

So what on earth is this? you wonder. Or not, if you know already. 

The Crunch Cup is a clever device that purports to allow you to drink your breakfast cereal. No more messing around with spoons! No more trying to stuff a bowl in the cupholder of your car! Now you can fix your Cocoa Puffs up and head on out to work! 

I was given this as a gift by a relative who knows how much I love cereal. Would this be helpful to me, she wondered? Well, since I work from home now, commuting is not a hassle anymore, and not therefore a time in which I might wish to have some Lucky Charms in beverage form. Still, we must give this a try because it's clever and it's for cereal. Yum!

First: Take the thing apart and fill the outer cup to the milk line. 

Second: Fill the inner cup with cereal and apply lid. (You will notice that I used Cheerios for this test, and I have to confess that the first time I tried it I used cornflakes. Flakes get too mushy too fast, though, and are not suitable for drinking.)

Third: Insert cereal cup into milk cup, secure, and you're ready to go! Just make sure the white cap on top is on the drink position before you try to use it, or you'll wind up wearing some milk. 

And the question is: Does it work?

Yes. I think the design is interesting because when you tip it up, dry cereal and wet milk pour into your mouth at roughly equal speed. I suspect that the shape and size were carefully measured to ensure that, while being able to fit in the average vehicle cup holder. I don't think it would scale up or down well. I did manage to dribble a bit of milk on my shirt anyhow.

Considering its size, though, you don't get a lot of cereal, and in fact I found that I had milk left over when the cereal was almost gone. I say almost because some Cheerios remained stuck inside the cereal section after milk got inside. There's no non-messy way to extract them when that happens. 

I think it's useful for people who really do get their morning nutrition in the car. But I would caution that it's not as secure as, say, a good travel coffee mug. It only takes a bit of tip to get milk on you, and soured milk is not the scent you want to fragrance the office. If you leave it in a hot car all day while you work, it would probably get a little nasty by quittin' time. Then there’s the pothole question. So there are some issues to consider. 

The fact that it works at all is pretty neat, though. It is made of the finest plastic China can supply, and is dishwasher safe. Plus, if you're more of a smoothie drinker, just leave the insert cup out and it becomes a smoothie cup. Not a perfect one, since the top doesn't seal shut, but a big one.

I think I'll stick to granola bars and maybe an apple if I want to have breakfast in the car, though. I might get crumbs but I'd never get splashed.  

Bad game shows.

I was trading notes on the Globle, the game that does for geography what Wordle does for five-letter words, with my old friends, and the question of Micronesia came up. Country or not? I remembered that it had once been administered by the United States, but has been independent for some time (official since 1990, as it turns out). I remembered that prior to full independence from the United States, there was a syndicated late-night game show that sent its winners on vacation there. I will be doggoned if I can remember or find the name of the show, but Micronesia has stuck with me. 

Anyway, it reminded me that there have been many lame game shows through the years. And yet, I can think of many lamer ones that never got made. Here are a few. 

📺💰📺💰📺💰

Bowling for Flounder

The Bong Show

Name That Rationalist Philosopher

What's In Your Fridge?

Wheel of Mishegoss    

Three Rounds with the Mike Tyson

Snot Potato!

Clinical Study

Eat Your Weight

Russian Roulette

The Recently Divorced Game

Three-Card Monte on Avenue D

Clean That Bathroom!

Girl or Drag Queen?

📺💰📺💰📺💰

Personally, I think I'll buy my own ticket to Micronesia, thanks. If I ever want to go to Micronesia. 

Fred's Book Club: Hell on Earth.

Hello, book fans, and welcome to today's amazing entry in our Wednesday Humpback Writers feature, the feature named for Hump Day, not for the writers, some of whom may have humps of one sort or another, but I've never asked. You have to draw the line somewhere.

Today we have a classic of journalism by a writer who was not afraid to get down in the mud (sometimes literally) to dig for information, who has probably had more guns pointed his way than the average mid-level drug dealer, and yet has retained his sense of humor through it all.

Holidays in Hell, originally published in 1988, is a collection of pieces by P.J. O'Rourke, the one-time National Lampoon writer whose career has been headlines by two constants:

1) Go to places in the world that completely suck, or don't suck, and find out why they are the way they are; and

2) Make fun of them.

This book, which is a pretty good snapshot of the state of the world in the eighties, features essays of his visits to horrible places like Lebanon, El Salvador, South Africa, the Gaza Strip, and Epcot. He would go to these places so we wouldn't have to, and God bless him for it.

O'Rourke is a keen observer with a great eye for detail and a sharp wit, some of which would ensure no large modern New York publisher would go near him these days. Here's P.J. on ...

LEBANON 

Miss Phillips was gone for two hours. She emerged from the donnybrook perfectly composed and holding three bus tickets. I asked her what all the shooting was about. "Oh," she said, "that's just Lebanese for 'please queue up.'" An ancient horrible Mexican-looking bus pulled into the crowd smacking people and punting them aside. Amal was carrying a co-ed's full complement of baggage in two immense suitcases. I handed my kit bag to Miss Phillips, grabbed these and made for the bus. Or tried to. Three steps put me at the bottom of a clawing, screeching pile-up, a pyramid of human frenzy. I heard Miss Phillips's voice behind me. "Don't be shy," she said, "it's not rude to give a wee shove to the Lebanese." I took a breath, tightened my grip on the suitcases and began lashing with Samsonite bludgeons at the crowd of women, old men, and children. If you ask me, it was pretty rude, but it was either that or winter in South Lebanon. 

POLAND 

"Let's start with nightclubs," I said as soon as the cop had given up on us. Zofia raised an eyebrow.     "There's one called Kamienolomy, 'The Quarry,'" said Tom. The decor was budget Mafia. Because of the name, I guess, the walls were covered with Permastone house siding. There were little strips of disco lights around the dance floor, but they just flashed off and on; they didn't move around the room or change colors or anything.        A bored combo -- one singer, one guitar player and a guy on the electric organ doing the rhythm, bass and drum -- played a Ramada Inn lounge arrangement of "I Got You, Babe," lyrics in memorized English:            Ugh gut you to told me height            Bucket jute tuchus god night

THIRD-WORLD DRIVING 

Traffic Signs and Signals: Most developing nations use international traffic symbols. Americans may find themselves perplexed by road signs that look like Boy Scout merit badges and by such things as an iguana silhouette with a red diagonal bar across it. Don't worry, the natives don't know what they mean, either. 

EPCOT 

At Epcot Center, the Disney corporation has focused its attention on two things greatly in need of Disneyfication: the tedious future and the annoying whole wide world. 

The book is also educational. I would never have heard this theory of colonialism otherwise:

The historian C. H. Haring points out that there are two kinds of colonies. Farm colonies are refuges where Pilgrims, Quakers and other fruitcakes can go chop down trees and stay out of everybody's hair. But exploitation colonies are places for wastrel younger sons and sleazed-out noblemen to get rich on gold and slave-labor plantations. Farm colonists are interested in forming their own permanent institutions. Exploitation colonists are interested in getting home and spending their money. For this reason New England, Canada, Costa Rica and parts of Argentina are reasonably nice places, while Mississippi, Jamaica, Mexico and most other sections of the hemisphere are shit holes.    

Holidays in Hell was not the first book of O'Rourke's I read. Parliament of Whores, his 1991 deep dive into American politics, was an eye-opener for a lot of people and an introduction to economics too -- and funny as hell. It stated the reasons why America has been so successful -- rule of law, respect for institutions and vice-versa, freedom of enterprise, etc. -- and how fragile these things can be, as we are seeing now.

But O'Rourke lost Libertarian street cred in 2016 with his semi-endorsement of Hillary Clinton for president -- the woman of whom he once said "Every man looks at her and sees his first wife," part of the couple he called "blathering highbinders." I'm not sure if he considers himself a Never Trumper, but he's at the very least a Trump Despiser. With the backs of the conservatives against the wall as never before, this kind of attitude is hard to swallow to his longtime fans.

Be that as it is, although he's getting up there now (72 now and probably not going to any real hellholes these days), O'Rourke is one of the sharpest writers of his generation, merciless on the foibles and failings of his generation, and a real talent. If you hate his politics (or you support Mississippi), you'll still love The Bachelor Home Companion: A Practical Guide to Keeping House Like a Pig, which I also recommend without reservation.

Put it on, baby, put it all on.

Today is supposedly International Nude Day:

This non-official holiday was created by television presenter and former rugby player. Marc Ellis dared people to streak in front of New Zealand’s Prime Minister Helen Clark around the beginning of the twenty-first century. Since then it has celebrated to over 30 different countries.

The Web site I quote, Holidays Calendar, helpfully lists some advantages to taking off your clothes and running around like you're on PCP, including:

• Lower risk of Alzheimer’s in people who run barefoot--It’s believed walking barefoot stimulates neurons in the brain.
• Higher levels of Vitamin D in the body--Due to more sun exposure by the skin.
• Better circulation--Circulation is often restricted by clothing.

Well, isn't that nice.

I am sure I don't need to mention the truth that the people who want to run around naked are 99.999% guaranteed to be the people you would never want to see naked. Many of them you wouldn't want to see in clothing, even. My wife and I were on a vacation years ago, and noted that on one private beach to which we had access, one or two Europeans couldn't help themselves but break the rules and get naked. They proved the rule as well as you can imagine. And people wonder why we don't travel more.

These people may be butt nekkid

However, as loathe as I am to spill the hot coffee on someone's nudist fun, allow me to address the so-called health advantages above with some health advantages of clothing, which human beings have been wearing everywhere and at all times since Eve had that famous snack. To the nudists I say:

👀 It is true that many people lack enough vitamin D, and more sunlight can help correct that deficiency. You can fill your D needs with 10-30 minutes of midday exposure... in clothing. Hanging around in the sun naked gets you plenty of skin-cancer-causing UV radiation. Even a plain cotton T-shirt has an SPF of 7. Your naked hinder has an SPF of nada.

👀 Okay, suppose it rains. Sometimes rain is refreshing. Sometimes it's awfully cold or comes with cold wind. How's that feel on naked flesh?

👀 Spurious assertions about Alzheimer's aside, walking barefoot outdoors can cause all kinds of problems, from the obvious (stepping on broken glass, sharp rocks, stinging bugs, burning hot pavement) to the less obvious (fallen arches, Achilles tendinitis, fungal and bacterial infections, and hookworm).

👀 Are all of you nudists 100% sure you can identify poison ivy, poison sumac, poison oak? I've had poison ivy on my arms and that was bad enough. Further, when one is in real nature, not phony cultivated nature, one often finds that natural bushes and other plants have many means of protecting themselves beyond itchy poisons, like thorns and sharp leaves. The average hiker, properly equipped, can Vallereeeeee Valleraaaah right through all that stuff, but not Joe Birthday Suit.

👀 And what about ticks? Good grief, to avoid ticks you have to wear long sleeves and long pants and tuck the pants in your socks. Running around in the buff means none of this. Might as well write TICKS EAT HERE on your chest. And ticks are only the tip of the bug iceberg. Have none of you seen Naked and Afraid?

👀 If you think nature is bad, try civilization. I've already mentioned broken glass and pavement, and we can assume the police might have something to say about your sartorial choices, but modern life (meaning, from 10,000 BC to now) favors those in clothes and is not built to protect the nude. Plus, if you want a snack, try going into the Circle K. No shirt, no shoes, no pants, no underwear, no socks, no service.

👀 Finally: I hope you're not planning to cook anything.

I can't think of a single reason one would want to go about naked in the outdoors beyond a maddened urge to be an exhibitionist or some deep-seated rebellion against clothes as a form of oppression. If the latter, well, boys, cutting off your nose to spite your face is bad enough. Imagine what else might get cut off. Mind the closing doors!

P.S.: Curiously, I note that tomorrow is said to be National Hot Dog Day. I trust this is just a strange coincidence.

Tequila hombre Fred.

So today is Cinco de Mayo, the celebration of the anniversary of Mexico's victory over France in 1862. I think that's not a bad cause for celebration. After all, France helped us in the Revolution but has been a pain in our boutoques ever since. 

As John J. Miller and Mark Molesky pointed out in their book, Our Oldest Enemy: A History of America's Disastrous Relationship with France, the French were among our enemies even in World War II. "By rejecting the advice of Woodrow Wilson and insisting on crippling and humiliating reparations, France fatally undermined the fledgling German democracy and planted many of the seeds of the Second World War -- a conflict for which the French required another American rescue. Before that liberation could occur, however, American troops landing in North Africa in 1942 encountered stiff resistance from the soldiers of Vichy France. The GIs literally had to fight their way through the French to get to the Nazis."

So yay, Mexico.

My bandoliers are on back order.

When St. Patrick's Day falls, Americans think of Ireland, Irish food, and alcohol, and not in that order. When Cinco de Mayo comes around, we think about Mexico, Mexican food, and alcohol, and definitely not in that order. It's the American way. We haven't started getting drunk over Latvian Independence Day yet (November 18), but give it time.

Well, we can't get blasted on Corona this year, I guess, since the Chinese corona death virus has caused the parent company to suspend Corona brewing for now. There's always Dos Equis, Tecate, and others, and does it really matter? Tacos go down with everything.

Of course, you can cut to the chase and drink tequila. And since we're all quarantined, you can guzzle it from the bottle in your own home. Olé! If anyone gets mad because of your poor behavior, point out loudly that A) You're home, sho yer not drinkin an drivin, and B) Your only crime ish cultural appropriation, sho go to the college and get a divershity cop, Karen, and 3) Shuddup already.

Like many of us, I first encountered tequila with the lime and salt paraphernalia because someone I was drinking with decided it was time we got manly and took the express train to Hammerville. And it worked! Several shots and more beer later, I had not only arrived, I had shot past the station into Woozytown and was deposited at last in Bedspin City. "Teh Kill Ya" had a reputation for being the one drink to have when you wanted to nuke the evening, but it really was unfair. We just never did shots of gin or vodka or whiskey at the bar, any one of which would have been as deadly.

Years later I was on a press trip, a freebie granted by work in exchange for writing a 1,000-word travel article. The magazine would get invites for these all the time, and the chief would reward someone who did good work with a chance for a free-ish vacation for one. I was the lucky choice. A bunch of reporters, some of us drinking like idiots, were catered to for several days by the local travel industry. I remember one night we were treated to a dinner cruise on a local river, and on a whim I ordered a tequila on the rocks. The interns working for the travel hosts were muy impressed that someone would sip tequila; they'd only ever seen people horking it down to get their drink on fast. I'd never seen anyone drink tequila on the rocks either, actually. And it made a nice drink. But it's the only time I ever drank it that way.

So that's my story of tequila, into which you can fold any mezcal references you want because they are included as they all tasted the same to me. I never ate the worm. I've been told the worm's hallucinogenic property was kind of a myth anyway, but your experience may have been different.

Fred's Book Club: Kahn!

Welcome once again to our Wednesday book club, the Humpback Writers club, where we pull out a book I've read and discuss it (no actual humps required). I am not expecting anyone to read these books, which are not always recommended, although today's is. 

Since it's that time of year for America's pastime to shine, which is of course Rooting for the Yankees to Fail (YOU STUPID TWINS! DOWN TWINKLES ON YOU!), I thought we might look at a classic by beloved baseball writer Roger Kahn.

The first book that anyone reads by Roger Kahn, of course, is The Boys of Summer, his brilliant 1972 history of the 1955 World Series-winning Brooklyn Dodgers. Except me. I read that book later, but the first book of his I read was about another important team: The Utica Blue Sox.

Good Enough to Dream (first published 1985) is about the year that Kahn bought the Class A franchise in Utica, New York, a team in the still-extant New York-Penn League that was unaffiliated with a Major League Baseball farm system. Because of that, the Blue Sox were made up of career minor leaguers and rookies who were not really considered prospects (the image of minor league teams being stocked with washed-up old-timers was long out of date by the early eighties). As Kahn details in his story, minor league ownership, especially at such a low level, is a labor of love. No one is getting rich but lots of guys lose money, and all of them have to work and promote hard. Not being affiliated with an MLB team had the advantage that none of the players would be called up during the short (June to September) season, but the disadvantage that there was no support from a wealthy club, no rehabbing big leaguers to draw fans. And there were horror stories about independent teams that ran out of money and forfeited games because they couldn't buy baseballs, or took the team on a road trip and had no money for food, all of which Kahn admits probably should have scared him off: "According to people in baseball organizations, running an independent team was moving into a neighborhood beyond redemption."

And speaking of which, Kahn came to own the club this way: a violent mugging in Fun City, a.k.a. New York. Following this, Kahn was in pain and for a long stretch unable to sit and use his typewriter. During his convalescence he was talking with some colleagues about what he could do, and the idea arose that, the Dodgers not being for sale (or in Brooklyn anymore), he might consider buying a minor league team if the financing could be secured.

After many, many false starts, they wound up with the unaffiliated team in Utica: "They had not become independent on ideological and practical grounds, like the thirteen colonies two hundred years before. They were independent because no major league organization wanted to claim them. Even the Falkland Islands were being claimed. Nobody wanted the Utica Blue Sox." But ultimately, Kahn did.

The title of the book comes from the woman who was the team's general manager for the club in 1983.

"We'll have everything fixed up in a few days," Joanne Gerace promised. "It'll look real nice."
     So this was my ball park. After all the joyous times at Ebbetts Field and Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium, I was assigning myself to work in an elephant graveyard.
     "A little paint and some weeding," Joanne continued.
     She stopped. "Bad, isn't it?"
     I attempted to cheer myself by closing my thoughts to the drying mud and shaggy weeds. I imagined athletes performing on this wasteland.
     "These fellows I hear are coming back," I said. "Hendershot, Jacoby. Moretti. Coyle. Are they really major league prospects? How good are they?"
     Joanne stood on her high heels in the infield and thought for a while. Then she said, "They're good enough to dream."

One of the many memorable moments in the book comes early on, when Gattis, the grumpy manager -- thirty-one-year-old drill-sergeant grumpy, not Wilford Brimley grumpy -- is trying to teach his squad the signals they intend to use. The system of signs is baffling to the crew, as the signs are situational and the same sign might mean something different depending on the count. He is failing to get through to them.

"Look," he said, "these signs are pretty complicated. Maybe they're too complicated for all of us. So instead of using the ones that I've been showing, we'll just use voice signs this year. Like this."
     Gattis cupped his strong, hitter's hands about his mouth and bellowed over the heads of his players down the orange corridor of the W.P.A. clubhouse.
     "Swing!"
     "Steal!"
     "Take!"
     "Bunt!"
     "Did everybody get those okay?" this fierce manager asked mildly. 

There are times in business meetings where I wanted to pull a Gattis.

Late in the book, when the club is a serious contender for the league title, Kahn breaks down the situation the way only a veteran of it could:

The fans imagined the Blue Sox as a gallant band of brothers, everyone supporting everybody else, smiling and heroic in the shared bounty of the glory.... The reality of the Blue Sox, as pressure increased and the season waned, when any mistake could be our undoing, when rival egos clashed with clangor and shouts, when everyone felt that his manhood lay on the line with each night's game, when the terror of a misplay loomed as large as hope of victory, was too much to explain to civilians, even if they had wanted to hear it, which they did not. 

The book is full of interesting incidents, delightful to any fan of the game; it doesn't matter if you never heard of any of these guys. You also get some fun facts about the city of Utica, an hour and a half west of Albany -- and a place I've been two a couple of times, all because of this book.

Early in my so-called publishing career I worked for a man who was a huge baseball fan, and recommended Good Enough to Dream. I remember him writing the title and author's name on one of those little pieces of notepaper that he favored for leaving me instructions. I loved the book, and I somehow got some of my friends interested in making a weekend trip up to see a Blue Sox game at the very place, Murnane Field, described by Kahn. This was several years after Kahn had sold his involvement with the club. The park looked pretty good; no elephant graveyard.

The second time I went to Utica I traveled with a fellow writer. We wanted to write a story about minor league ball, and were traveling to teams in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. That time we interviewed the then-current owner of the Blue Sox, a guy named Fowler, who was helping direct cars in the parking lot when we met him. By then the Blue Sox did have an MLB affiliation, the Chicago White Sox. We asked Fowler about Kahn's ownership of the team. "He just owned it for a year," he sneered. "Got his book out of it."

We never wrote the piece, but we did drink a lot of beer.

The Blue Sox were affiliated later with the Red Sox and the Marlins and then... nothing after 2001. The NYP League franchise left Utica for good, or for as long as anything is permanent in Class A ball. But now a new Utica Blue Sox team plays at the same park in the Perfect Game Collegiate Baseball League. They've tried other names for Utica teams, but they always come back to the Blue Sox.

One little trivia note -- minor league teams used to be named for their parent club; the NY-Penn League had teams like the Oneonta Tigers and the Pittsfield Mets. Later, teams found they could sell a lot more jerseys if the teams had good, regional nicknames, regardless of the parent club. The league now has teams like the Williamsport Crosscutters and the Vermont Lake Monsters. This phenomenon seems to have occurred in the minors all over the country now, and I applaud it.

If you like baseball and can get hold of Good Enough to Dream, I think you'll enjoy it a lot. Kahn is a terrific writer, even if not a dedicated owner, and he tells the story well. I'm sure some things about owning a minor league team have changed in the last thirty-six years, but probably not the main ones -- money problems, personal squabbling, tough competitors, and dreams. That's baseball.

The Mets are the team that captured me in childhood, but thanks to Kahn's book, and the trips I made with my friends, the Utica Blue Sox will always be among the boys of summer to me.

My happy place.

Over the years I have read a lot about the benefits of meditation. Getting calm, getting centered, finding inner peace, all that crap. Sounds good, right? But it's always eluded me. 

Usually I just fall asleep. Maybe meditation only works for people who sleep well at night already. That seems unfair, since one of the supposed benefits of meditation is the ability to sleep better at night, so if I can't meditate unless I already sleep well then I really am hosed.

Then again, if it's putting me to sleep, maybe I should count it as a win after all.

One of the other big problems I've had with meditation is that annoying advice to envision someplace peaceful and calm. Like what? 

The beach? Hot sand, rip currents, sand fleas, tourists, sunburn, seagull poop. 

The forest? Ticks, wasps, hikers, ATV riders, bears.

The lake? Chiggers, Jet-Skiers, giardia, more sunburn, more ticks. 

The mountain? Snow, ice, wind, falls, avalanches, bears. 

Let's face it, nature is a terrible place to find peace. Something is always trying to eat you. Have a look at the friendly neighborhood rabbit in your backyard. How relaxed does he look?

How about someplace in civilization? The library, the park, the church? No -- they have people. You can't meditate around them.

Okay, so my happy place is my home?

No, because if I'm home I should be working, or cleaning, or fixing something, or paying the bills, or doing the dishes or the laundry, or tending to the dogs, or blah blah blah wah wah wah.

Then it struck me. Finally, I knew my happy place, the place I could envision to find an atmosphere of peace.

A nice, clean hotel room.

Hotel rooms, when they're in buildings that are built soundly and are bug-free and clean, are some of my favorite places on earth. Since my career has not required a lot of travel, I associate them with vacation, not work. They are the cool, comfortable place after a day on the Interstate.

I'm not looking to do anything in the room, neither naughty nor nice. I just want to be there. To enjoy the A/C, the free ice, knowing that if I need anything it's a phone call away. The bathroom is clean and I didn't have to clean it. The bed is made and I didn't have to make it. No animals, no kids, no bosses, no neighbors I'm sick of, nobody. Sturdy walls to keep out the noises of others. Chain and bolt and "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door. TV in the sole control of moi. Comfy chair to read in. Quiet, no responsibility, nothing that needs to be done, nothing to try to attack or crap on me.

Keep your mountaintop vista, your rolling surf, your cool glade. If I want to picture a place of solitude and peace, I'm going to imagine a well-kept hotel in a small town with cool air and quiet hallways. Ommm....

Die!

I'm thinking of opening my own casino. I think it's a pretty good investment. I'm a little short on cash for the actual building, but I have the prototype dice:

Ha ha! No, of course this is not a prototype for my hotel casino project. Rather, it is a six-sided die (only a dork would feel obliged to point out the number of sides) that a relative got for me as a kind of "Someone Went to Vegas and All I Got Was This Lousy Souvenir" type gift. And I love it. You just don't find a lot of Fred merch among the name souvenirs.

I find gambling to be fun, but I'm too cheap to do it seriously. It's about the only vice that doesn't grab me. I keep thinking of exactly how hard I had to work for that C-note that just went flying into the croupier's drawer.

But owning a casino is another matter. Somebody's got to make money from all that gambling, and that's the house. Slot machines particularly line the house's pockets. Why not mine?

I might feel a little bad about it. I've seen real dedicated gamblers in action, and when they're in the zone, winning or losing, they are on Planet Gamble. Old ladies playing six machines at once would probably have to be pulled bodily from the chair in the event of a fire. I wouldn't want to be the fireman who had to try it. So maybe I'm too softhearted for that kind of thing.

Well, I don't have a good name for it anyway. "Fred's" might be okay for a barbecue joint but not for a classy casino. If I were to open it in Vegas, I'd have to find a gimmick. Maybe all Googie stuff; turn the page to the New Frontier era and keep it there. Space-agey but still Rat Pack friendly. Maybe we could call it Planet Gamble.

Hey, I'm starting to like the idea after all! Anybody got a spare half billion?

Let's fly, let's fly away.

Mars needs baggage check.

Oreo for the road.

As you all know, I often have to take Nasbico to task for their weird and unusual ideas of what to do with their classic Oreo cookie, America's best-selling cookie. Really, many of these Oreo variations were so disappointing that they may have led to the return of Hydrox.

This summer, however, I thought Nabisco got it right with the limited edition Rocky Road Trip Oreo.

My wife disagreed, but let me tell you, I think this cookie's pretty good. Doesn't have much to do with Rocky Road ice cream, except for the marshmallow, but who cares? It's an Oreo cookie with chocolate filling that has crunchy marshmallow bits in the filling -- and in the cookie itself. I know, right? The marshmallows are of course not of the Campfire or Jet-Puffed variety, but rather more like the marshmallows from Lucky Charms. And we're always after those Lucky Charms.

It got me thinking about Rocky Road, meaning the ice cream. I've never been a big fan; I like flavors of ice cream more than ice cream with lots of chunky stuff in it. Rocky Road has chocolate and marshmallow and nuts, usually almonds (unlike the Oreo version, which has no nuts). The history of Rocky Road is itself interesting, and as usual our friends at Mental Floss are on it. Apparently still-extant two ice cream manufacturers, Edy's/Dreyer's and Fentons Creamery, claim credit for inventing the popular variety. Or maybe it was some guys in Kansas. It's a mystery. Good thing that all of Ben & Jerry's stupid flavors are documented.

As are Oreos. Rocky Road Trip is obviously a vacation-season variety, and I gather it will gone soon. Summer's semi-officially on the wane; although we have almost another month to go, kids in New York know they're finished. They'll be waiting for the school bus next week. I know other kids in other parts of the country have already started classes, but in New York, or at least the southern part of the state, we stick to the no-school-in-August (except for dumdums and college students) rule that was in place when I was a child. No kid today knows why Jerry Lewis = Doomsday, but if you're in my age group you do. Labor Day weekend was the last gasp of summer, and even if summer sucked, even if you wanted to see your school friends again and break out all your new school supplies, even if you were bored stupid, summer was still better than school.

If you fall into the no-school-yet category, get a pack of Rocky Road Trip Oreos and cram a few in your mouth. It's a vacation cookie. It'll make you feel like you're in the back of a Winnebago, cruising along without a care in the world.

Or maybe not. But it's a nice thought, isn't it?