Mr. & Mrs. Taco 12-Pack

I wonder what took so long?  

In a city where you can commit matrimony officiated by none other than The King in a drive-through chapel, why wouldn't you want to give serious consideration to tying the knot at Taco Bell's 24-hour Las Vegas strip Cantina?  Heck, you could even book it for Taco Tuesday and look outrageously sophisticated.

It all starts this summer for taco loving couples ready for some serious re-fried romance.  

Taco Bell's more than reasonable $600 wedding package includes Taco Bell champagne flutes (Who knew?), "Just Married" t-shirts, a Taco Bell bow tie and garter, a Cinnabon Delights wedding cake and a wedding bouquet for the bride made entirely of hot sauce packets.  Also included in the hitching piñata is a full blown ceremony presided over by any officiant you care to ordain.  (In Vegas this can be accomplished in as little as four hours.  For example: I, Reverand Ken, am ordained at the Bookie Buster Discount House of Worship & Lingerie.)

To kick off this new promotion Taco Bell is sponsoring a contest for couples that requires them to share a photo or 30-second video explaining how Taco Bell played a part in their big romance.  Add the hashtag #LoveAndTacosContest and fans will vote on their favorite stories; then beginning March 1st judges will choose the winning couple.  The winners will receive an all expense paid trip to...LAS VEGAS! including a honeymoon suite at a local hotel and an order of chalupas with a side of "oh baby, do that to me one more time."

Thinking outside the bun!

On the surface this seems like a fairly well thought out promotional vehicle for Taco Bell.  Most guys, if given the chance, would gladly trade a traditional wedding wingding for a $600 blowout at Taco Bell, however, I do see one big problem.  How do you get the potential bride drunk enough to make this seem like her dream wedding?  Remember she has been watching movies like Tammy & and the Bachelor, Father of the Bride, and Sleepless in Seattle since she was a little girl.  Good luck peddling hot sauce bouquets and Taco Bell garter belts to well, uh...just about any female you know.  

Maybe the executives at the Bell need to give this a little more think time.  Perhaps adding a jumbo order of re-fried beans for those traditional wedding night Dutch ovens?  

Yeah, maybe that's a guy thing.

Never mind.

Maybe if you got the Colonel to officiate?

Let The Bidding Begin!

Some people really know how to spend a hundred grand.  

Consider the discretionary budget available to the clown who just forked over $100,000 for a Cheeto that supposedly bears an uncanny resemblance to that big fat gorilla, Harambe, from the Cincinnati Zoo.  This was the gorilla who was shot by his handlers after he threatened a small boy who had gotten into his enclosure.  The kid was stupid and his parents inattentive but Harambe paid the price and became a bit of a legend, enough so to inspire an eBay seller to solicit bids on his  Flamin' Hot Cheeto doppelganger.  The bidding began at $11.99 and ended several hours later when P.T. Barnum's "a sucker born every minute" maxim or the right amount of alcohol kicked in and produced the $99,900 winning bid.

I guess I see the resemblance but, now what?  Surely you don't eat your new prized possession?  Do you shellac it?  Mount it on the wall?  Put it in the safe for positive proof you were not of sound mind when the kids go to probate what's left of your estate?

I thought about all of this for quite some time and have concluded that it is more than a little crazy to attempt to divine what makes a person with some spare cheese spend it on something like this.  No, it's time to forget all that and get busy finding something just as stupid to sell to the obviously growing horde of folks with more money than brains. 

A quick trip to the pantry and I struck gold!

Right there in that big Costco bag of Maui Onion potato chips was a little dandy that, I think you'll agree, is the spitting image of the late Franklin Delano Roosevelt. 

Simply check out the comparison of the chip with a 1945 photo of Roosevelt and Winston Churchill joy riding in a vehicle captured from Hitler's motor pool.  Uncanny!

I'm opening the bidding at $11.99.  This is a one of a kind treasure.  Operators are standing by. 

FDR...don't you see it??

FDR takes Winston for a spin in the Fuhrer Mobile, 1945.

If It Were Up to Me...

I just spent the past couple of days going through the dreaded cell phone update we all seem destined to endure every couple of years.  I hate the damn things but get shamed into upgrading my "cellular experience" more often than I'd like simply to ward off the laughter of younger far more tech savvy friends and neighbors.  Also, my wife likes to get new phones.

When did all this technology sneak up on us?  Wasn't it just last week that we were all carrying dimes just in case we had the overwhelming desire to call somebody while we were away from home?  Now it's almost a universal requirement that we carry these modern day slave bracelets at all times.  No longer are we allowed to go outside or to seek sanctuary in our cars when we simply want to be left alone.  These days, with the exception of a brave few, we are all "reachable" any time of the day or night whether we like it or not.  Some folks actually seem to enjoy this electronic intrusion and revel in never having to take a few moments to consider the windmills of their mind.  I just wish they didn't feel compelled to make the rest of us privy to every unbidden and completely uninteresting thought that rattles through their head.

"Hey, what ya doin'?  Me?  At the grocery store lookin' for some Campbell's cream of chicken."

How many idiotic geographical grocery related conversations are we compelled to unwillingly participate in before we start packing heat?  There seems to be no end to this nonsense.  Next time you're at the airport check out the number of waiting passengers killing time blabbing incessantly and boringly on their phones instead of reading a book.  Or, count the number of calls from people you know who are in their cars  and, instead of turning on the radio or merely THINKING quietly, decide to call your number hoping for some pretty swell and entertaining repartee'.  Granted radio is mostly a suck fest since the industry ran off yours truly and most of my reprobate buddies, but COME ON!  (No offense anyone who has  called me recently.)

So, now, I have a new cell phone.  The old one only had two years on it but was already, according to the millennial maiden who waited on me, an antique.  It has taken me two days just to make everything right and it'll take approximately another two years for me to feel comfortable with the new slave bracelet unless, of course, this one starts to make me look too fat or  too old.  Maybe it's time to just get one of those geezer phones.  What is it?  The Jitterbug?
Better yet, how about I just get a big sack of dimes.

Now, if I can just find one of these.