IHOP Layers It On For America...

Who says we don't make things in America anymore?


Not me!


I know better. We make BLUBBER and plenty of it!





So what if the Germans and the Japanese make better cars; the Koreans better TVs, the Swiss far superior chocolate and the Danes the best porn? Here in the good ol' USofA we make gut busting deliciousness that has cinched us the heavyweight championship belt in corpulence. (So what if we can't get it around our waist? Pass the pudding please.)




No, just when I was bursting with pride...okay, my pants were bursting with a new layer of "fun fat" provided by the Colonel's new and scrumptious Double Down sandwich treat of fried chicken, bacon and cheese, A NEW ARTERY CLOGGING FOODGASM HAS ARRIVED!




Say "Hello" and "welcome to the family" to the brand new IHOP Pancake Stackers!
Where else but America could some evil gastronomic genius dream up a 1250 calorie slice of heaven that consists of a crustless cheesecake filling surrounded by two buttermilk pancakes topped with a strawberry, blueberry or cinnamon apple compote and whipped cream ??? (Of course you can boost the caloric ante with some eggs, hash browns and a choice of bacon, pork sausage links and ham if you're feeling patriotic.)

And talk about endorsements..."It's yet again another dietary disaster brought to you by fast food," said Susan Levin, a dietitian for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, which was also critical of the Double Down. (It's this reporter's opinion that a couple of large cocktails and an evening at IHOP might calm down this skinny shrew.)

Carolyn O'Keefe, the IHOP senior vice president of marketing offered, "It's and opportunity to give our guests another reason to come into IHOP." (My kind of executive.) She made no mention of the new "wide load" seating being installed at several locations.

Ms. O'Keefe went on to say that "Everyone has a special mouth-watering dessert that hits their comfort sweet-spot."

Pictured here after only one week of having an All American dessert for breakfast experience is Hollywood's Tom Cruise. Now be honest, doesn't he look a lot more adorably American with some meat on his bones?





Looking especially hot are Mary Kate and Ashley Olson after ONLY ONE Pancake Stacker breakfast at IHOP. They should look like they hail from Dimpled Thighs, Nebraska by early Summer!

"It's skank-o-licious!!!"

Now, if you'll exuse me, I seem to have spilled some syrup down my keyboard makkkkkkkkkkkkkkkinnnnggggggggggggggg it veeeeeeeeeeeery hhhhhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrdddddd to yummmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

And, YES, I would like a Diet Coke with that.

GRANDPA HAS...

Well, NOTHING.
That's why I'm going to take charge of the blog today.
I'm Daniel Danger Diepholz (rhymes with peoples). Most of grandpa's degenerate friends call me Triple D or 3-D and I'm down with that, though I prefer Dan Dan the Danger Man or Danger Dan the Dancin' Man. The latter handle seems to test well with the chicks at my play group; so we'll see.

Grandpa and grandma tend to be too tired to do much of anything after I spend the day with them. I don't expect that to improve anytime soon since I'm now six months old and starting to eat solid food. (Grandpa can barely handle changing my diapers now, just wait until he gets a load of my newly spectacular real food...uh....loads.)

My take on the state of the nation six months in? Glad you asked!
First of all, thanks a heap for running up the national debt and sticking me and my little pals with the check. How stupid do you think we are??!!! You dumb bastards keep falling for politicians who promise you FREE everything even though they don't have so much as a Chicago Roll in the U.S. treasury. I know you think you are "sticking it to the man", but I AM THE MAN and I'll tell you right now when the check comes I will be in the men's room. Suck on that for a while!


Regarding other matters...
Can anybody hook me up with some audio books or something? I don't yet know how to read and frankly am suspicious of some of the stories grandpa is telling me. Was he really president of the state of Iowa? Do they even have a president? Also, is there any truth to the rumor regarding his invention of the thong and brassiere? It's hard to imagine that this gasbag actually made a living telling whoppers on the radio for nearly forty years. By the way, what the hell is radio?


Here is a picture of me, 3-D, getting a relaxing bath administered by two blond ladies. Grandpa says I should enjoy this while it lasts because in a few years getting two blonds to give you a bath will get pretty expensive. FUN, but EXPENSIVE.

Well, thanks for dropping by but I really should be crawling along. It's almost time for me to ride grandpa like a horsey. (I'll break the old hay burner yet!)

Oops..... Do you smell something? Maybe it's time to check my diaper. Or, has grandpa started to get that old guy smell? What is it?? Ode de Larry King or something?

Whatever you do...never pull their finger.

The /Colonel Does it AGAIN!

This is a picture of KFC's all new Double Down.

It is two hunks of fried chicken with bacon and cheese in the middle.

GENIUS!

A caloric dream come true.

I can't wait until my grandson, Dan, is old enough for a solid piece of American gut busting excess like the Colonel's Double Down. Do you think he'll be ready once he hits seven months?

Oh hell, I'm heading out for one, maybe two, right now. I can blog later.

The Weight Watchers' meeting will be breaking up soon and we all know that those porkers will be all over this like drag queens at a wig sale.

Later!

"All Mobbed Up"

When I saw that Tommy James had written a book called, "Me, the Mob, and the Music", I knew I was going to have to read it.

Tommy, for those of you who didn't come of age in the 60's or 70's, was a hit maker extraordinaire. He and the Shondells charted a slew of number one records like, "Mony Mony", "I Think We're Alone Now", "Crimson and Clover", Crystal Blue Persuasion" and the one that started it all---"Hanky Panky". From the obscurity of Niles, Michigan to the rock n' roll bigtime this is the story of Tommy's show business education. It ain't pretty.

For years the radio and record industry was full of shady characters and even shadier deals. Lots of records that weren't so great became hits because record labels provided ""consideration" to program directors and disc jockeys for airplay. The guys who ran the record companies had legions of promotion people who were paid to make sure that the artists under contract to the label got plenty of exposure on pop music stations in all the key markets. Whatever it took...cash, booze, babes, dope, there was no shortage if it got the records on the air. There was a ton of money in rock n' roll and often times the artists were last in line when it was passed out.

In 1966 a Pittsburgh DJ started playing "Hanky Panky" by Tommy James and the Shondells and got a tremendous response. Tommy had recorded it a couple of years before when he and the Shondells were just a regional band in Southern Michigan and the song had died as a minor regional hit. The Pittsburgh resurrection changed all of that. Soon Tommy found himself in the offices of Morris Levy the president of Roulette records in New York City and that's where his music business tutorial began.

Morris Levy

In a sleazy industry Roulette records and Morris Levy stood out. Morris was a tough guy from the Bronx and he was in business with the mob. Guys like "Vinnie the Chin" Gigante, Gaetano "Corky" Vastola, Tommy Eboli, Dominick "Quiet Dom" Cirillo, and Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno all of the Genovese crime family were his partners and friends. This was not a great situation for a nice boy from the Midwest. Naturally, Tommy signed with Roulette. The book is the story of the wild ride that followed.

If you grew up thinking that the hits you listened to on Top 40 radio got there because they were legitimate hits, this book should open your eyes. If you worked in the radio and record industry, you'll find yourself saying...."Hey, I know that guy!"

"Vinnie the Chin" says, "I think you'll like this book, or else!"

Spring 1946

It's mostly the longer days and the way that the shadows fall in the evening that let me know that it is Spring in this corner of the country. I remember how dramatic the transformation was in my Midwestern youth. The switch from Winter to Spring meant not only the chance to ditch heavy jackets and boots, but there was an entirely new and fecund essence to all outdoors. There was a smell and feel to the air that was as pronounced as that of a new car. Everything was fresh and nothing seemed impossible.

Baseball was back and girls in Summer dresses were mere days away.

Now, in my sixty-second year, it's hard to remember how good Spring used to be. Oh sure, I'm excited for a new year of baseball. The Padres have replaced the Tigers of my misspent youth. But, instead of days at the beach and nights at the drive-in, I now look at my "to do" list of projects for the yard and the house and it just not the same.

I was lamenting this lack of Springtime excitement as I lay awake the other night and got to thinking about my dad. It's funny how often I wonder about him these days. He has been gone for fifteen years yet is never far away. Maybe that "eternal life" so many folks are counting on consists of your ability to knock around in the noggins of family and friends. I don't know, but that logic makes more sense to me than any other.

Anyway...I began to wonder what the Spring of 1946 felt like to all the men and women of my parents generation. How magical must it have seemed to them to have survived a world war and been alive to see another Spring. Think of it! You plow through an economic depression only to be handed a catastrophic "war to end all wars" and for the better part of five long years have no idea how it is all going to end. "Will I live to see my family again?" "Will I have a family?" "Is my country going to survive?" How amazing that they persevered and came out the other side of a hell that most of us can only imagine.

No wonder most of them never talked much about how they spent 1940-45. They were just grateful to have the Spring of 1946 and all of its endless possibilities.

I think I'll start on that "to do" list of 2010 with thanks and appreciation for a generation that came before.

It's Official...Stooges Now Run The Show

One of the first things that happened to me during Army basic training in the 1960's was something called KP. Kitchen Police is the detail that had America's fighting men doing things like washing mountains of dishes, cleaning grease traps, hosing out garbage cans and helping mess sergeants prepare fabulous Army fare like mush and SOS. KP was abandoned when the military decided to go with civilian contractors for meal preparation and dispersal sometime in the 1970's. (Civilian contractors...what a concept!!)

I've been thinking a lot lately about my time in the service and the three or four times I had KP and it's not just because I still have dishpan hands.

No, KP remains etched in acid on my frontal lobe for one particular reason. My first day of KP taught me the most important fact a person can come to know about large organizations (see government) and their ability to run things. They can't! I arrived at this ultimate truism after spending an entire day pitching perfectly good roasts, hams and turkeys into a couple of massive dumpsters parked outside our company mess hall. There was nothing wrong with these items save the fact that they were "over supply" and it was a court marshall offense for a mess sergeant to be caught with any kind of supply "overage" at the end of the fiscal year. It ALL had to go. "No", we were told, it couldn't be given to a food bank or other charity. It had to "disappear"--NOW!

This was my introduction to how the government handles the details of running a big operation. They, I concluded, couldn't manage a two car funeral and in the more than forty years that have passed since my Army service I've seen nothing to change my mind. You see I HAVE dealt with the IRS and also been to the DMV.

Now we have congress handing us a big steaming pile of national health care that will make sure that every American has the proper medical attention free of charge. Well, free if you figure that you are going to be out of town when they pass the hat for the $3 trillion that its going to cost. I'm guessing that it will take a whole lot more than the "rich", as defined today, to make up the tax shortfalls that this will manifest. Get ready for higher income taxes and a national sales tax just for starters. Oh, and while you're at it, you might want to get in line for a doctor. Even if you can find one, the good ones will want cash; not some government IOU.

It is beyond my ability to understand how the same folks who hate BIG BUSINESS and BIG RELIGION are willing to trust BIG GOVERNMENT with the most important things in their lives. If you don't like big business, don't shop at WalMart. If you don't like church, watch cartoons on Sunday morning. If you don't like big government----YOU'RE SCREWED!

What the hell happened to the idea that the federal government was there to protect our borders, deliver the mail and not much else? The people who think the government has the solution for all of their problems and can fulfill all of their hopes and dreams are the same clowns who would have been eaten by bears a couple of hundred years ago.

Get ready to start filling your own teeth.

Doctors Larry, Moe and Curly are in charge now.

"Where's that change we can believe in?"

You Shouda Been Here Next Week!

"Yeah, next week everybody naked."

Suddenly I was feeling like I needed some of the wife's seasick medicine as I scoped out the amorphous blobs of aging decomposing flesh around the ship's pool.

"Whole cruise be clothing optional, oh boy!" This seagoing bulletin was being relayed via one of the "pool butlers" who were busy catering to the whims of landlubbers like us bound for the Panama Canal aboard the ship Constellation. And, as it turns out, pool butler Esteban and his compatriots were correct about it all. In fact, most of the ship's crew had been undergoing sensitivity training for the past few weeks to prepare themselves for the coming onslaught of uncovered flesh. (How does that work? "Everybody grab some of these pornos to watch this weekend.") A class on how to overcome the gag reflex would been more useful, but I digress. I began to speculate about the nudie sailing and wondered if there would be prizes. You know..."Best dimpled thighs", "most original use of cellulite", and "Sexiest dried arrangement", the mind reels at the possibilities. Since we hadn't been invited I would have to wait for news of how this one went. (Most of the crew being Muslims from Indonesia; put the odds of a High Seas jihad on Red Alert in my book.)

Linda and I teamed up with my pal of fifty years, The Skipper, and his wife Betty for our "bucket list" check off of the Panama Canal navigation. They are always good for laughs. It's a guaranteed yuk every day just to see what the Skip is wearing. He won't wear clothes with Polo ponies or alligators, but shirts and lids not seen since the days of Ralph Cramden and Ed Norton at the Raccoon Lodge in Brooklyn are consistently in the mix. (see photo)

Marching to a different drummer? The man is the leader of a musical aggregation not of this world. I've often surmised that he's the love child of Whoopee John and Patsy Cline. It is also helpful that the Skipper was actually once a real skipper of big oil tankers and has navigated the Canal on many previous occasions. All I had to do was keep the cocktails coming and the sea stories would unfold as we traversed the locks.

The Canal was amazing. I had read David McCullough's "The Path Between the Seas" several years ago and was again reminded of the massive scale of this remarkable piece of engineering. It is a wonder to behold, and America did it when no one thought it possible. You owe it to yourself to see it. It will make you proud.

After navigating the Canal Zone we made a brief stop in Costa Rica which did not disappoint. There is much beauty in that corner of Central America and the price of just about everything will remind you of the U.S. in the 1960's or 70's. Nice place.

Before sailing to San Diego, (we started in Miami), there were a couple of stops in Mexico.

Mexico always makes me sad. It is such a beautiful country with friendly people and bountiful natural resources yet is, after so many years, unable to realize anything close to its potential. The natural resources alone should make it a rich country; so why does everyone remain so poor? Some day they'll figure it out and get rid of the idiots running the country.

We made it back to San Diego after two full weeks and, as you may have guessed, took a pass on the "clothing optional" leg of the cruise that continued on to Hawaii. I wonder how many of the crew abandoned ship in Honolulu with severely damaged retinas. After eyeing the clowns boarding the ship in San Diego, I tried to imagine how many hands would make it past Point Loma?

"All passengers are invited to participate in the shuffle BROAD tournament on the aloha deck at eight PM."