Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Chains- Damn em ta hell

CHAINS - DAMN EM TA HELL
Biggest restaurant changes in last 35 years…
Sloppy dress…Unruly kids...Non smoking…Obesity...Celeb chefs…Finger food…Raw food…Fancy pizzas…$3 Bottle water…$5 coffee…and CHAINS.
Back in my long ago there were none here...then along came HoJos.
  
   Back when quarterbacks called their own plays, presidents wrote their own speeches, and ham steak with pineapple ring was on every menu, usetabe every food joint was somebody’s mom and pop. Only time you used the word “Chain” in a sentence was to describe fences, bikes and pervy sexual positions. Cruise the 2-lane main drag back in the day and you knew who was who.
Lotta joints had their own names blinkin…
Lee’s, Oliver’s, Raimondo’s, Lloyd’s, Floyd’s, Christy’s, Cluie’s, Eyerly’s, Haley’s, Larry’s, Harrell’s, Hare’s, Tony’s, Vereens, Selvey’s, Morse’s, Moody’s,
From my open car window, going sixty, I could rattle off the names of the other owners as they neon’d by. They were all legends of the summer. The pioneers who came in loaded-down sedans. The ones who created from nothing. The ones with the balls to throw all their chips in one pot. All gone to the dining room in the sky.

Charlie Kordas at Seven Seas
George Anthony at Mayflower
Tony Carnaggio at Tony’s
Capt Juel’s at The Hurricane
Louie Achilles at the Broadway
Wimpy Anderson at Aunt Maude’s,
Tony Coury at the Rip Tide
Charles Fleishman at White Heron
Chris Moshures at Excel & Mammy’s Kitchen
Warren Cromley at Rice Planter’s
Sam Diminich at Roma
Eli Saleeby at Brass Rail
Johnny Burroughs at Peaches Corner
Sammy Vereen at Wayside
John Loud at Clipper Ship
Alex Karetas at Seaside
Spero Bogache at Ocean View
Cooter Jennings at Sloppy Joes and the Bowery,
Papa Chris at Mammy’s
Chris Drosas at The Colony
Lee Letts at the Pink House
Lattie Upchurch at Outrigger
Tony Thompson at Kozy Korner


   Now, goin sixty, your eyes blur with same-ification. One chain after the other on every highway. When did unique become bad, same good? 

Monday, July 1, 2013

Health Food

Stopped by the Health Food Store today waiting for my wife to stock up on some Vitamin D3. While I waited I ogled my time away watchin unhealthy, weirdly-garbed, sandle'd people seeking the fountain of youth with Vitamins A thru Z. They were being  tumerac'd, ginger'd, fish oiled, wheatgerm'd, zinc'd, selenium'd and horse chestnut'd.

All I could think of is... just come to our restaurant and have a healthy cut of salmon, side of asparagus and a glass of heart-healthy red. Or say f-k it and have a NY Strip topped with crabmeat and béarnaise sauce and a dirty martini.

Vitamins A thru Z ain't gonna keep us from dying.