the rix mix

“Saturday night, Sarah Palin is going to drop the first puck at the Philadelphia Flyers’ hockey game. Then Palin will spend the rest of the game trying to keep the hockey players out of her daughter’s penalty box.”

Conan O'Brien, 10/08/08

Olive Garden (Darden Restaurants, Inc., also owner of Red Lobster) denies they are pulling ads from Dave Letterman's show, I don't think they can until the contract ends without losing the money they paid. & it'd be dumb. Dave's ratings went up, way up among Leno's older audience. The Late Show can easily make up the ad revenue with Viagra commercials. & as you see in the graphic, Darden stock is doing fine.

Your blogger used to patronize full-service chain restaurants, when I had girlfriends. Probably like most people we went while we were driving back from somewhere, or on impulse. They're convenient, predictable, everywhere. Avoided them on Friday & Saturday evenings, minimum hour wait for table at TGIF.

I met one girlfriend in Blimpie's. She worked there. I didn't patronize the place much, but when the mutual attraction became obvious I got very good sandwiches on my lunch breaks & frequented it more often. Later, she waited tables at a Ground Round, which had decent food & o.k. atmosphere if you went late when the children's parties were over & kids weren't flinging the free popcorn. I thought free popcorn was a bad idea, too filling. They were franchised, the owners had some menu flexibility. She received free dinner-for-two certificates from her boss, which we cashed in at the Ground Round in Toms River because it served fresh seafood, she'd have lobster or daily special fish, & I'd have crabcakes or steak, & we left huge tips & came home with doggy bags of appetizers, sometimes stuff we hadn't even ordered. We also stole cute, small ceramic coffee cups from Denny's. Oh, we were rogues. She's still remembered fondly by some older WFMU DJs for temporarily transforming me into a sociable, out-going human being.

I haven't been to an Olive Garden. Never had the opportunity. The faux Tuscany gourmand cuisine wouldn't stop me, or that it's promoted as a multi-generational family tradition, like ordering a Maruca's Tomato Pie during vacation in Seaside Park. I've been to many Pizza Huts, most of the food there is awful even by my standards, always disappointing, yet I couldn't stop myself. But then, the typical pizza you find in a Jersey downtown is wildly overrated by Sun Belt expatriates.

Labels: Grandma Palin, in the news, love, TV