Rachael Ray Does What?

OK. I like Rachael Ray just as much as the next person. She's talented, bubbly, has a nice sense of humor, makes some pretty tasty dishes in 30 minutes, and likes dogs. She even cooks for dogs -- especially her Pit Bull, Isaboo. As a matter of fact, it was because of my friend, Bob, The Boy Bloginator, who himself is a blogging Pit Bull and has a dreadful crush on Isaboo, that I was even Dogpiling Rachael Ray to begin with. Actually, to be honest, I was Dogpiling Isaboo so I could find a nice picture of her to send to my buddy Bob so he could have a pin-up Pit of his very own. But while I was Dogpiling Isaboo, I naturally came across the home page of Rachael Ray. On it, there's a nice shot of Rachael and her dog, Isaboo. I can understand Bob's attraction to Isaboo. She IS very pretty, in a Pit Bull kind of way.

Anyway, out of curiosity I started to scroll through the pictures of Rachael to see if I could find any special photos of Isaboo so I could surprise my buddy Bob with one. What I discovered just about sent me to the floor. Seriously, who had the brilliant idea to pose Rachael (or 'Rach' as she's called) in these ludicrious pictures: "Rach gets comfortable on the couch," "Rach drinks lemonade," "Rach [in a little black dress] cooks on the grill," "Rach gives a big smile," "Rach chops apples," "Rach and John singing." Oh, and one of my favs? "Rach sets the table for Thanksgiving." Thank you, Rach, for the cleavage. Turkey? What turkey?

Honestly, who thinks up these things? What pimply-faced pubescent mindless marketing midget came up with the idea to pose her in all these ridiculous positions, and what possessed her to agree? Certainly by now she has enough money to refuse such stupidity. And she certainly has enough brains. Does Food Network own her like Nike owns Tiger Woods? (That little logo of theirs must be tattooed on everything he owns. Can he even get that hat off anymore or did they stitch it to his head?)

I just couldn't believe it. They work her to death (how many shows is she on?) and then give her a bigger photo spread than a Playboy Bunny. Hell, maybe that'll be next. Let's hope not. She's pretty wholesome and I'd like to see her stay that way. At least, stay away from that wrinkled up old fart Hugh Hefner. Is he still alive or is he stuffed? If he's stuffed, Playboy needs its money back. The taxidermist did a lousy job.

OK, never mind Hefner. So, after scrolling through about 20 pictures, looking, hoping, for an end to the "Rach does..." I gave up after I came across "Rach has breakfast in bed." Honestly, it's not the pictures that bother me so much. She is very photogenic. It's the titles that irritate me: "Rach smiles outside," "Rach gives a big smile," "Rach Plays with Dogs on a Truck." They read like Dick and Jane. Is it just me or does this fatuous rot really appeal to people? OK, I know. This is a rhetorical question. After all, we're the country who actually had people vote for Sarah Palin. The Dick and Jane population of the planet. Enough said.

And I still didn't find a pin-up picture of Isaboo for my friend Bob. Sorry, Bob.

The Turducken-ification of Thanksgiving

Have you noticed that Thanksgiving, as a separate and unique holiday, has all but disappeared from the airways and stores? Sure, there are still ads featuring stuffed turkeys and stuffed relatives (this is probably redundant), and the stores are busting with birds, but the whole concept of Thanksgiving itself seems to have been wiped off the commercial map. I can't believe I'm actually complaining about this, since every holiday seems to be nothing more than a string of commercials. But I think what I find most irritating is the fact that a whole group of holidays has been crammed into one another, like a turducken -- you know, that macabre act of jamming a chicken into a duck and then stuffing the whole fowl mess into a turkey. Only a rabid carnivore could come up with such a freakish concept. Does anybody actually eat those things? What do you cut into them with, a band saw?

Anyway, I think that's what's become of Thanksgiving. It's the duck between the chicken of Halloween and the turkey that is Christmas. I'm not yet sure where Hanukkah and Kwanzaa fit into all of this. Maybe they're the extended version of Turducken, the Rôti Sans Pareil, or "roast without equal," from 19th century France, in which 17 birds were nested within one another. Nor have I figured out where New Year's fits -- maybe it's just the cheap champagne we swill to deaden the absurdity of it all. But I miss those Thanksgiving ads and their idealistic notions of Pilgrims (with the emphasis on grim) sitting peacefully with Indians, breaking bread rather than treaties. You know, the Norman Rockwell ideal of family and "freedom from want."

I guess we can thank Walmart for starting this screwing-up of the holidays. After all, the minute Labor Day is over out come the cheap Halloween costumes, gaudy autumn decorations, chintzy tinsel, and plastic evergreens. It's all like one big cauldron of crap, from the minute you walk in the store. Well, granted -- it's that way all the time, but around this time of year it's especially egregious. Bathing suits hanging next to faux-fur coats is amusing -- maybe even convenient if you belong to a Polar Bear club. But there's just something wrong about aluminum Christmas trees appearing along side candy corn and cornucopias.

There's a bit of irony to be found in our modern Thanksgiving. Take the research done by Robyn Gioia. According to Gioia, a fifth-grade teacher at the Bolles School in Ponte Vedra, the original thanksgiving festival was started, not by the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock but by a Spanish explorer, Pedro Menendez de Aviles, who landed at what is now Saint Augustine, Florida on September 8, 1565, and celebrated a feast of thanksgiving with Timucua Indians. They apparently dined on bean soup. Woo hoo! Hey, that's over 50 years before the Pilgrims sat down with their Indians. Guess the Pilgrims had better PR. We know the Indians didn't.

Then too, Thanksgiving is a harvest festival. But when you think of factory farmed turkeys, genetically modified sweet potatoes, and preservative-laden stuffing, there's not much to be festive about. Yummy! Pass the carcinogens, please.

My point isn't to depress you or put you off your turkey dinner. It's simply to draw attention to the fact that Thanksgiving, which, along with pumping us up for a season of 'spend like it's 1999,' and is ideally supposed to herald a season of thankfulness and good will, has been pretty much appropriated by the collective Holiday and rendered insignificant. We jump right out of our made-in-China flameproof costumes (OK, if they're made in China they're likely not flameproof) and into our ho ho holy days of rampant capitalism with neither a thought nor a breath to give thanks for whatever we have.

Even though Thanksgiving is based on an improbable myth of indigenous cooperation and invader benevolence, it's still nice to imagine there was one instance in our history of belligerence in which people actually sat down and got along with one another. Then again, if modern Thanksgiving gatherings are any indication, it's all PR.

Live Bait Becomes Brain Bait

(Not to be confused with Mourning Becomes Electra.) I had originally intended this blog to be called "Live Bait" inspired by the picture you see here. When I discovered that name had been taken, I decided on "Brain Flakes," as that's what my wife calls the dander she stirs up when she scratches the dogs' heads. Well, that blog name was taken too. So, after showering myself with my own brain flakes, an idea emerged: Brain Bait. I liked it. And so, here it is. I have no idea what, if anything, it will turn into. But if it's anything like the machine pictured here, it should be at least mildly amusing if not thought provoking.

What is "Live Bait" anyway? Well, in this case it seems to be a vending machine that dispenses an assortment of (presumably) live critters, fresh for fishing. There are, I think, a few interesting things to wonder about such a machine. One: What kinds of bait are in this machine that could live for extended periods of time -- at least long enough not to be repugnant to fish? After all -- consider the half-life of most stuff in vending machines. If there is any correlation between this vending machine and the average, we're looking at a potential Superfund Site. (After further research I discovered there are a multitude of things that live in these machines: live minnows, night crawlers, wax worms (beats me), leeches, maggots (no surprise there) and even crickets.) Two: What mastermind thinks up such things? (Turns out it was some guy in Pennsylvania who converted an old sandwich machine. Humm. Wanna bet the maggots were already there?) Anyway, aren't there enough small children in circulation, armed with spoons and trowels and nets to scare up these small perfect-for-fishing critters? Certainly there were in my day. So, do we really need such machines? (Apparently so. According to the article I read, there are over 1,000 machines scattered across the U.S. And here's one of them, in my very own little home town. What are the odds?) Three: What kind of brave soul stocks such a machine -- in this case, at least, a machine that sits directly in the sun for most of the day. What happens if the electricity dies? Well, we know what happens, really. But does the machine then become deserted because no one is courageous enough to open it up, clean out the dead bodies, and restock? Does the EPA descend, don their orange suits, take a fork lift, and scoop it into the near-by creek? (More on that creek in another post.) And four: Why is this machine right outside the only grocery store in town? Is this a bizarre local cultural statement -- the better food to be found in town is outside the grocery store in this vending machine?

OK. Granted, the creek I mentioned is only a few hundred feet away from the store and the vending machine, but honestly, even now no one in his right mind would sink a night crawler into that water much less eat anything he'd fished out of it. Really. Not too many years ago, the fumes alone ate the paint off buildings. On hot summer days the smell was so bad it could bring tears to your eyes -- from miles away. After decades of abuse from the local glue plant and tannery, the creek used to run like gray sludge. Most likely even now a minnow or wax worm cast into the creek would merely land on the surface with an undignified plop, there to slowly dissolve.

I'm still pondering the symbolic significance of this machine's constant presence at the grocery store. Any thoughts?