Lucky Town

Lucky Town                                          2419

Wednesday, November 30, 2005-9:44 P.M. CDT

Reporting live from my non-show having, day-off napping, listless, workless, non-paycheck earning luxury suite at the Ramada Limited in Paducah, Kentucky.  Honestly, it's the nicest $41 room I've ever rented.  It's actually a suite, and it's so nice I get the feeling that folks down here in the South don't really know how much things are worth.  In Upstate New York, I'm quite confident that I would've grabbed my ankles and had my hotel key swiped up my ass, magnetic strip to the left, if I had to pay for this room on a night off.  God bless the Confederacy.  Also, I'm across the street from a Huddle House, that fine Southern Waffle House wannabe, where my lunch waitress couldn't stop commenting on the trucks going by.  I guess a three-truck convoy down here is the Southern equivalent of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.

My day couldn't have started any worse.  Some yob was knocking on my door at 9:00 in the morning, claiming to be housekeeping, but mocking me, saying they were a comedian, too.  I have a feeling it was someone from the show last night, but didn't care.  Then my cell-phone alarm started malfunctioning.  It didn't ring when I had it set, but it started ringing after I turned it off, every 5 mintes without fail.  It finally stopped, just before I succumbed to the temptation of winging it off the Tallahatchee Bridge.

I checked out of the hotel maybe 15 minutes late, and my oil light in my car came on right away.  4 quarts of Castrol full synthetic later, procured at a nearby Auto Zone, and I was back on the road, with one slight problem...my car hood would't latch.  I was able to close it, but it refused to click down.  I knew that wouldn't suffice, because at 80 miles per hour (my regular driving speed), my hood was sure to blow off the car, and I wasn't interested in launching a 40-pound metal kite and then driving hoodless like one of the Duke boys.

I found a garage, but the guy was swamped and really couldn't help me.  He pointed me out to a body shop across the road, and before I could get over there, he came running back out and helped me figure out what was wrong with my latch.  I had applied WD-40, but didn't know which component to manipulate, and a quick pry-out with a screwdriver did the trick.  I really appreciated his help, and slid him a gratuitous $5 for his assistance.  He initially refused, but I made him take the money.  It occurs to me that a five-dollar tip might hurt some Southerners feelings...Lincoln really didn't do that much for the South during his presidency.

So today was just a chill-out day to regroup.  I have some plans in the works that will drastically change my career, or at least the way I do business.  I haven't ever had any career goals except to go out and entertain, and I realize that show business is so much more than that.  I'll post more as things begin to gel.  In the meantime, I'm continuing to monitor the destruction of the Republican party here in the U.S., and I'm laughing with every new indictment.  I think there should be Republican trading cards so kids can put "Scooter" Libby and Tom DeLay in the spokes of their bicycles.

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY

P.S.  Here's a picture I though you'd enjoy...it's a collection of Rochester/Western New York comics all collected in one place...it's a good chance this group will never be in the same room as many have moved out of town, out of state, and jail (no kiddin').

Back Row: Mike Ruiz, Ray Salah, Kevin Berry and V.J. Stanley

Second Row (staggered-try to follow along): Lamar Williams, Jeremy Schachter, Matt Bergman, Steve Burr, Annette Lorenzo, Mark Wiedmann, Tiny Glover, T.L. Johnson

Front Row:  Mike "Pickle" Dambra, Yours Truly

Tiny hid behind me, making me take up pretty much 25% of the whole photo.  Dammit.

What's neat about this picture is that we're all still working and progressing, for the most part, and that's why you'll never see us all together again.

RT

Tennessee

Tennessee                                                             2408

Wednesday, November 30, 2005-12:48 A.M. CDT

Good evening from Fort Campbell in the lovely town of Clarksville, Tennessee.  After a grueling 12-hour drive (and a nice 90 minute nap), I performed at Tipper's Nightclub here in town (town being an Army base, mostly deserted because most of her troops had been deployed).  I'm working this week with Stephen Juliano Moore, who I met up in Harris, Michigan at the Chip-Ins Resort Casino many a moon ago.

The show was a total knife-fight, with much of the audience in attendance falling into the "chatty" category...these are the type of people who get shushed in a movie theater, and get all indignant about it because they don't think people should be telling them what to do.  It made me glad that I'm only featuring, and could bail at 30 minutes.

My last journal entry talked about last Friday's show in Buffalo at Witz End, which was bad, too.  I'm glad to report that Saturday I had two solid shows, because I had two solid crowds to work with.  Tonight, I worked in front of soldiers who weren't trained well enough to deploy.  What a treat.

Tomorrow is a night off, so I'm going to Paducah, Kentucky a day early to see what there is to see.  I'm really going because I'd rather stay an extra day in a Ramada Express than the fabulous Skyway Motel where I'm sleeping tonight.  It's not without it's charm, but it does conjure images of rooms which saw escaped convict's last nights on Earth.  Not for me, bro.

Today's big thrill was buying gasoline for $1.99.  I actually saw it for $1.89, but had no room in my gas tank or I would have pumped like a fool.  I need to get a gas can, but I'm resisting the temptation because I don't want to be piloting a rolling bomb down I-70 at 85 mph.

O.K., sleep now.

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY

TV Party

TV Party                                          2376

Saturday, November 26, 2005-10:56 A.M.

Good morning from snowy Buffalo, New York, where yesterday we were treated to about six to eight inches of the white stuff.  Pam and Harmony and I were coming back from our shopping trip when the snow really started to fall, and I got back to the hotel just in time to comfortably get ready for my 8:00 show at Witz End comedy club.

On the way to the club, a 4-block walk from the hotel, I came upon a guy trying to push a car out of a snow-filled parking lot.  Now, I'm wearing dress shoes, have no gloves, and I'm pretty tired from walking from the parking garage back to the hotel in unplowed snow, and then the three blocks towards the club in the unplowed snow, and I'm thinking "What Would Jesus Do?"  So I helped the guy push the other guy's car out of the snow.  We did it, through the regular pattern of rocking back and forth, and got the car dislodged in about three minutes.  I felt good, but realized that the answer to "What Would Jesus Do?" is that He'd levitate the car and cause all the snow to turn into mist.  Sometimes an answer like that just isn't practical.

So I help the guy get his friend's car dislodged, and he goes over to the car to get in, I thought.  Come to find out, he was a homeless guy and the guy in the car was paying him to push the vehicle out of the snow.  And he didn't even break me off a little taste!  I didn't realize what was happening until I noticed that the guy was walking behind me toward the club instead of enjoying a nice warm ride.  I still feel I did the right thing, but c'mon already.

At the club, we had a decent showing for the early show, but they were stiff and tentative, just like the crowd on Wednesday.  I think the holiday has a lot to do with it, because last night I decided to stay on script, and my material that is polished and usually gets the best response, still got a good response, but not anywhere near what I'm used to.  And lest you think I'm being Captain Ego about this, the material was written so that it would work all over the country, and I've gone great lengths to make sure that I could test it anywhere and everywhere.  I'm confident in my act, and that's why I felt so tragic and helpless on Wednesday...I'm just not used to doing so poorly.  Headliner Mark Anthony from Cleveland also struggled to gain the full attention of the crowd, and he's one of the better acts out there, and that validated me a little.  It was ugly all around.

So with plenty of snow falling outside, Buffalo television was running a snow advisory that warned against unnecessary travel, particularly in the downtown area.  Consequently, we had two people show up for the second show, and I knew we were going to cancel, so I told Mark that we should go up to their table and talk to them a little bit, to soften the blow.  We did, and they were very nice, and we schmucked around with them...I did a chunk of my Amish material in our conversation, and they liked it., and Mark (who didn't realize I was going into a bit) wound up giving me a couple of tags that I'm going to use.

Hopefully tonight will be better...if you have to cling to something, you can do a lot worse than hope.

Talk to ya later.

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY

Thank You

Thank You                                                               2360

Thursday, November 24, 2005-12:54 A.M. (Friday morning)

Happy Thanksgiving, all!  I'm in Buffalo, NY, home of snow, sub-zero wind chills, and Witz End Comedy Club.  My wife, Pamela and daughter, Harmony, have accompanied me on the big 65-mile trip west for Thanksgiving weekend.

Yesterday was quite possibly one of the worst days on record for me.  It started innocently enough, with a meeting at the Comix Cafe in Rochester with owner-general manager J.J. Parrone, which was innocent enough.  I book mc's for the club, so I needed to sit down with him and go over guidelines for 2006.  We got done in just under half an hour, and then it was on the road to gas up the vehicle (cheapest gas in town at BJ's wholesale club....$2.33 a gallon), off to the bank, and then head home to pack up the car.

Things went smoothly, except that my wife is a typical female, and took a good long time to get packed up and ready.  As a comic, I like to get into town a few hours early for a nap, shower and a meal.  It puts us in the mood to put forth our best performance.  My wife dragged her feet, and we didn't check into the hotel in Buffalo until 6:30.  It didn't help that I had to drop my Toyota Corolla off to the shop to be worked on (bad alignment), that was just another delay.

So the show at Witz End wasn't my strongest.  Hell, it wasn't even in the top 100 for this year.  The crowd was small for the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and we started almost 25 minutes late (not good).  There was one guy in the audience who wasn't even turned toward the stage....he was sitting on maybe a 3/4 turn, with the 1/4 considered to be looking at the stage.  I got some laughs, but it wasn't enough for me, and even though it might have been considered to be at least adequate, I immolated myself with too much self-deprecation.  I got laughs when I wanted to get them, and then would lose the audience with the very next line.  It was self-deprecation bordering on self loathing.  I think the problem is that I was trying to get out of 30 people what you would get out of 130 people.  When it's a small crowd, even if they all laugh, you still think you're bombing.  I definitely needed a nap.

I jetted early while fill-in headliner Steve Briscoe was on stage.  Normally, I would have stuck around to chat after his show, but I was tired, hungry and depressed, so I headed back to the hotel, stopping at Prima Pizza and Pasta for dinner to go.  They are a block from the hotel, and were a real lifesaver last night.  I went back for bottled water later in the evening because they were the only game in town at 3:30 in the morning.  More on that in a minute.

So I get back to the hotel and grab some sodas from the hotel vending machine, and the three of us have a nice dinner in the room.  I made the mistake of giving Harmony some of my Diet Pepsi, and the caffeine kept her up all night.  She was bouncing and shrieking and I was worried that we would be bothering other hotel guests with the noise at that late hour, despite the fact that we were on the top floor, all the way at the end of the hallway in the corner.  Later in the evening, Harmony was still up, and we decided that we should fix up a bottle for her, which usually helps her get to sleep, but no milk was to be had.  I headed down to Prima Pizza, hoping they would have some, but after I navigated the after-closing bar traffic, they informed me that they were out.  I grabbed some bottled water and headed back to the hotel, where some sort of drunken frat boy convention was going on.  There were people drinking in the lobby, drinking in the hallways, drinking in the elevator, and I think the girl at the front desk was writing a suicide note.  I told her my problem about having no milk, and she got me some from the breakfast area...not a lot, but just enough to do the trick.

When I was leaving the hotel, I took the stairs, which only went to the third floor, where the bulk of the revelry was happening.  There were hotel personnel in the halls and in the elevators, but you could tell that there was just too few of them to make a difference.  There were crushed potato chips in the hallways, empty beer cans and bottles stuffed in ashtrays, and just a general disrespect all around.  Today, I found a cigarette butt stuffed behind a display case in the elevator (this is New York...there's no smoking allowed in public areas indoors).  I didn't have to engage any of the drunks in conversation except one kid on the elevator on my way back, who asked me where I got my pizza...he was too far in the bag to be of any concern.

At the pizza place, I arrived at the front door to see a sea of people already inside and in line.  I opened the door to go in, and immediately two underdressed bitchy blonde girls started yelping at me to shut the door.  I politely told them to go fuck themselves, and the overwhelmingly male contingent in line got a good laugh.  I don't have a lot of patience for the self-centered, stupid or drunk, and when you combine all three, I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire.  I had already been awake much too far into the evening after a bad show, so these girls didn't know what kind of a buzz-saw they were walking into.

We finally got to sleep sometime before dawn, and woke up in the 2:00 P.M. region.  We got showers and packed off to Old Country Buffet for Thanksgiving dinner.  I thanked some of the employees for working on a holiday, and Toya, the girl at the register, told me that out of 416 parties who had come in today, we were the first ones to thank them.  You could tell that they worked their ass off feeding the thousands of people who came in, and a little recognition was nice.  We had a nice meal, and being the only non-vegetarian at the table, I made it my responsibility to make sure that the turkey was moist and delicious.  It was excellent, bird-flu be damned.  I had cranberry sauce and stuffing with gravy, and felt better about spending the holiday away from home.  At least I had my family with me, and that meant a whole lot.

Tomorrow, we're going to hit the mall and get Harmony's picture taken with Santa.  She's not even two years old, so I'm sure she doesn't know what that means, but years from now, it'll be a nice picture to have.  Also, I have to pick up some clothing items because I under-packed (read: I didn't do any laundry and I'm short t-shirts and underwear...I'm sorry you had to visualize that).  Luckily, Pam the Coupon Queen has some Casual Male coupons on her, so that trip's on the docket for tomorrow.  Did I tell you that I love her very much?  Well, I do....we went grocery shopping last week, and by working the sales and using coupons of various origin (printed online, newspaper-clipped and store register tape) she saved 51% of our grocery bill.  That's not too shabby, my friend.

O.K., enough gushing.  Time to let the Soduku puzzle in the Buffalo News torture me some more before getting some well-deserved shut-eye.  It's back to work, tomorrow, too.

Hope you and yours had a great holiday.  And screw the Dallas Cowboys.

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY

 

Great White Buffalo

Great White Buffalo                                        2334

Tuesday, November 22, 2005-12:26 A.M.

Greetings, all, and welcome!  Since everyone and their brother has their Christmas Decorations up, I thought I would join in the festivities early as well.  Here's a nice wreath for the door:   I hope you like it.

This past weekend, I worked at the Funny Farm Comedy Club in Gloversville, NY.  The club started out in the town of Broadalbin, in a renovated barn, and then moved to a country club, and finally to the Fireside Restaurant.

I was working with headliner Mike Irwin, whom I have known for about 12 years or more.  He was filling in for Mike Stankiewicz, a comic from Baltimore who I have known for even longer, about 15 years.  Either way, I was going to be a winner; it's always nice to work with a buddy or someone you're comfortable with.

We had one show on Friday and one show on Saturday, and the Friday show outdrew Saturday, which was unusual.  Until I found out that the local high school team, the Amsterdam Rams, were competing in the state football finals.  Apparently, quite a few people stayed home to watch the game, which was on local television.  Lucky me.

Both shows turned out to be excellent, regardless, and I left for home a happy man.  I had plenty of reasons to have a rough week; I got a late start on Friday, and really had to cook down the New York State Thruway to make it.  Then, I found out that the comic's accomodations, which I had to myself, had no phone, hence no internet service for me.  I have come to be so addicted to the internet, that I feel adrift without it.  I even got so desperate on Saturday that I drove around Amsterdam (the largest city within a 40 minute drive) looking to poach wireless internet service by parking in a hotel parking lot.  Alas, my efforts were fruitless, and I had to depend on basic cable television to while away my time.  Finally, I had a bit of a head cold working when I left the house, and with the cold weather settling in here in Upstate New York, I was hoping that I wouldn't be a candidate for sick bay by the time showtime rolled around.  Luckily, my sinuses cleared up and I stayed un-sneezy for the weekend.

On Sunday, my beautiful wife and I celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary.  Actually, we've been together for 11 years, and that's how I announce it when I mention it.  Come to think of it, I mention it every time I get on stage.  She's the best thing that ever happened to me, along with the beautiful daughter she gave me.  We had a nice quiet dinner together, and my mother-in-law was nice enough to watch Harmony so we could enjoy ourselves.  Our waiter, Chris, was very attentive and quite the flatterer.  At one point, he told me I looked like George Clooney.  Now, I don't know if I agree with that comparison, so let's see if it's a fair one or not.

Here's George Clooney:     And here's me.

I can see how someone could get us confused.  Dark hair, slightly greying at the temples, an air of sophistication, and of course, the rugged good looks that the ladies all die for.  Yeah, that's me, alright.

Except for the horrendous drubbing that the Buffalo Bills (my squad, yo) took at the hands of the San Diego Chargers (48-10), it was an excellent day.

This week, I'm performing in Buffalo, NY, and Pam and Harmony are going to make the short drive up the NYS Thruway and stay with me for Thanksgiving.  We return to Rochester on Sunday to enjoy our Thanksgiving with Mama Davis, who works in the medical field and will be on duty Thursday.  A few days home to recuperate, and then it's off to Kentucky and Tennessee for a week, hopefully to dodge the snow.  We'll see.  In Buffalo, our plans include taking Harmony to the mall to see Santa Claus...she's pushing two years old, so I don't know if she'll dig it or be afraid, but we'll find out, I guess.  In the meantime, I'll enjoy the benefits of both working and having my little family's company.  God is truly good, I tell ya.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY

Tear Down The Walls

Tear Down The Walls                        2292

Wednesday, November 16, 2005-3:24 P.M.

Well, another day older and deeper in debt...

Yesterday was my 39th birthday, which I celebrated by going out and running errands all day.  I started out by visiting the Sleep Center of Rochester for the results of the sleep study I took last month.  Come to find out, I have mild sleep apnea, which means I stop breathing for periodic episodes as I sleep.  Sleep apnea occurs when the soft tissues in the windpipe and the back of the throat relax during REM level sleep, causing a stoppage of the airflow.  During the study, I had about 6.8 such stoppages per hour, with the longest stoppage being about 20 seconds.  No wonder I wake up groggy some times!  The other night, I had a dream that I went back in time and tried to save Elvis Presley by warning him that he would die of a drug overdose.  I was with a friend of mine in the dream, and he was yelling at me because by preventing Elvis' death, I would destroy the space-time continuum, causing irrevocable damage to the universe.  Then I was in a restaurant with a bunch of servers who were standing around waiting for their boss to cash their checks, and he wouldn't cash them, and made the servers wait outside in the rain.  Then I woke up.  If that doesn't make a case for my need for treatment, I don't know what does.

Next stop was back home to sit with my daughter while Pamela visited her grandmother.  I brought home some french fries for Harmony, which she calls "fwies."  She enjoyed them, as most children do.

Later, upon Pamela's return, I headed out to pick up a check for the TV commercial I did last month.  After six weeks, I got tired of waiting for payment, so I just waltzed into their office and demanded my money.  Actually, I called ahead and asked them nice, and they said "C'mon down."  I hit the bank, and walked out with my clams, my tomatoes, my lettuce, my dead presidents....but no money.  Just kidding.  I cashed the check, paid some bills, and then treated myself to some modest birthday presents.  The Record Archive, a big Rochester music store, is condensing it's inventory to one of it's two stores, so the one that's closing was having a 70% off sale.  I purchased a Lenny Bruce album I didn't have, marked down to three bucks.  I also bought some tapes for the car, mostly metal stuff, Sacred Reich, Mind Over Four, Rollins Band, King's X, Brad Gillis, and then two personal favorites, The Bears featuring King Crimson guitarist Adrian Belew, and Canadian folk-rocker Bruce Cockburn.

The evening culminated in a nice birthday meal at Friendly's, with Pam, Harmony, Pam's mother and her Aunt.  I had a nice Buffalo chicken salad, and a nice conversation, and then headed back home.  When I got home, I decided to do some housekeeping.  I was taking some clothing down to the basement to wash, and somewhere along the line, I lost my footing on the stairs, and fell into the wall.  I collapsed the drywall in the stairwell....put a big football-shaped hole in the drywall.  Happy birthday to me.

So today I get to see how my home improvement skills measure up.  I'm starting to turn into Bob Vila, only without the tools or expertise.

Have a nice day.

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY

Cheeseburger In Paradise

Cheeseburger In Paradise                                      2253

Monday, November 14, 2005-6:46 A.M.

I'm up early today, for no apparent reason.  Which is good, the furnace guys will be here in a few hours, and we'll have heat in our home again.  I'm glad that my previous estimate of December 1st turned out to be unfounded, but it's been pretty mild this year, even stretching into November.  I can remember when I was a little kid, it was always cool seeing if it would snow in Rochester before my birthday, November 15th, and of course, always looking forward to a white Christmas.  So far, it looks like we're just going to have to brook a bunch of fallen yellow leaves and some mud, which is actually o.k. with me, now that I primarily drive for a living.

I got home from Reading, Pennsylvania and the fabulous Reading Comedy Outlet around 6:00 Sunday night, and then accompanied Ray Salah out to the Comix Cafe, my home club, to see headliner Mark Knope and of course, the members of the staff at the club who knew me from when I worked there full time.  I went up and did a 12-minute or so guest spot, worked out some of the Amish material I was peddling this past weekend, and it worked well.  I think I want to expand the bit because it really fits well with how I feel about religion, and it comes from a point of view of tolerance.  I've been listening to a lot of Lenny Bruce in the car, specifically the Carnegie Hall Concert, which is the best recorded work of his that I've heard, and it served as the template for this work.  He's very funny in the concert, but he also makes very specific points about social issues, and I highly recommend searching it out and listening to it at least once.

While in Reading, I decided to do some housecleaning of my vehicle, and I went through the glove compartment and took out all of the condiments, plastic fast-food cutlery and straws.  I'm insane about food, and if I have to eat french fries without ketchup, I'm unhappy, to say the least.  I've always been fixated about food, even since I was a little kid, and when I was in junior high, I won a writing award for a short story using mayonaisse as a death symbol (it's true).

So I went through my glovebox, put all the condiments in a Hardee's bag, and have inventoried them, deciding that it would give me a snapshot of my habits, not that I need any clearer picture of my habits.  I eat in the car, primarily fast food, which I love dearly.  It's hot, it's ready, and it's everywhere.  You can't really drive to a part of the country that doesn't have a drive through window where they will happily exchange about five of your U.S. dollars for a tasty grilled or fried or roasted piece of meat on a fluffy, white bun or biscuit or croissant or hoagie roll, accompanied by some deep-fried potato product that's been over-salted, and a large, wax-lined cup filled with a dark and delicious, icy cold carbonated beverage.  God, I'm getting the car keys now just thinking about it!

Anyway, I inventoried the condiments, and here's what I came up with;

18 Burger King ketchups
 2 Burger King mustards
 6 McDonalds ketchups
 1 Wendy's ketchup
 1 Wendy's salt
 3 Wendy's hot chili seasoning
 2 McDonalds mild picante sauce
 2 McDonalds barbecue dipping sauces
 1 McDonalds hot mustard dipping sauce
10 Subway mustards
 6 Heinz ketchups (no designation)
 1 French's mustard (no designation)
 1 Sweet 'n Low (no designation)
11 Equal (no designation)
12 Sugar Twin (no designation)

And all packed in a Hardee's bag.  The fact that I even had a Hardee's bag shows some desperation on my part, because their food is ass to me.  The worst.  I must have been really hungry and there must have been no other choices.

So the numbers don't lie; I am a predominantly Burger King consumer.  The Subway mustards?  I picked up a bunch of them because sometimes I'll dash into a Wal-Mart after a show if I'm in a small town and there's no other food options, and I'll grab a deli sub, and they never have the little packets of condiments in with the sandwich.  I hate that.  And I'll usually use mustard, even if it's a roast beef sandwich, because I enjoy the zip of the mustard, and it keeps well.  Mayonaisse can be dodgy, especially if the car gets warm.  Now you're just asking for some egg 'n oil-based bird flu.

Subway is good food for me, but hard to eat in the car; that shredded lettuce goes everywhere.  The secret to eating in the car is to keep it neat.  I generally hate french fries, because I get the oilall over my hands, but what are you gonna do?  Wendy's will let you get a salad, but you have to pull over to the side of the road to eat the damn thing, and driving schedules don't always allow for that.  Actually, I've never been so late that five minutes made a difference (or would have helped me, in the extreme couple of cases where I was late), so maybe I should rethink this attitude.

McDonalds is always there, but for breakfast only.  They outdo Burger King in that respect, but Burger King gets the prize for lunch.  Put it to you this way; a whopper comes wrapped in a nice piece of paper that you can fold back and it catches any stray ketchup that wants to drip out on your nice white shirt, and all the lettuce stays contained.  A Big Mac, while a completely nice sandwich to order when you're sitting down, comes in an unwieldly cardboard box that is very difficult to handle when you're shooting down state road 322 at 15 miles over the speed limit.

Wendy's is always nice, and quick, but their single burger always leaves me still hungry, and their double burger makes me feel bloated.  There's no middle ground.  Arby's is great, and delicious for a cold-cut guy like me, but it takes too long, and I always feel like I spent too much money on lunch.  The flip side of the coin is that the food is fresh and hot, but curly fries always burn my mouth, and I don't enjoy eating them because I'm not 12 years old.

Whenver I can, I'll order the fringe menu items; McDonald's breakfast burritos.  I don't usually do well with egg in the morning, but it's all wrapped up in a nice little breakfast sleeping bag and there's not much chance that it'll wind up becoming part of the pattern of my jacket.

Taco Bell is right out of the question.  It's fine at night if you've been drinking, because any gaseous emissions will happen in your sleep, but who can eat that dreck when you're awake and sober?  Messy food and flatulence?  I have more self-respect than that.  And have you ever tried eating a crunchy taco while driving?  It's like trying to put a horseshoe on a pig.  You might as well just dump the contents of the shell into your coat pocket, and then crumble the shell onto your floor mat.

Kentucky Fried Chicken is good, the sandwiches at least, but you don't see them as often as the other restaurants.  Ordering pieces of chicken, again, is right outof the question when you're driving.  It's hard enough trying to talk on your cell phone and book April 2006 dates without greasing up your steering wheel and trying to avoid careening into a ditch at 85 miles per hour.  Popeye's is the same problem, although as a sit-down option during the day, I'm the first in line.  I love the gumbo, what can I say?

I had my first Taco John's experience in North Dakota earlier this year.  I have nothing to say about them, because I never see them.  Good food, though.  And luckily I slept alone that night, although it was nice of the headliner to offer.

Sbarro can kiss my ass.  Real Italians wouldn't eat that shit at gunpoint, and shame on them for wasting nice tomatoes on their subpar marinara sauce, rubbery meat and dry cheese.  Never again.  And their meatball subs suck, too.  Worst bread I've ever eaten.

Boston Market isn't even fast food.  It's some of the best food out there, kind of a low-rent Cracker Barrel.  If there's time, and I've got a coupon, I'm in.  And if you've never been there, I'll treat (if I got a coupon).

So that's the fast-food roundup.  I know my doctor would be rolling her eyes and shaking her fists at the heavens, but short of making drastic lifestyle and vocational changes, this is the life I lead.

Pumpkin pies are two for a dollar?  Yes I would, thank you.

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY