Month: July 2026

Papaya, Jerry, Papaya!

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Here it is the Fourth of July and Camera Girl and I are home alone with the dogs and various other captive living organisms.  The kids and the grandkids have headed for the ocean and we must fend for ourselves.  And we had a nice dinner and finished up our chores (except this one) so I said let’s watch a movie to celebrate the Fourth.  And I left the choice of movie up to her.  What would she pick?  Independence Day?  Yankee Doodle Dandy?  Ah, Wilderness?  No, her pick was inspired.

“The Hot Dog Program.”  It’s a documentary from a guy from Pittsburgh who did documentaries for PBS (boo!!!).  The show travels across the country from Coney Island in Brooklyn to Anchorage, Alaska describing the local variations in the toppings, condiments and preparations of hot dogs in various places in the United States.  And to tie it into the Fourth, the show features the Fourth of July hot dog eating contest at Coney Island.

But the real reason why this movie was a brilliant selection for the holiday is because back in 1999 when this special was made there were people in all parts of the country who were excited to describe hot dogs as the most American of American foods.  And even the foreigners who were interviewed were visibly excited about associating with the American culture that the hot dog was emblematic of.

In place as different as Chicago IL and a small town in Alabama everyone thought of their local hot dog stand or store as a touchstone to their childhood memories and local life.  It linked up with summer barbecues, baseball games and summer fun.  And everyone from lawyers in Manhattan to Hollywood actors in Los Angeles to small town policemen in Georgia were sure that they knew the best place to get a hot and a drink.  Of course, they wouldn’t agree whether that drink was papaya juice in Times Square or a Coke in a glass bottle in small-town South Carolina.  But the disagreement is the point.  It’s local flavor.

And the movie was also highly educational.  We saw the awful cut of beef that is used in their manufacture and watched as the disgusting puree that eventually becomes hot dog is shaped, cooked and shot at high speed into a storage bin.  What could be more appetizing?

But what makes this movie most enjoyable is seeing Americans from 1999 talk about an America that was still the one we all remember as kids.  A place full of happy people who can enjoy a simple thing like having a hot dog for lunch without there being any political, cultural or ethnic baggage associated with an iconic American food.  Back then no one was making the point that we should consider the taco or the egg roll (or even worse some vegan grass burger) should be the new American cuisine and we all should renounce the hot dog as anathema and bad for the planet.  And that’s probably why we both enjoyed watching this so much.  Happy Independence Day.

Tom’s World – 04JUL2026 – Atlanta Road Rage

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TomD

 

My knowledge from both a personal and professional level indicate that the Georgia DOT is well funded, efficient and competent. Lord only knows the crisis level if that were not the case. Pure traffic density is the issue.

The density problem was significantly purposefully created by supposed “environmental” groups. The effects of the rapidly developing increasing traffic density has been easily extrapolated for decades. In the late 1990’s and early 2000’s a number of projects were proposed to head it off to a significant degree. But, each project was sued into non-existence in Federal court , one by one. Every suit was brought and financed by non-regional environmental groups ultimately financed by, nobody knows. The Sierra Club was the front group for several suits. Whatever the ultimate purpose of the suits was it did not include the well being of the citizens

The biggest hit was an outer perimeter to route non-local traffic, both E-W and N-S entirely bypassing metro Atlanta. I75, I85, & I20 all intersect in the middle of Atlanta constituting a large portion of the total. But noooo. Several other major projects were killed.

You would not believe the competency the GDOT call on to plan and execute MAJOR infrastructure projects. This bunch in FDOT District 3, not so much. They make what would be a 4-5 month project in Atlanta Metro last for literally years. And in the face of rapidly increasing traffic density, the local FDOT’s traffic light timing and coordination is absurdly bad.

I was “involved” with the industry for some time and before I retired couldn’t open my mouth publically.

Picture below: Ga 400 entering Buckhead area of the city on a Sunday morning. Buckhead was the area in the news a couple of years ago that tried to secede from Atlanta due to non-protection from the APD from the hoards of inner city predators.

<a data-flickr-embed=”true” href=”https://www.flickr.com/photos/tomd77/21935250858/in/datetaken/” title=”Into the belly of the beast”><img src=”” width=”2048″ height=”1477″ alt=”Into the belly of the beast”/></a><script async src=”//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

Blow-Up Godzilla and Highway Mayhem

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The Third of July was a busy day.  We had to get the pool vacuumed before guests arrived and then there were chores around the yard.  And then we had a good summer cookout with burgers and potato salad, corn on the cob, sausage and peppers and watermelon.  No wonder losing weight is such a slog!

And it was a good visit with reminiscences about summers up in Maine when my kids were young and other trips.  And I had an interesting conversation with Princess Sack of Potatoes.  She said something about how useful mothers were.  So, I mentioned to her what fathers were useful for.  I asked her if she ever got tired while out somewhere and her father carried her around like a sack of potatoes?  Or what exactly would happen if the car got a flat tire far away from a tow truck?  Or if suddenly traffic stopped on a crowded highway in the middle of summer and after an hour someone would have to get out and walk up the road to see how long the stoppage would be.  And this caused a yelp from Princess Sack of Potatoes’ mother.  She remembered that day very well after all these years.  And she was still upset by it, remembering how certain she had been that I would never come back alive.  We all got a big laugh out of that.

This was shortly after I had moved out of New York City but I was driving into Manhattan to attend a wedding in SoHo.  It was a science fiction themed wedding with a blow-up Godzilla in attendance.  We were on the FDR Drive when the traffic screeched to a halt and nothing happened for about forty minutes.  So, since it was very hot that day and my car’s air conditioning was non-existent, I shut off the engine and started walking between lanes of traffic to see what was going on.  And about a half mile up the road there were police, fire and emergency vehicles blocking the road in both directions.  And along with several crashed cars there was a very fancy sports car that was upside down and wrapped around a light pole and some other parts of the highway infrastructure.  The firemen were cutting away what was left of the frame to get at what was left of the driver.  It looked pretty grim.

The good news for us was that our direction on the highway would be released as soon as the ambulances got their patients stowed away and headed to the hospital.   The other side looked like it would be stuck for hours.  So, after satisfying my morbid curiosity for a few minutes I headed back to my car with the news that we would be moving in less than another half hour.  And my youngest daughter looked so relieved when I managed to return before the traffic had started to move.  She was convinced that if I hadn’t gotten back before it started to move then of necessity I would be squashed like a bug in a cartoon.

It’s funny, up until today I hadn’t thought of that day in thirty-some-odd years.  Funny what stuff just pops into your head.

Scooby Doo and the Heat Index

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I was informed by “AccuWeather” that today’s forecast high temperature would be 99 degrees Fahrenheit.  But it was further stated that it would feel like 114 degrees Fahrenheit!  Now I once spent a summer in California and we did several times reach 114 degrees.  And as far as I can remember this was nothing like that.  99 degrees at 100 percent humidity and 114 degrees with bone dry air feel nothing alike.  One is a blast furnace and the other is a steam room.  So, what is the sense of this scare temperature of 114?  The weather dweebs on my local cable provider were running in circles warning of impending climate catastrophe and exhorting me to shelter in place.  I was especially amused by New York’s Mamdani begging his citizens to protect themselves from the heat but also commanding them not to set their air conditioners below 78 degrees.  Apparently, the electrical grid in New York is experiencing brown outs and everything must be done to avoid a black out during Taylor Swift’s upcoming nuptials at Madison Square Garden.  Something tells me that the wedding party will be excused from obeying the 78-degree mandate.  Can’t have a middle aged pop diva sweating at her wedding.  Think of the poor groom!

So, I finished off the rest of the lawn this morning with my push mower and as soon as the gas tank emptied, I changed the oil on that little Briggs and Stratton powered trash mower.  This will buy me some time until the tubing for draining off the oil from my riding mower arrives from my friends at Amazon.com (tomorrow they say).  I had to suspend the mower upside down and at an angle to avoid something to do with the spark plug and I looked distinctly goofy holding it in that position.  But I only spilled a couple of drops and voila!  She sounds as good as new (sorta).

As I was watering the plants in the pool area, I saw a little frog jump in so I fished him out with the pool net and threw him into Camera Girl’s Pond.  Now this was slightly after her evening feeding frenzy so as soon as he fell in, there was a boiling, bubbling panic around him and he jumped straight out into the high grass behind the pond.  Well, he probably did the right thing.  If he wanders back into the swimming pool, he can take solace from the knowledge that being chlorinated to death is a quiet peaceful end compared to being hacked to bits by the Piranha Brothers.

Tomorrow we will have Princess Sack of Potatoes and her parents here to swim in the pool before all of the grandkids head off for a week by the seaside.  A little rest and relaxation for us is good but it will be a bit quiet without them.  This week I sat through several hours of Scooby Doo cartoons that I’ve already seen too many times and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 which I probably could have skipped too but with them there enjoying this ridiculous entertainment I kind of felt like part of the gang.  Which is pretty cool.