She stood, her back towards me as I entered.  I saw the others scurrying about, but she was a fixture.  Although I knew better, her hands on the hips posture oozed command.  Her delusions of grandeur were shattered, however, when her manager pointed out my presence.

As she slowly turned towards me I felt the contempt building from behind her black-rimmed glasses.  I was an inconvenience.  She strolled towards her post, staring me down, hoping for my demise.  “Welcome to Burger King, would you like to try a Whopper Value Meal?” she dutifully sung to me.

I tried hard not to reciprocate her hostility.  “Can I have a Double Whopper…”

“Would you like cheese with that?” she interrupted.

“Please. And a large fry and a Coke.”

“For here or to go?” she boringly responded.

“To go.”

“That’ll be $6.03.”  I handed her the only money I had, a twenty-dollar bill.  “You don’t have three cents on you?” she asked as if fully expecting me to.

“No, sorry.”  I shook my head to reaffirm.  She breathed an exasperated sigh as she counts my change.  “I’m sorry, can I get no onions on my Double Whopper if its not already too late?” I ask.

Her return gaze made me shiver.  She turned her head towards the grill and yelled, “Did you make that Double Whopper order yet?”

“Counter or drive-through?” the young, high school age grill person responded.

“I am on counter, why would I ask for drive-through?” she snapped in return.  “Of course I need counter.”

“No, I haven’t made it yet,” the grill person’s tone began to match hers.  I worried for my food, hoping it would get to me safely.

“Well, when you finally get around to the Double Whopper for counter, I need it with no onion,” she commanded of the grill person.

“Whatever,” came a muffled response.

After her exchange with the grill person, she slid a large cup in my direction.  “Coke is over there,” she gestured in the direction of the soda fountain.

I walked over to the fountain, filled my cup, found a lid, and returned to the counter.  “Excuse me, can I get a straw?”

“There aren’t any over there?” she replied, as if questioning my eyesight.

“Nope.”

“Here.”  She whipped out a straw from under the counter and laid it in front of me.

I thank her as she walked over to the fry station to assemble my large fry.  She nonchalantly tossed the fries into the bag and collected my burger a second after the grill person finished making it.  Carelessly, the burger joined the fries in the bag.

“Thank you.”  I walked out, sipping my coke, fully expecting to have to remove the onions from my Double Whopper when I got home.

At the Tampa Bay Times, I wrote an article on Morrisound Studios. They were broken into six months ago. I checked in with them to see how they are doing.

Six months after break-in, Tampa’s Morrisound Recording is back on its feet

I also did another appearance on local blogger Clark Brooks blog. I wrote about the cost of fast food coke and fries. Did you know it changes per value meal? It’s true.

Guest Author: Mike Lortz – The True Value of Fries and Coke

First and foremost, here is a link to a delicious culinary delight brought to you by the leo weekly: presenting bourbon infused pizza.

From The Delta Blues comes a bio and discussion on the life of “Honeyboy” Edwards, a blues great who passed away a few weeks ago.

From Wired Science, here is an analysis on whether bird poop can break a car windshield.

Also from Wired Science, did you know yogurt can calm the gut which affects the mind?  It can also helps calm some of the mind’s neurons. That’s wild.

Second to last, I was given honorable mention as the best sports blogger in Tampa by the blog Re/Creating Tampa. That’s so awesome. There are so many good sports bloggers in the Tampa area, for someone to call me the second best is extremely humbling.

Finally, here is a very cool video of a flash mob in California having a major lightsaber battle. Thankfully, no one was hurt.

Among the many awesome people I met during my journey to the Tampa Bay Rays home opener last Friday was my new friend Brittany Ward (she’s on twitter). Like most women, Brittany loved the afro and wanted to wear it. I obliged and together we decided to test out the power of female persuasion under the guise of a three foot afro. Hence this short film entitled “Afro Girl Gets a Beer”.

Over at RaysIndex.com, I compared the Rays coaching staff to a military unit. There are coaches, officers, and even a few potato peelers.

The Rays Combat Coaching Corps – RaysIndex.com

Then, at BusLeaguesBaseball.com (have I ever mentioned we have a book for sale?), I wrote about a few Red Sox prospect who was highly regarded by the Topps baseball card company – but no one else.

Reviewing a Future Star: Pat Dodson – BusLeaguesBaseball.com

Now that I’ve plugged myself, here a few interesting links that I think you might enjoy written by other people.

DailyFinance.com wrote that Cap’n Crunch may be on the way out. According to the article, the makers of the fine cereal aren’t displaying it on their website or anywhere else. I will be very upset if the Cap’n is retired, as Peanut Butter Cap’n Crunch is one of my all-time favorite cereals.

As a matter of fact, here is my top five:

1. Peanut Butter Cap’n Crunch

2. Cinnamon Toast Crunch

3. Rice Krispie Treat Cereal

4. Cap’n Crunch Crunch Berries

5. Reese Pieces Cereal

I’ve never been much of a marshmellow cereal fan, but anything with high amounts of sugar – I’m all over it. Some people drink coffee, I eat candy cereal. It gives me the buzz I need to get going in the morning.

(Update: DailyFinance needs to check their facts. The Cap’n isn’t retiring. And I can stay sugar buzzed in the morning. Hooray!)

Speaking of getting up in the morning, lately I’ve been able to do so a lot later as I have been without a job since late January. Although there hasn’t been any money coming in, I’m feeling a lot healthier than I was when I worked at my job. According to the LA Times, people who don’t like their job or feel irregular stress because of it actually felt better after they left, even it meant losing their income.

Maybe that’s me.

Speaking of me, here is a post I swear I probably would have written if I wasn’t beaten to it. Over at BusLeaguesBaseball, fellow writer Brian Moynahan discusses the history and future of a minor league team in Pensacola. Hey, I thought Florida minor league news was my beat?

Indiana definitely isn’t my beat, but it is home to the greatest fictional athlete ever, Jimmy Chitwood. Did you know he had five times the impact of any current NBA player? Can you imagine what he would be worth in the open market? Instead, he was regulated by The Man and his socialist school zoning areas. Which, in 1950-something Indiana, was the whole town of Hickory. Except for the black kids, they had to go to school outside of town.

And finally, because I think it is in my contract as proprietor of this fine site, here is Deadspin.com’s latest “Dead Wrestler of the Week” post – a tribute to the late, great Captain Lou Albano.

(Perhaps you are wondering, why the pic of Snoop and Darth Vader? Why not?)

Over the years I have convinced my Dad to wholeheartedly throw his allegiance to FSU. Before I was a Seminole, he could have overlooked college sports without a care. Now he is a diehard supporter.

The other day I received a very strange email from him. He sent me a forward of an email he sent to the M&M candy people in which he asked why there were so few red and yellow M&Ms and so many blue and orange ones in a recent bag he purchased. He also asked the M&M people if they knew blue and orange were the school colors of that hated university down the road. Why wasn’t the closest thing to garnet and gold fairly represented in his bag? Was this a national trend, or did he just get a bag filled by a UF alumnus (probably a math major)?

Less than a week later, my Dad received a response from the M&M people, which he of course also forwarded to me. His sneaking suspicion was correct – there were more blue and orange M&Ms than there were red and yellow ones in every bag. Although it depended on the flavor, in some cases the ratio was almost double.

Here is the response of his inquiry:

Dear Sir,

In response to your email regarding M&M’S CHOCOLATE CANDIES.

Thank you for your email.

Our color blends were selected by conducting consumer preference tests, which indicate the assortment of colors that pleased the greatest number of people and created the most attractive overall effect.

On average, our mix of colors for M&M’S CHOCOLATE CANDIES is:

M&M’S MILK CHOCOLATE: 24% cyan blue, 20% orange, 16% green, 14% bright yellow, 13% red, 13% brown.

M&M’S PEANUT: 23% cyan blue, 23% orange, 15% green, 15% bright yellow, 12% red, 12% brown.

M&M’S KIDS MINIS: 25% cyan blue, 25% orange, 12% green, 13% bright yellow, 12% red, 13% brown.

M&M’S DARK: 17% cyan blue, 16% orange, 16% green, 17% bright yellow, 17% red, 17% brown.

M&M’S PEANUT BUTTER and ALMOND: 20% cyan blue, 20% orange, 20% green, 20% bright yellow, 10% red, 10% brown.

M&M’S PRETZEL: 20% each of red, green, orange, blue and brown.

M&M’S COCONUT: 37.5% white, 37.5% brown and 25% green.

Each large production batch is blended to those ratios and mixed thoroughly. However, since the individual packages are filled by weight on high-speed equipment, and not by count, it is possible to have an unusual color distribution.

Have a great day!

Your Friends at Mars Chocolate North America

Only in a bag of M&Ms Dark are there more red and yellow than orange and blue. And then only by 1%. I don’t know where “my friends” at the Mars Chocolate Co. conducted their “consumer preference tests”, but I have a sneaking suspicion it was somewhere close to Gainesville.

On October 11th, The Voice of Russia reported that a series of summer forest fires had pushed Russian Yetis into the Kuzbass Basin, a land known for its bear population. Claiming the land as their own, the superior Yetis “declared war” on the bears, pushing the bears out of their natural habitat and into the surrounding villages. The Russian news source concluded that an invasion of bears into human areas would not be good.

If this “war” between yetis and bears continues, there is a risk that bears will not sleep this winter because of a shortage of food, instead going to villages in search of something to eat.

So far, The Voice of Russia is correct. On October 26th, an article was published in the Guardian News discussing the plight of the starving Russian bear. These hungry bears have taken an unusual step in order to find food – they have begun tearing open caskets and eating human remains. According to the Guardian,

Russian bears have grown so desperate after a scorching summer they have started digging up and eating corpses in municipal cemetries, alarmed officials said today. Bears’ traditional food – mushrooms, berries and the odd frog – has disappeared, they added.

I wonder what the Russian Government will do. Will they assist the bears in returning to their natural habitat and protect them against the hordes of evil Yetis? Or will they unfairly punish the hungry bears for encroaching on human civilization? You know they don’t play around in Russia. They are known for making people (and bears) disappear.

As I find out more, I will be sure to post updates here.

(Image from here.)

I’ve never liked cows.

Roman trumpets sound well

when played off-key.

Blast a note,

cows moo.

A symphony of tears.

painful to their ears.

Not mine.

I smile

and eat another hamburger.

(Pic from this site.)

On Tuesday, June 1st, a Heineken truck overturned in Tampa.

Using Biblical logic – that it takes only a couple of days to come back from the dead – I blame Hopper.

Good to know your sense of humor goes with you in the great hereafter.

And because pictures of babies drinking beer are always funny:

(h/t on news of the overturned truck to fellow Tampa blogger Clark Brooks.)

I’m talking about food at the movies.

The Gasparilla International Film Festival was held at Tampa’s CineBistro, a small, up-scale theater that also features a gourmet restaurant. Customers order food or drinks prior to the film and the waitstaff brings it out before the movie starts. A bit high-priced and not something I would do all the time, but a fun experience nonetheless.

CineBistro is not the only place in Tampa that does the food-movie thing. Other theaters in town feature full bars, pizza, and of course, the normal array of candy, popcorn, and soda.

What I have yet to see, however, is any food offered for the health conscious among us. Those who don’t want to nosh on nougat or munch on Milkduds are out of luck at the theater. With our health food craze entering its second or third decade, I am flabbergasted as to why no one has done this yet.

I don’t think it would be too difficult to for a smoothie place to affiliate themselves with a local cinema. Instead of candy, why not offer protein bars or trail mix? Even the head of Sony Pictures, Michael Lynton, recently suggested theaters should offer a healther menu, with items such as “fruit cups, vegetables with dip, yogurt, granola bars, baked chips and unbuttered, air-popped popcorn”.

As writer Rosecrans Baldwin writes in his recent commentary about the evils of popcorn, “a medium popcorn at a Regal-chain movie theater contains 1,200 calories and 60 grams of saturated fat” . That’s preposterous.

Yet no one has offered an alternative. It should not be that difficult. If I can get a margarita, I should be able to get a strawberry-banana smoothie with a heaping scoop of ginseng, ginko biloba, amino acids, protein, or whatever else I want in there.

Come on movie theater people, I want smoothies at my movies.