Syrup, Beer & Donuts

I was granted 24 hour leave this past weekend and enjoyed some fine recreation. Saturday night was spent at Phil and Mary’s Camp for Worn Out Thirysomethings along with five friends for pulled pork sandwiches, mac-n-cheese, and Sabres hockey. Luckily I was able to fight off sleep during the first period of the hockey game and make it to a bedtime of 11:00. My two fellow skiers from that afternoon didn’t stay up quite so late. Perhaps if I had been offered any Cisco I might have crashed for good much sooner. Being parents who have forgotten how to sleep in, we were up at 7:00 the following morning and beat the rush to Cartwright’s Maple Inn pancake house. We rookies were put to shame by Hauer, who packed away eight buckwheat pancakes.

I have decided relatively recently that I am not going to have anything to do with “pancake syrup” ever again. There is a reason that Aunt Jemima can’t call its product “maple syrup,” and that is because it is total crap made up primarily of corn syrup. I only use real parmigiano reggiano as well. No more Kraft parmesan cheese for me. I think the real stuff is worth it. I just wish that I could afford to drink Saranac all the time, not for the cache of the brand, but just for the quality of the beer. Some of Dennise’s extended family rips on me for drinking Stroh’s, Genny, or PBR, and I make no apologies for it. If a beer snob who drinks Harpoon regularly thinks I’m a slob for drinking PBR, I can accept that. I just won’t make any apologies for not drinking a more heavily marketed beer. You will never convince me that Coors or Budweiser is superior to Pabst. There is nothing wrong with Budweiser, but let’s dispense with the idea that it’s the kind of beers.

Speaking of marketing and maple syrup, I hate all the Dunkin Donuts commercials. They are on during Sabres games constantly. Let’s run down the list:

“Human Interest Stories” – Premise apparently is that human interest stories are an addictive new feature of television and people are gradually able to pull themselves away long enough to go out and fill up on donuts. Sorry, I guess I missed something here. I didn’t realize this new trend was going on, so I can’t identify. I know a similar spot about reality television would have been timely about ten years ago. Oh well.

“Coffee Shop Menu” – Premise is that the offerings in a trendy coffee shop can’t be understood by patrons. Now I KNOW this would have been timely about ten years ago when people weren’t taking trendy coffee shops for granted like they are now. Ten years ago is roughly around the time that this type of “humor” became stale as well. You can actually go into a Starbucks and ask them for an extra large coffee and get served. You don’t have to slink off to Dunkin Donuts in humiliation or learn “Fratalian.” Nice repetitive monotone as the line of drones reads off the menu. That's exactly what I want to hear.

“Maple Tree in the Cubicle” – You get tree sap from a maple tree, you don't get maple syrup. According to the placemat at Cartwrights, it takes 40 gallons of sap to produce one gallon of maple syrup. I hope you burn in hell.

The only thing that resonates in these commercials for me is “America Runs On Dunkin,” the Jeopardy! style answer to the question “Why is America a fat country?”

Thankfully the olive-skinned girl in the Blue Cross commercials jogs through every Sabres telecast to provide some sort of counterpoint.