Melt

"You know what I need,
Or maybe you don't,

Stop wastin' my time
Do I have to come right flat out,
and tell you everything,
Gimme some money...."

Spinal Tap-Gimme Some Money

We have a new culinary phenom in my neck of the woods. It's based on  age-old stand-by of bread and cheese and heat. It's an eatery called,....simply,..."Melt".

Now, the reason this joint is now a phenom is for one reason alone. It's because that freaky-looking guy from "Dive, Diners and Drive-ins",...I think his name is Guy something-or-other,...came to town and gave it the rave review,..like he does with every dive that he goes into. I think the criteria of having a show like his is to simply ohh and ahh about everything that your stick in your pie-hole.

In any event,...this place is now the rave of the region, right? So, my better half asks me if I want to go there today for lunch. We had an hour to kill and thought we'd take advantage of time spent together, doing something that we both love.

Eating.

So we travel down the through-fare to this famed establishment and walk in an expect to be wow-ed by their famous grilled cheeses.

Ok,...this is where it gets funny,...

We go in and they tell us that the wait for a table,...on a Toooozday afternoon, mind you,....is 45 minutes to an hour,...or we could sit at the bar and get our order placed promptly. We choose the bar because' we ain't got that kinda time to kill for a freakin' sandwich, right?

We plop down at the bar and order two waters and a coffee for me. One water for her. One water and coffee for me. They present us with their menus.

My stomach begins to turn by the combinations that they had on these sandwiches. A Gyro grilled cheese with tahziki sauce, a Monte "crisco" grilled cheese with berry preserves, a cinnamon grilled cheese,...and the grilled cheese for the month? The Godfather grilled cheese. It was pizza rolls,...Jeno's pizza rolls,...stuck onto a freakin' grilled cheese with Parmesan sauce on top of it and Parmesan cheese on the bread,...all served with a shit load of fries that you would never be able to eat in one sitting.

I couldn't help but wonder about the mind that put this crap together. None of it was appealing and it seemed like a six year old came up with the menu.This has to be one of those instances where the presentation of fluff is put under the heading of genius and the masses just suck it up.

Kinda like Jean-Michel Basquiat.

I give the guy credit for trying something new and capitalizing on it. If we all did that, this world would be a better place....but I just can't get on board with this. 10 bucks for a glorified grilled cheese is pretty much taking advantage of people in rough times. And I know it can be said that if people are willing to pay it, then so be it. If it makes us feel better to go to an over-rated restaurant then live and let live

It can be said that he is providing jobs for people. Yeah, maybe,...but I saw no fewer than 7 cooks on that line taking upwards of 40 minutes to get a stupid grilled cheese out....while acting like they're doin' us the favor by letting us eat there.

This is like the Studio 54 of Cleveland. No merit, no substance.

And, like disco, it will fade into obscurity and people will wonder what it was they were thinking when, in years to come, they look back on this folly.

"Melt". Yeah,...what a stroke of genius.

Anyway,...

Whitney

"...but February made me shiver,
With every paper I'd deliver.
Bad news on the doorstep.
I couldn't take one more step.
I can't remember if I cried,
When I read about his widowed bride,
But something touched me deep inside,..."

Don McClean
American Pie

I am not a person who is given over to a lot of emotion when a celebrity dies. I don’t really do that whole feely thing.

But yesterday was different. I don’t know why. I never really gave a whit for Whitney’s music and her stormy personal life. I did watch her dramas unfold and she did seem to me a person who was always struggling to keep her balance as she climbed a slippery slope. Like usual, I always gunned for her and hoped for the best,..and then quickly forgot about it as I turned the page. Then she died.

That was just one of those sobering moments. I think it’s because she was still fighting. Her career was by no means over, and she still had that appeal,…but the finality of it all was simply a rude disillusionment. It shows us the obvious. At the end of the day, you check out with nothing. Everything done on this planet doesn’t amount to a hill of beans when the lights go out. You don’t take your voice and money with you. You don’t take the servants who bow to your every need. You don’t take your limos, houses, jewellery and small dogs. You simply take yourself. Your parking needs to be validated and then you move on to wherever it is you are going. Tasks achieved in an earthly realm never amount to much at the final checkout.

Never.

I don’t mean to sound cynical about this. After all, for some reason, I did actually weep when I heard the news about Whitney. I struggled to think of anything she sang that I actually liked or wanted to listen to. I struggled to come to a realization as to why I felt this deeply about her death. It was more in the premature stillness of a voice that had more to give that really cut my soul. I suppose the same could be said of other singers who died too soon. That they had more to give.

But, in the final analysis, is that a bad thing? Maybe they didn’t have more to give. Maybe they gave all that they could and were never able to reconcile the demons that plagued them. Is that really their fault? Or is it ours? Do we place the line of expectation too high for reality?....or is that they (the collective “they”. The ones who checked out too soon) just had too much time on their hands and let the excesses that they could afford play havoc with their lives?

As usual, we have to give the benefit of the doubt until the final autopsy reports validate speculation. It’s a courtesy that must be afforded to everyone in the towers of fame. “We just have to wait before we cast that stone to shatter legacy….”. But what does it really matter? That is simply a formality. Dead is dead. Does it make it more palatable when we find out that it was a heart attack instead of an OD? Does that instantly validate their exit?

48 is still too young and age for any to die at. When it involves a younger person who dies, the intensity of the speculation becomes more visceral. More jaded.

I’m inclined to believe that there was some trouble afoot in regards to Whitney’s demise. To me, however, I simply don’t think that the way she died has any bearing on her reflection as a person. If it was due to a chemical overdose, I have a hard time being critical of it. I don’t care what anyone says, the claws of addiction are wicked in nature. One never learns to master it, one just learns to live with it,..if you are somewhat successful at keeping the hounds of addiction at bay. How many of us are that successful, truth be told? We live in a society in which we are over-taxed in our senses. We are over-taxed in the amount of stuff that comes our way. We are on sensory-overload and we have accepted this knowingly and willingly. I mean, I was told about her death through a phone call and not by anything I read on the internet. I simply turned on the computer and waited for a few minutes for the updates on AOL and MSN to kick in. This is simply the world we live in now, isn’t it? The seventies are gone and with it went a sense of naiveté.

When we lament the fallen idols and their less-than-sterile exit, I can’t help but wonder if there is a certain sense to point the finger back at us a little bit. Not in the way of responsibility. Not that at all. But do we somehow validate our existence by pointing out the flaws in theirs? I mean, let’s face it, we all took a certain element of satisfaction when we watched Lindsay and Brittany self-implode in front of our eyes. We revelled in the 78 day marriage of,…well, I won’t utter her name here,…to that basketball doofus. I mean, we made the K sisters who they are and we are the ones who can’t stand them anymore.

It’s like Colin Clive getting bored with the monster and telling him to go away. There are not a lot of options for Boris at that point.

I never really dug Whitney’s music. I never really got into it and into her as a person. But, for some strange and haunting reason, I think her death will remain with me until mine,…

Anyway,….

The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth…