May 3, 2005 - A Story to Relish

In the recesses of your brain, where old commercial jingles never die, there are a couple of dusty old cerebral cells where you’re storing the lyrics to a car commercial that goes as follows:

“Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie, and Chevrolet. They go together in the good old U.S.A. Baseball and hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet.”

We all know what it means. We’re all fully aware that the marketing powers are playing up to our nostalgic patriotism, longing for the days of Fourth of July barbeques, country stores, and service with a smile.

These days, if someone is serving you apple pie, there’s a decent chance that the pie was bought in a big white cardboard box at Costco. And, baseball … well it’s still an all-American sport, but most of the Americans playing are from South America. Hot dogs? Well, once again that’s a Costco staple – sold in bulky bulk from inside, in the food section and outside in the food court. It’s quality for less. A big dog and a big coke cost only $1.50.

It seems as clear as the Gulf Stream waters that Costco is the new cultural center of America. Here in the good old U.S.A., it’s the country store of the new millennium. On Monday, the dedicated staff of edhat.com was at the Costco snack bar to observe local Americans eating hot dogs. We were counting the number of hot-diggity-dogs purchased between noon and noon-thirty.

There are many people in this country and elsewhere who believe that Israeli interests drive U.S. foreign policy. Ed doesn’t have an opinion about that, but he is pretty sure that there is a strong Jewish influence over hot dog selections at Costco. Usually, Costco sells Hebrew National brand - kosher dogs that answer to a higher authority. Yesterday, for some unknown reason, they were selling Mt. Sinai hot dogs – an alternative kosher brand. The Costco staff told us that they change lots periodically, but only after fully depleting the old stuff.

In addition to hot dogs, Costco also sells pizza, salad, churros, and something called, “chicken bake”. We were unable to determine if any of these are Kosher. And, in case you were wondering, there is a website showing the nutritional information of all the Costco food fare. As you can see, just one chicken bake could effectively end your diet.

During our count at the Goleta Costco food court, there were four lines for food. At noon, there were approximately 5 people waiting in each line. At noon-thirty, the line length had grown to around 10 people. In the half hour period, a total of 144 people were served. In their orders there were 72 hot dogs. This is a lot more dogs than we saw at Surf Dog awhile back.

LisaF was the winner of yesterday’s contest with a guess of 72 exactly. As Chick Hearn would say, “The mustard is off the hot dog!” Lisa wins a 2005 Santa Barbara Axxess book.

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