Cuttin the Upper Crusts Off

(This is an actual movie)

I’m going to be more right up front and honest about this potential conflict of interest than a dead man standing on Cialis.  When my wife and I got married in Ireland, it was covered by a local “look at us we’re a legitimate city” magazine called Upper Crust – that’s actually just the name my dad uses to make fun of it, but it’ll do.  I admit it.  Being the media whore that I am, I had to get all the free advertising that I could at that time because I had just opened my own law office (it’s not like I still wouldn’t call them now for a follow up story if we were getting a divorce).  Some of the very same pictures published in that UC wedding spectacular extravaganza are located on my MyFaceSpace page – and they can be yours for only .10 cents a download.  Anyway, as a result of allowing UC to write a story about our wedding in Ireland – which contained rather flowery quotes that summarized what we said without really saying what we actually said – we obtained a free subscription to UC Magazine for a period of time.  I read it when I get it because, I need to know where the “Have’s” around here: buy their swill, get their garden dirt, dry cleaning, insurance and think about buying expensive jewelry from one of those artist witness protection program participants (but never do).  Just when our prescription needed a refill, a local merchant re-upped us for another six months.  Good thing too.  I was about to start asking around how to “score” some UC, and that’s never good.

Since you undoubtedly missed it, the last episode was all about this dude (Jay Something or Another) who was described inside the magazine as sort of a weird cross between a fancified fast-food manager, and someone with Pat Riley fashion overtones.  Apparently this cat’s family has owned the Dairy Queen here since it was a Duchess and – like all monarchies, whether tepid or below freezing – someone must have died or cashed in all their Dilly Bars and headed towards the warm, ice cream cake melting temperatures of Florida.  As a result, Jay is now the new CEO of Dairy Queen.  The cover even called him “Dairy Queen’s New CEO”, which would lead anyone only a class or two short of their GED to surmise that this guy was the CEO of the whole burger, ice cream and blizzard shootin’ match.  Which is obviously a falsitude, or untruthiness as Dubya might say.

But if you read the story, you would agree that Jay seemed like an alright guy.  It wasn’t really his fault that every other restaurant his family seemed to get into failed.  I mean hell, how do you go from ice cream to Mexican food, which they apparently attempted at one point?  A fajita blizzard may sell well somewhere near the Tex-Mex border, but anywhere else the seasonings just ain’t going to jive with the creaminess of the cool.  Know what I’m saying?  Like you could have a ice cream chile relleno.  How are you gonna fry a breaded pepper with ice cream in the middle of it?  Are you gonna use the tops of ice cream sandwiches as chips, and let people dip them in cups of chocolate salsa?  Even in all that, like I said, Jay is obviously smart because (a) he stayed alive and has gotten into the family business, (b) he’s good looking and running with the free advertising and (c) he’s smart because the article said he bought a sailboat with the proceeds from the sale of airline stock he purchased years ago.  No doubt the cat is bright, and glad he’s the King of the Dairy Queen.  I’m all about a local family running a business, and making tons of cash; or just staying around here for years doing it, making themselves and everyone else happy.

In this month’s episode, the parents of Jay wrote a letter to the UC editor to say how great the article was; at one point they said their entire family was proud to have been profiled in “such a remarkable magazine”.  Uh, remarkable?  I’ll admit the fancy, glossy pages are nice, and all the advertisements do make me feel like stimulatin’ the economy by performing my own little personal bailout.  But “remarkable”?  Are you serious?  These peoples lives must be so boring on a daily basis if seeing their own family history glossified in a 8 x 12 format with stapled centers makes them feel like they’re reading Julius Caesar while wearing a toga with a stiff Spring wind.  Get out and live a little people.  They also went on to say, “We thank you for considering our family’s restaurant visions over the years to be newsworthy.  It was a fun article, and we enjoyed it immensely.”  I can tell you right now that in no way does the UC Magazine qualify as news.  Nothing about this thing screams hard hitting journalism.  I guess it could be if they had reported on some sort of new super secret blizzard technology Jay had came up with, but just because something is in print, that doesn’t make it newsworthy.  And who the hell describes an article as fun?  By the way they talked about it, you’d think they take a cut out laminated version of it with them to parties.  Maybe I should give that article to my son when he turns five.  “Happy Birthday buddy!  Here is an article about some guy with a greased wig like daddy’s who runs a Dairy Queen.  Now stop crying and go play with your friends.”

UC’s point in all this is for the exact purposes set forth in the letter to the puffer as stated by The Pages, who, by all accounts lovingly turned them all.  Hey, I’ll say this for them, you’d rather have your frosty family history thrown around in UC than on the pages of the local newspaper – because at least the UC doesn’t cover obituaries, or the district and circuit court docket.  The articles are meant to make the people who they are about happy.  They are meant to show everyone in the city, “Hey, this is me.  I’m this way and this is sort of person, so you should like me because of it.”  There is nothing really wrong with that, and it obviously has an audience since we received a “gift” refill after our original prescription ran out.  My own personal experience with it was different as I’ve said.  The pictures and all that were good, and the article was well written; but it was well-written because it said what would have been best for us to say if we were wordSmiths.  It’s not that my wife and I had anything bad to say about Ireland at all.  It’s just that after reading the story, you’d think The Cleavers had gotten married on The Emerald Isle.  I think I was quoted as saying something like, “All the people in Ireland are just so downright friendly and helpful”.  Not the actual quote, but I have never even gotten close to talking like that.  I would have said something like, “Man, them fewls in Ireland are tasty.  Werd.” – or something ignorant like that, so only people around me enough would have known what I meant.  In the end, local rags like the UC magazine can be a good thing.  Just don’t take them too seriously.  All you have to do is read it, and learn about what you should be buying if you want to be cool.