Tell Me It Ain't So -- Coney Island Tacos!!!

Van (on right) and I at Angelo's on Dort Highway

My friend Van from Georgia paid a visit to Michigan recently and I was lucky enough to be able to spend an entire day with him back in our old hometown of Flint, Michigan.  Since time was short,  we combined the two things that we loved to do into one – which is sitting down in front of two up and a side of fries from Angelo’s and playing a game of Scrabble.

Van and I take Scrabble pretty seriously.  For the last eight years or so, a Friday night doesn’t go by where the both of us aren’t online taking each other on in a game of Scrabble.  We connect to some Scrabble playing board located in Romania (I’m serious) and we use Yahoo or Google Talk for live audio chat to talk trash to each other as we play.   His wife and my girlfriend think that the both of us are nuts and neither Van or I will correct their opinion of us, because we know that despite our weirdness that they still love us.

The date was August 21, 2010.  I drove over to Flint from the Port Huron area (where I now live) to pick up Van at the motel where he was staying on Hill Road in Grand Blanc.  We were both hungry for coneys and playing a game of Scrabble and I decided that the best place to play and eat would be at Angelo’s Dort Hwy location – not only because the place isn’t as busy as the Franklin and Davison location – but this Angelo’s is located in the old Wendy’s restaurant location (next to where Ember’s use to be) and we had spent many hours soaking up alcohol with burgers and fries there in the early 80s.

You might think that people might say something to you or give you an odd look or two when two normal looking guys sit down in a coney island restaurant and set a Scrabble board before the drinks and menus are brought to the table – you might think it – but nothing whatsoever happened.  No stares, no comments, no nothing.  As a matter of fact, our waitress was nice enough to take a picture of the both of us playing and enjoying our coneys and who said the people in Flint aren’t friendly.  Hahaha!

To make a long story short – I am proud to say that I won what we titled “The Flint Angelo’s Scrabble Challenge” by a score of 348 to 283.  I should have taken a picture of the winning board – but it totally escaped me.

What didn’t escape Van or I was something that we saw posted on a sign at Angelo’s.  Angelo’s was introducing a new menu item and Van and I took it as a slap the Flint coney dog and something that we felt embarrassed that Angelo’s would stoop to doing just to sell a few more dogs.  The item that they were selling: ‘HARD SHELL CONEYS” – which is nothing more than coney island tacos.  What the…..

If you were born and bred in Flint, Michigan – there is one thing that we could always be proud of and that’s Koegel hot dogs.  Koegel hot dogs aren’t your everyday hot dog made with animal parts that you wouldn’t feed to your pet.  Koegel’s were (and still are) made to some pretty high standards and anyone who has ever eaten a Kogel coney longs to hear and feel that snap of the dog when you bite into it.  It’s that snap and the high quality that we have come to expect in a coney made with a Koegel hot dog – but now Angelo’s (of all places) is cheapening the coney experience by turning it into a taco.

I have had arguments with coney island cooks in the Port Huron area about the Flint coney versus the Detroit style coney.  I don’t care what these slap-happy grease pushers say --- the Flint coney is a better hot dog and I’m sure that there are other people out there who feel the same way that I do, but it just saddens me that Angelo’s has now turned the coney into a taco.  What’s next coney pizza?  Coney Subs?  Coney sushi?  Coney on a stick?

If you love coneys like I love coneys….I urge you to say no to the Hard Shell Coney at Angelo’s,  After all that Flint has gone through as a city – the last thing we need is to see Angelo’s make a mockery of our beloved coney island. 

And with that said…if you see my waitress…tell her that I could use another coney and a side of fries with gravy.

He's Coming Home....For A Visit, That Is

  A photo of Van and Rich taken during Van's last visit to Flint

I can see it now. 

He’s counting down the days. 

I wouldn’t be surprised if he has a  calendar set up at his home in Macon, Georgia and he’s using a big black Magic Marker © to mark the days off. 

30 days.  29 days.  28 days. 27 days.  26 days.  25 days.  24 days.  23 days.  22 days.  3 more weeks!

After some seven years, my buddy Van VanDeWalker is going to be visiting his hometown of Flint, Michigan and to say that he’s excited about this visit would be the understatement of the century.  He’s pumped!  If you could put anticipation for a trip on steroids – Van would make Barry Bonds look like a piker when it came to being “juiced”!

No longer does Van have to settle for reliving the memories of biting down and hearing the snap of a Koegel Vienna with Angelo’s coney island sauce, mustard and onions…he’s going to be able to enjoy one, two, maybe three.

Van can attest to the fact that not only does seven days without a Halo Burger make one week – imagine seven years between a Bill Thomas olive Halo burger.  Knowing Van  he’ll probably tell you that having to live all those years without a Bill Thomas Halo burger was a living hell – something akin to being water boarded by Dick Cheney.

The anticipation for this trip is high…really high…and it makes sane men do strange things.  If I were a betting man, I’d place a few bucks on one of the first things that Van does when he gets off the plane at Bishop Airport is to kiss the ground.   Yup, he’ll get down on his knees and kiss the tarmac and hope like hell that airport security doesn’t bitch slap him.  I’m sure that before Van leaves the airport in his cheapest you can find but still expensive rent-a-car, he will buy a Flint Journal from one of the airport coin boxes to read back in his motel room.  And, if I know Van, he’ll be sneaking a peek at a headline here and there while waiting for the traffic lights to change on the way to his budget motel. 

One of the reasons that Van will be visiting Flint will be to attend a high school class reunion,  but one day of his three day visit will be taken up by doing one thing – joining me for a tour of the old town and seeing first hand just how much things have changed. 

Whether it was going to Kearsley Park on a hot summer day to learn basic lessons of safety at Safetyville, USA or taking in a Thanksgiving Day Northern/Central game at Atwood Stadium on a cold winter day – that’s the Flint that will forever be a part of a lot of us.  Or maybe it was jumping on an MTA bus and meeting all our friends downtown to see a movie at the Palace or Capitol Theater, or enjoying a ice cream sundae in the restaurant at Smith B’s or a bag of caramel popcorn from Dales. There are so many moments and places that both Van and I are going to relive as we drive around Flint and remembering how it use to be.

When we drive by Windmill Place – I’m sure we’ll have a laugh remembering when that Saturday a long long time ago when I participated in a “Celebrity Hot Dog Eating Contest”.  The organizers of this even pitted me against some small bellied “celebrities” from WTRX, Channel 5 and some other media organization that I can’t remember and they didn’t have a chance against my hot dog eating skills – me, the well-trained eating machine.  These guys were no match and I didn’t even have to pull out all of the stops to trounce the competition.  . 

Van will be surprised as I take him to one of the new sub-divisions in Grand Blanc and remind him that the radio station that we once worked for – WTAC – once stood where these beautiful homes now stand.  I’m sure he’ll also be surprised by all of the changes on S. Saginaw in Grand Blanc….this wasn’t the way he remembered the way it looked.

Van will also be surprised when I point out to him that the “Jumbo Video” store on Dort Hwy., across from K-Mart, is where the Ember’s Lounge once stood.  It was at the Ember’s Lounge where all of his friends left him alone on the dance floor to do a drunken Pee Wee Herman dance as we enjoyed our drinks and watched him from our table.

Our sight-seeing trip to Flint wouldn’t be complete without checking out the Citizens Bank weather ball or driving by that forty foot waitress in front of at the coney island restaurant on Corunna Road.  For old times sake – we’ll probably buy a lottery ticket or two at Paul’s Pipe Shop and see first hand all of the improvements downtown from the Durant Hotel to Channel 5’s new Flint headquarters to the new grocery store that just opened.  We’ll probably visit the old neighborhoods and share stories about what made living there so great and as we’ll probably pay a visit to Gracelawn to honor family members who have left us that made these memories we’ll share possible. 

So, join us in counting down the days.  August 20-23, 2010 – Van VanDeWalker visits Flint.  Believe it or not – on August 21^st – Van and I are going to combine two of our loves into one thing….coney islands and Scrabble.  So, don’t be surprised if you see two guys chowing down the dogs at Angelo’s while they’re playing a game of Scrabble.  You’re more than welcome to watch – but please – no helping the participants.  

It's My Buddy's Birthday!!!!

A much younger Van VanDeWalker and Rich Frost

Happy birthday, Van VanDeWalker!

Yup, my old buddy Van (who works for Animal Control in Macon, Georgia) is turning fifty-six today (which is something like three-hundred and ninety-two dog years, but who’s counting?). Van is probably going to be bombarded with birthday wishes from friends and family all day and who knows how many more people in the Macon area, that he has met in his day-to-day journeys with his famous dog, A.C. Pup, will shower him with even more love and birthday wishes. But, you wanna know something? If there’s anyone anywhere worthy of that love and attention – it’s Van VanDeWalker – who like me is proud is proud to say that he’s “from Flint, Michigan, damn it!!!”

What kind of guy is Van VanDeWalker? Well, let me put it to you this way – Van and I met each other some twenty-five plus years ago at WTAC Radio in Flint. We were both hired to work there when former newsman (now Genesee County Prosecuting Attorney) David Leyton purchased the station and switched the station’s format from country to talk. I arrived at the station at around 5:30 in the morning to find VanDeWalker already there preparing for his first newscast. After he introduced himself to me, Van asked me if I would like a cup of coffee from the pot that he just brewed up in the station’s mini-kitchen. When I told Van that I can’t drink caffeinated coffee (because of what it does to my blood pressure) and that I only drank decaf, he went on to compare decaffeinated coffee to female genitilia and it was then and there that I realized that Van and I were going to be friends forever.

Van and I have gone through a whole lot in the last twenty-five plus years. We have probably shared more good moments than we have bad and despite the fact that some eight hundred and eighty-one miles separate us -- our friendship continues to grow – thanks in a large part to the Internet. Both his wife, Traci and my girlfriend, Marty think that we are both a little nuts because we love to play Scrabble and have played it online for nearly nine years – talking trash with each other on the audio chat on Yahoo Instant Messenger as we play. And I will admit that Van is the better Scrabble player – and although I may bitch that I’m a lousy at the game – I wouldn’t mind losing every game, because it gives me a chance to be able to bond over the Internet with my buddy, Van.

Although we have never talked about it – I think that Van and I are a lot alike. If we could wave a magic wand – we would both be sharing our lives with the people that we love today but living in the town that we love and remember (Flint, Michigan), but know deep in our heart that our old hometown will never be like we remember it. And, it’s kind of frustrating that we can’t show our love ones just how great it was to live in Flint – because that city doesn’t exist anymore -- but Van and I remember and every so often it helps the both of us to keep that Flint connection going – because we’re from Flint, damn it! We feel more comfortable with a couple of coneys and a side of fries with gravy on it from Angelos than we would if we had to dine in some fancy four star restaurants.

Van and I both came from neighborhoods where people cared for each other and they watched each other’s back. We lived in neighborhoods where you knew everyone on your street and the street behind you – and if someone needed a hand – you extended yours and you helped them no questions ask. I’m sure that a lot of what Van experienced from living in the kind of neighborhoods in Flint that he lived in, has made him a better person and an even better animal control officer in Macon, Georgia.

You can’t deny it, Van….today is your birthday….and you’re from Flint, damn it! I wish I could be with your personally to celebrate your birthday and I hope you accept my virtual birthday gift of a basket filled with Koegel hot dogs, a week’s worth of Halo Burgers with olives with an endless stream of Vernor’s Crème Ales, a couple of Big John Steak and Onion barbeque steak and onion subs, and some Ya Ya chicken. And, I if you look deep in the virtual birthday gift box – there’s also all the Flint Journals that you have missed reading since you moved to Georgia and, although it’s not from Flint, I threw in a couple of can cases of Tim Horton coffee – only to satisfy your “Hockey Night In Canada” lovin’ taste buds.

Happy birthday, Van!!!

My Facebook 25 Things You Didn't Know About Me List

It seems like a week doesn't go by when I don't recieve one of those "25 Things You Didn't Know About Me" list from someone on my Facebook page. Well, I was recently tagged -- which means that you have to do a 25 Things list or you'll go to hell or something...so, I cranked out my list over a two hour period last night and I thought I would also post it on my blog for even more people to read (and wonder out loud why I did it).


"25 Things You Didn't Know About Me"

1. I was born at 4:30 in the morning on January 15, 1954 at St. Joe's Hospital in Flint. (The hospital – once a teaching hospital – is now closed).

2. I wet the bed until I was about four years old. I was "cured" when my Mom told our neighbor to get the scissors out because she wanted to "cut my thing" off so I wouldn’t do it anymore. As soon as I heard that – I ran and hid underneath the bunk bed that my sister and I shared and cried myself to sleep. As ugly as this story may sound – I never peed the bed again.

3. My parents got a divorce when I was eight years old. The day that my father left us – my sister and I helped him pack his clothes.

4. This surprises a lot of people: I was once an altar boy at St. Leo The Great in Flint (another place that played a part in my life that is also closed).

5. The unique thing about my first communion photo is that, unbeknownst to me at the time, the zipper on my pants was wide open and you can see the white of my shirt popping out of my trousers.

6. Although there was at least seven of them – I can’t remember celebrating Christmas with my father as a part of the family unit.

7. The first car that I ever owned was given to me by legendary Flint broadcaster, Peter C. Cavenaugh and the car even had a name "The Rock N’ Roll Mobile". If that car could talk – it would have some stories to tell – and some of my exploits added to its legend.

8. Some schools in Flint that I have attended: Lewis Elementary (torn down), Lowell Jr. High (closed and may be torn down in the not too distant future), and Flint Northern (I was the first graduating class from the new Flint Northern building on Mackin Road ). (A theme running through these 25 questions – the old Flint Northern building was torn down.)

9. I took one college course at Mott Community College in Flint. It was an English course (my worse subject) and the only reason that I took it was because of a girl who I would ride to and from school with. I had an extreme crush on this girl (but could never act on it) – not only did she have huge breasts – but she also had these beautiful and mysterious eyes that you felt could zero in on what you were thinking. (Note: A picture of this girl can be found on Peter C’s wildwednesday.com web page – she’s one of the people in the production crew at Wild Wednesday).

10. Growing up – I had fantasies of being a writer, but here’s where my fantasies get weird I visualized writing great stories in a booth at some coney island in Flint while I drank coffee and smoked cigarettes – and some waitress (unlike your normal coney island waitress - she’d have brains along to go along with her beauty) would fall in love with me and we would live happily ever after.

11. In high school – I was a member of the school newspaper – and it was there that I acquired a love for journalism.

12. Probably the most fun that I ever had in radio had to be at WTAC. I worked at the station when it was rock n’ roll, country and talk – and each one of the eras there had some great moments. In a period of maybe six years – I got to work with people like Peter C., Fred "Boogie" Brian, Jim Kramer, Ed Brown, Gary Raymond, Dave Barber, Ray Nelson, Van VanDeWalker, Chris Pavelich and Pete Sark (just to name a few). I was incredibly lucky to be able to work with some incredible Michigan broadcasting legends.

13. Getting married live on the radio was probably the dumbest thing that I ever done on radio (as well as in my life). The judge who Dave Barber arranged to perform the marriage ceremony had to get special permission from the Michigan Supreme Court to perform the ceremony. The marriage tanked after two-hundred and ninety-seven days and I ended getting a do-it-yourself divorce. Afterwards -- I was always afraid of bumping into the judge who performed the ceremony because I thought that he might ask about how "me and the missus were doing".....but I found out that this judge’s marriage did a turn in the toilet, too – so, I didn’t feel so bad.

14. Although my marriage lasted less than three hundred days – it’s been going on fifteen years that Marty and I have been together.

15. When it comes to sex - I was a late bloomer - and I can remember the first time that I ever had sex – and the only reason why I can remember it is because it happened on the afternoon of the day that Elvis Presley died. While driving the girl home from my house – I turned the car radio on to WTAC and heard the news about the King’s death. Hearing the news surprised me, because I always thought that he was dead! I could have sworn that I saw a picture of him dead on the cover of the National Enquirer long before he died while trying to "pinch a loaf" on the toilet at Graceland.

16. My longest stint in radio (some 13 years) was working at WHLS-AM and WSAQ-FM in Port Huron (which later merged with WBTI-FM and WPHM-AM and a stand-alone station in Marine City).

17. My shortest stint in broadcasting was working in the traffic department at Fox66 Television in Flint. I hated the job and it was the only job in that I was ever fired from. I was the wrong person for the wrong job – but I need the job at the time.

18. I would have to say that my very best friend is Van VanDeWalker. Van now lives in Macon, GA with his lovely wife, Tracie, and a whole bunch of dogs – but I met Van when he came to work at WTAC when David Leyton (now Genesee County Prosecutor) purchased the station. I arrived at the station early to produce "Morning Magazine with Dave Barber" and the first thing that Van asked me was whether or not I wanted a cup of coffee. I told Van that I only drank decaffeinated coffee (which the station didn’t have) and his response to me was "drinking decaf coffee is like eating hairless pussy". I think I mentioned some of the merits of "the hairless" and we became fast friends from that very moment.

19. To show you how much of a pathetic fuck both Van and I are – we play Scrabble with each other online. We don’t just play – we have Scrabble seasons of a hundred and sixty games – and we’re currently in our eighth season. We connect (audio-wise) with Google Talk and we talk trash to each other as we play. Van is the better Scrabble player having won six of seven complete seasons.

20. I use to joke around that "the only good kid is one that you could pop into a microwave oven" – but that was before I became a "Grandpa" to Marty’s son Bill and daughter-in-law Beth’s two children. You haven’t experienced life until you receive the unconditional love that comes from a grandchild. About once every six weeks or so – I’ll e-mail grand baby pictures to some twenty-five plus people in my address book. I know that some people must think I’m nuts about these babies – but I can’t help not sharing my love of these beautiful babies with everyone that I know.

21. When it comes to food – I could eat barbequed ribs seven days a week. But, please don’t try to feed me sauerkraut and sausage, bean soup, or oatmeal without raisins – that’s unless you enjoy the sight of a man doing some projectile vomiting.

22. The first movie that I ever remember seeing was "Ben Hur" at the Northland Drive-In in Flint (which no longer exists). The first movie that I can remember seeing (by myself) in a theater was "Viva Las Vegas" with Elvis Presley that was showing at the Capital Theater (now closed – but the marquee was used in the Will Farrell movie "Semi-Pro").

23. The dumbest habit I ever had was smoking....which I did for nearly thirty years.

24. The hardest thing that I ever had to deal with was the death of my Mother and having to tell her on Thanksgiving Day 2001 that my sister and I would understand if she didn’t want to take any more chemo cancer treatments. For those interested – I write about that day on my blog – that you can link on to at: http://lostinavoca.blogspot.com/2005/11/mom.html

25. And last but not least – here’s the 25th thing that you may have not known about me: I have cried a few times while watching a movie on Lifetime with Marty. Are you happy now?