What a bust! An expired Howard Johnson’s sweeps, around which, before I realized the deadline was past, I was going to recall Max Apple’s short story “The Oranging of America” as well as a few swell memories of eating out at the local Howard Johnson’s Restaurant, right off Exit 16 of the Connecticut Turnpike, with my family. We hardly ate out when I was growing up, in part because of the younger children underfoot, but when we descended upon Howard Johnson’s and arranged ourselves in a booth I felt an exquisite sense of protected contentment the likes of which I’ve rarely felt since or expect to feel again. I always ordered fried clams and slathered them with tartar sauce and, for dessert, I more often than not ordered pie a la mode. It was not fancy but it was bliss.
Next, I went to enter a sweeps for two nights at The Pierre that requires a product number and unfortunately I do not have said product in my possession. But so much is my desire to stay at The Pierre that I plan on getting said product, even though I tend to favor No Purchase Required sweeps over these sorts of sweeps. I am acting like some silly woman who in another era would have lost her marbles over green stamps and the infinite passion of possibility therein.
Next, I checked out a sweeps, sponsored by Entemann’s, for two nights in Beverly Hills. Entemann’s, which Frank Sinatra used to have flown from the East Coast to Palm Springs because they weren’t sold there and he loved them that much. Entemann’s, maker of the coffee crumb cake I’ve eaten for years. When I was pregnant back in 1996 and my son’s father was out of town covering the Republican Convention I ate an entire Entemann’s cake all by myself one afternoon. I did not share one crumb, not even with the cats.
Alas, the Official Rules do not specify which hotel, they just say a Los Angeles area hotel, which is not promising since that could be some sort of Miss Lonelyhearts affair with mildew that would bring on my allergies and inspire a fit of sneezing along the lines of the one I had when I rented an eighteenth-century farmhouse in Spain and every night when I went to bed I sneezed over and over and over until I lost count and went out like a light and in the morning I’d hurry to the café down the street for coffee and my waiter was named Angel. On the weekends, he was a bullfighter.
So, what then, what? What about a trip to Dublin! St. Patrick’s Day approaches. Isaac is readying for his annual sipping of the green beer.
To enter, click HERE. One entry per person. The deadline is April 1.