On The Question of Lovin' It
Saturday, March 05, 2005
If you're not a good reader, listen to this piece through WBEZ.
I'd estimate that when I was in eleventh grade, I ate about two thirds of my meals at McDonald's. Back in the halcyon days of 1994, you could still smoke there, whereas you could not smoke in the cafeteria of my boarding school. That year, I ate around 200 orders of large fries and smoked 1,500 cigarettes at the golden arches, and you'll never guess what happened to me: I didn't die.
Either I am indestructible, or the guy from Super Size Me is a whiny brat who throws himself into a tizzy every time a little piece of his liver stops working. The fact of the matter is that McDonald's is as American as the rectangular apple pies it serves and the moms it underemploys. And today, we mourn America's loss, because every time a friendly, neighborhood place like the Rock 'n Roll McDonald's shuts down, an artery in the circulatory system of our great nation gets clogged.
Will no one think of the hideously inaccurate airbrushed portraits of celebrities? This place is a landmark, people! A landmark opened in 1983! Can't Mayor Daley do something about this? If not, can't the Chicago Reader write a breathless story about how the failure to save the historical Rock n Roll McDonald's proves the stunning fact that the Daley administration cares more about money than about architecture?
Fortunately, they aren't going to totally destroy the corner of Ohio and Clark by building, like, a Burger King or a Wendy's. Instead, Ronald and Grimace and other non-union workers are going to build a new McDonald's on the gravesite of the old one. And even a sentimental, change-phobic crank like myself has to admit the new restaurant will be sort of awesome.
It will have high-speed Internet access, for instance, allowing me to visit WebMD and read about the symptoms of heart failure while eating my Big Mac. And the new restaurant will feature long, communal tables instead of the small, private ones we're used to. It will be just like the cafeteria in fourth grade, except without fruits and vegetables, which is a shame, because by far the best part of my fourth grade cafeteria was Eric Piercy using a banana to explain a certain act that some presidents think is sex and other presidents think is not sex. All the other parts of the fourth grade cafeteria were torture, but I'm sure communal seating will work great at McDonald's. If there's one group of strangers I trust, it's "strangers who eat at McDonald's downtown even though there are dozens of reasonably priced, gastronomically superior restaurants within a three-block radius."
But of course, one will not go to the new McDonald's merely to eat. To quote an architect on the project, the new McDonald's will be "a place to see and be seen." Specifically, to see, and be seen by, overweight families from Wisconsin. And, of course, you won't be able to smoke. Ah, the inexorable march of progress. I'm lovin' it, indeed.
I'd estimate that when I was in eleventh grade, I ate about two thirds of my meals at McDonald's. Back in the halcyon days of 1994, you could still smoke there, whereas you could not smoke in the cafeteria of my boarding school. That year, I ate around 200 orders of large fries and smoked 1,500 cigarettes at the golden arches, and you'll never guess what happened to me: I didn't die.
Either I am indestructible, or the guy from Super Size Me is a whiny brat who throws himself into a tizzy every time a little piece of his liver stops working. The fact of the matter is that McDonald's is as American as the rectangular apple pies it serves and the moms it underemploys. And today, we mourn America's loss, because every time a friendly, neighborhood place like the Rock 'n Roll McDonald's shuts down, an artery in the circulatory system of our great nation gets clogged.
Will no one think of the hideously inaccurate airbrushed portraits of celebrities? This place is a landmark, people! A landmark opened in 1983! Can't Mayor Daley do something about this? If not, can't the Chicago Reader write a breathless story about how the failure to save the historical Rock n Roll McDonald's proves the stunning fact that the Daley administration cares more about money than about architecture?
Fortunately, they aren't going to totally destroy the corner of Ohio and Clark by building, like, a Burger King or a Wendy's. Instead, Ronald and Grimace and other non-union workers are going to build a new McDonald's on the gravesite of the old one. And even a sentimental, change-phobic crank like myself has to admit the new restaurant will be sort of awesome.
It will have high-speed Internet access, for instance, allowing me to visit WebMD and read about the symptoms of heart failure while eating my Big Mac. And the new restaurant will feature long, communal tables instead of the small, private ones we're used to. It will be just like the cafeteria in fourth grade, except without fruits and vegetables, which is a shame, because by far the best part of my fourth grade cafeteria was Eric Piercy using a banana to explain a certain act that some presidents think is sex and other presidents think is not sex. All the other parts of the fourth grade cafeteria were torture, but I'm sure communal seating will work great at McDonald's. If there's one group of strangers I trust, it's "strangers who eat at McDonald's downtown even though there are dozens of reasonably priced, gastronomically superior restaurants within a three-block radius."
But of course, one will not go to the new McDonald's merely to eat. To quote an architect on the project, the new McDonald's will be "a place to see and be seen." Specifically, to see, and be seen by, overweight families from Wisconsin. And, of course, you won't be able to smoke. Ah, the inexorable march of progress. I'm lovin' it, indeed.
