Typing Out Loud: Cereal Prizes in 2025

Freakies!

For some reason this morning, I had a flashback to my childhood ambition of what I wanted to be when I grew up. I listed with pride in my Communion preparation book that I wanted to work at McDonalds!

High aspirations there. 

I also printed carefully in said workbook that I also wanted to create the prizes that went in cereal boxes. 

Ah, the ambitions of youth. 

So I thought it would be a fun goal for 2025 and fulfill my childhood dream of creating a cereal box prize! 

But more goes into it then just creating a plastic thingamabob that will entertain for the five minutes it takes to finish a bowl of Sugar Smacks. And that's where my training in marketing comes into play. 

Who's my cereal company? Will I create a fictitious cereal brand or pick an existing one? And who is the audience for this? Part one!

 

And prizes are usually created to promote something - a movie, an event, or an idea. Thus researching and coming up with a theme will be part two of this exercise! 

I know from growing up that it was never about ONE prize - there was always a "collect them all!" promotion that kept mom buying more than one box of cereal so we could get all the prizes or enough to satisfy all of us getting our turn to claim the premium. And there's a vast number of freebies within that idea - stickers, puzzle books, paint with water, magnets, and plastic toys were all part of the giveaway. Even free music evolved from plastic 45s on the back of the box to codes to download songs. Do I want to 3-D model plastic toys or create an array? Part three!

Part four will be execution, actually creating the prizes. This is where the fun comes in. I know I have the skills to design stickers, puzzle books, and magnets, but what about an actual 3-D toy? With the availability of 3-D printers, can I do it? 

Oh, the things I make up to keep my brain engaged... 

That's It, Just One Line - Death on Two Legs

"You're a sewer rat decaying in a cesspool of pride."

Typing Out Loud/Why Art Matters: A New Skating Season

I believe my soul is on fire... 

The powers that be, this time those that control music rights and publishing, have rendered ALL of my skating programs illegal. How? BMI/ASCAP came down hard on US Figure Skating, USA Gymnastics, DCI marching band, as well as bars, restaurants, gyms, and other public spaces if they haven't properly paid for the licensing rights to play music. If your music isn't on their approved list, you have to pay an extra royalty fee to play it. So I looked up my program music...

No more character showcase for I'm Only Sleeping. 

No more artistic to Melissa. 

I'm glad I practiced The Girl That I Knew Somewhere because it's not on the list, and thus a retired free skate before I could compete it. And Daydream Believer isn't an option either. 

So what now? A fresh start.

The list:

Burning Sky: it's cool, like really cool. I've already got a bug up my ass defending its deserved place on Bad Company's 10 from 6 greatest hits album which is really only 10 from 5. Did they think we wouldn't notice? I think there's enough to work with here, plus thunderstorms, to pull together a really cool free skate program. And look at that color palette up above - blue AND orange! It's on the approved list. ASCAP score 100%.

Shame on the Moon: It's got a sweet shuffle and takes me back to my shy early high school days. Solo dance. It's on the list. ASCAP score 100%.

This could be visually stunning.

Calypso: This has been in my back pocket for a while, but someone I used to skate with disliked John Denver, so I set it aside. The idea was to skate as a figurehead at the front of a ship. ASCAP score 100%.

Sky, sea, and the heavens. I like it.

I really cannot believe how easy this was.

The Beatles, Ranked! 21-25

Dance on George

21
Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) (31) I should hate it because it's John's confessional about being a rat to his wife Cynthia, but it's just so... complicated. The opening guitar riff is intimate, George's sitar is otherworldly, and I got the complexities of the story when I was young, even if the innuendo went completely over my head at the time. And as the narrator, he's not the winner in this story; the girl rebuffs him, and he ends up sleeping in the bathtub. This was my first choice for My Fab Four on Sirius XM. 

22

In My Life (4) It should be higher of course, but we are talking about all A+ material at this point. I tend to compare and contrast masterpieces based on eras, and this beats Yesterday (2) for me every which way. John considers it his first great song. I've been having conversations with Will about the Beatles as he says they were the first boy band. I agreed but pointed out the distinct difference of how they quickly evolved from She Loves You to things like this.  

23

Nowhere Man (42) Three Rubber Souls in a row. More introspection from John. Those harmonies can melt the coldest of souls, but the way he sings "Maaaaaaan" alone is enough to earn top rankings. 

24

Don't Bother Me George wrote this one while sick in bed and noping out early on Beatlemania. There's an echo-y quality to his singing, the guitar groove is all that, but I love the percussion provided by Ringo on bongoes and Paul playing a woodblock. Plus there's pretty cool b-roll of the boys dancing to it at a nightclub in the A Hard Days Night movie. Critics have long said this is The Beatles at their worst, and I've listened to it carefully in an attempt to hear what they are trying to say. Nah, this is a jam and so really like him. 

25

In Spite of All the Danger The first song to make it on vinyl, a Quarrymen song credited to McCartney-Harrison. They paid five pounds in July 1958 to record the 78 in a closet with a microphone. Doing the math, George was 15 and Paul had just turned 16. The other Quarrymen, in addition to John, were Duff Lowe on piano and Colin Hanton on drums. 

In true teenage boy fashion, they pooled their money to make the record, coming up just short a few shillings. When they finally had enough, they paid the last of the deposit, and the record, a single solitary disc, was theirs. They all took turns owning it, passing it around, with Lowe keeping the record until Paul asked to buy it back in 1981. 

It was made available to the public on the Anthology recordings in 1995 and Paul still plays it live as a tribute to George and John. Thanks to Duff for keeping it safe all those years, I'm glad his brief membership in the band paid off very well. 

It was not my intention, but interesting to note #25 was their first recording and #26 was the last.

Sirius/XM did their annual Top 100 countdown over Memorial Day weekend. A number in parenthesis is that song's position on that countdown.

Mini Movies in my Head: How I Reunited The Beatles

Paul is about to tell me to get out of the road.

In a classic watch what you eat before you go to bed, I had a vivid dream of somehow being responsible for reuniting The Beatles in the 70s. 

I was playing hopscotch in the parking lot of an apartment building and a girl playing in the grass asked if she could play too; I said sure. There was chalk, jumping, striped shirts, and laughter. I asked her name and she said Mary, pointing to her little sister, said that's Stella. 

I said I had a little sister too and looked around for Candi but she wasn't there; said I had a sister Gia who was riding her bike, and she replied me too my sister Heather is around somewhere. 

Mary tripped, and I pulled her out of the way of a gold Cutlass. The man in the car recognized her but I was worried about stranger danger, and pulled her aside. A boy got out to play with us, said he was three and he was Sean. 

Being protective of my new friend, I told the man that if he wanted to talk to her and me, he had to talk to our dads. 

Suddenly Ringo is my dad (apologies to the real Jerry). Mary's dad is of course Paul, which means 3/4 of the Beatles are now talking in the parking lot of this random apartment building. There's a park across the lot, with benches, suddenly there are guitars, and someone says "Let's call George." He shows up with Dhani in a baby Bjorn. There's a jam session in the park, and as I'm waking up to make sense of it all, I theorize this is the advent of the kiddie rock genre, and I envision myself on the cover of Rolling Stone's Kids Who Rock issue as a hero to all music lovers, while eating an apple. 

Rethinking Green

Clover seed pods -sometimes they would explode!

Green is...

Taste: clover seed pods, as kids we used to call pickles because the seed pod looked just like a little sour pickle. We used to nibble on these when the plants would spring up in the grass or in a crack in the concrete. It was also fun if they were a little ripe to give them a twist and watch them explode.

Touch: the kids think it's insulting to say "touch grass," but go ahead, especially the new, tender shoots.

Smell: a freshly mowed lawn.

Hear: a lawn mower on a summer night.

Hm, not so clever, am I. Blame it on the grass for being so green.

Best Meal I Ever Ate, Hamburgers

It's just a stone's throw from Little House on the River.

There's something about the nostalgia of looking back at your younger days when things were a little more carefree... and you weren't the one picking up the check. 

For some reason, eating a hamburger with mustard, ketchup, pickle, and onion at the crowded lunch counter at Schlenkler's back in the 70s on Christmas break comes to mind as the best burger I ever had. 

Schlenkler's today is still maybe 15 seats max and includes an expansion so you can imagine how tiny it was back then. I think we walked there, we may have been only down to one car at the time and my mom was at work. I remember feet sweating in moon boots and fighting to get a round stool at the counter. My dad may have eaten standing up behind us.

Simply delicious. 

Opinions have not changed, Schlenker's is consistently named to "Best of" lists in the state, not only for the burgers but for onion rings as big as your head. The last time I was in there I dealt with rude staff and almost walked out. But the burger? Worth it. 

Since I don't get down to Jackson much anymore - mom spends the majority of her time in Florida - I needed a new best place and Mishler's fits the bill. 

This place in Evart is so beloved that the owners have been trying to sell it and can't seem to shut it down due to public outcry. The For Sale sign that has been out front for a year has quietly been removed. 

I made a mistake the first time I went there by ordering the taco salad. Absolutely nothing special and I was discouraged from going again. The next time, Will pestered me because he really wanted a cheeseburger and a milkshake. 

Let that be a lesson to you: don't go to a burger joint and go rogue  - stick to the basics.

Fresh ground quality beef, toasty bun, generous toppings. A regular sets you back $3, a double, $4. That is insanely rock-bottom. Hand-dipped shakes in a wild variety of flavors outside the classic chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry; raspberry truffle is the house flavor. 

Deep-fried goodness includes the usual fries, cheese sticks, onion rings, and mushrooms. The onion rings have to be hand-dipped, they are too big, fresh, and greasy. 

Pia, who is the pickiest of eaters, requested a trip to Mishler's over Memorial Day weekend and put away a big burger and curly fries, wishing as she was eating, that she could eat there one more last time. We took her parents there the week they came to get her, and I think Martin wants to move here.

Sadly, they open late in the season and close early, so get while the gettin' is good in the heart of summer.