Michael Landrum

Call me Nostro-fucking-damus. José, I want a percentage!!! (Note to TLC, you will be hearing from my lawyers for theft of intellectual property regarding "I Made Boom Boom!")

I'm a little bit confused--maybe more so for assuming Paul Harvey is a preacher or some type of "man of the cloth". 1) Isn't god creating something on the eighth day kinda like me going to the grocery store getting everything I need to make my Seven-Layer dip, getting home and getting all settled in on my BarcaLounger and then going "Oh shit, I forgot the Tostito Scoops!" and then going back out to the store? 2) Didn't god already make a farmer whose offerings he wasn't too psyched about so the farmer got all pissed off and killed his brother? 3) Does that mean that the "small, but important and growing, highly symbolic" target niche is Doomsday Preppers who want a good truck to run over their brethren with and the Dodge Ram is just such a truck? I mean, from a biblical-based marketing point of view, the whole ram thing is very clever and makes a lot of sense. You guys are all smart. Can someone figure this out for me?

Perhaps they will also be offered fellowships at Harvard where Barton Seaver can use them as test subjects in developing his symposium on "Sustainable Humans", alongside his Eco-Action Workshop, "How to Use the Ecological Devastastion of Cruise Ships to Promote the Environment...and Yourself!"

When it is a compound adjective modifying a subsequent noun, yes. So calf's liver, but calf's-liver mousse. Maybe it's the apostrophe'd possessive which throws you, so think: Bee pollen, versus bee-pollen jelly. As a great man once said, "The crux of the biscuit is the apostrophe."

I may be further black-balled for revealing this closely guarded secret of the restaurant world, or worse, be paid a "visit" by one of the members of the "Social Club" belonging to the "brother-in-law" (maybe more "vor v zakone") of the famous Crypto-Jewish Graham "famiglia" for violating the sacred code of Omertá, but since I have been forced into seclusion in an undisclosed location anyway, I may as well. What has been the case for over a decade, and hidden by layer after layer of off-shore shell corporations (Postcard from Aruba, anyone?), is that Tom Sietsema and a secret, crack team of elite Kaplan graduates each year produce--via unimaginably complex fractal algorithms derived from countless viewings of Seasons 3 and 4 of Sex and the City--a set of refrigerator magnets designed to seduce and titillate, beyond all control, food critics and those who aspire to be. These are then placed in a bag, or sack, and shaken vigorously by a mysterious, some would say biblically unknowable, figure known only by the sobriquet, Joey Onan, who then "spills the seeds of imagination", as the process is known, onto a large mirrored glass table. Then, once David Haagedorn is sufficiently intoxicated by the sweet elixir of his own pheromones, which have been captured and aerosolized in a uniquely Jose Andres alchemical process and manufactured by naked Costa Rican virgins working 18 hour shifts under armed guard, he arranges the refrigerator magnets into magically prescient--not trend-setting, trend-upsetting--press releases which, after being edited by that monkey wearing a fur coat at IKEA, are dispersed under multiple pseudonyms by "publicists", which are then promptly and freely plagiarized by food critics across the country--even right here in DC! If I am not heard from again, just remember--Follow the money. Follow the money.

Sippin' on a cherry soda pop, building houses made of sand. Like a little child with a fantasy, just a fraction of a man. But I was in love when they put her down, on my porch step in the rain. I could feel her love coming to my heart, through the window pane. But how could I know? She was just up and gone? My best friend gone? I'm so all alone. I really miss you, Brandy, I'm so all alone. When are you coming back home? I really miss you, Brandy, missing you every day. Are you coming home to stay?

So, an eight-year spate of cognitive dissonance and feared eschatology has finally resolved itself in the sudden recognition that Rockwell was the name of my freshman dorm at Andover. Those who passed through those halls must make an illustrious bunch. I have memories of loaves and loaves of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches as bulwarks against all-nighters, purloined bananas from Commons, illicit six-packs of Moosehead Ale from New Hampshire (drinking age 18!), and well- rotted quarts of pork fried rice as memories from there, which it turns out are stronger than anything I have posted or read here. Not that they eclipse memories and furtive longings of Willow Bay, Ritchie Banks, and I believe later, Olivia Wilde at the neighboring Johnson Hall. Not to mention a disturbingly close but completely innocent recondite mentorship by the Pumpkin Man (insert link here). Any one else out there? And whence forth from Rockwell? Adams? Taylor? Day Hall in billowing clouds of weed and Dead tunes? No pictures necessary. I'd be very interested in what the expert inter-webbians here can dig up about other survivors of the original Rockwell community.

I still have the fever. The only prescription is still more cow. I still put my pants on the same way the rest of you do--one leg at a time. And when my pants are on, I still make great cheeseburgers. We had so much fun doing Inauguration Fever, and it was such a good time, we are continuing it through today. To quote my girlfriend Topaz who so eloquently expressed both the Hell-Burger ethos and what I have to discovered in myself as my whole personal philosophy behind it, and what I have decided will be our official slogan from here on in: "If you grind it, they will come."

INAUGURATION FEVER Guess what? I have a fever and the only prescription is more cow. And more Obama. In what may well be the final paroxysms of ecstatic cathartic release bringing to a close the cycle of madness that was begun here in these pages over 4 1/2 years ago, we will be honoring and celebrating the Inauguration in the most fitting way possible--in one great Song of the He-Goat. On Sunday, January 20, 2013 (the Private Swearing In) we will be offering 2013 Li'l Devils with Vermont Cheddar Cheese and Tomato (Dijon Optional) and a small side (changing throughout the day, no guarantees) AT ABSOLUTELY NO COST. Free. Gratis (Bottled sodas/water $2--cash only). Crazy? Mad? Insane? Well, on Monday, January 21, 2013, we will be doing the very same thing! 2013 Li'l Devils with Cheddar and Tomato. Cheeseburgers. Free. Or as I like to call them, sorry I can't help myself, dithyramburgers. The catch? We request that for each burger a $5 donation be made (checks are cool), which we will turn over to the Boys and Girls Club in its entirety. Sunday will go to the Boys and Girls Club in North East for their after school meals program (often the only meal of the day outside of the school free lunch program for many of these kids). Monday will go to the Boys and Girls Club of Alexandria where many of my employees were members as kids and whose own kids are clients today. I'll make up the difference for any cheapskates out there out of pocket, guarantying each day's take to be $10,065, hopefully more. My only request? That the line proceed a strictly anapestic manner at all times, with no exceptions. Enforcers will be on hand. Caveats: Burgers will be cooked to medium (and may well lose pinkness to carry-over cooking, affecting color but not juiciness). Special orders, outside of no cheese for those who can't take it off themselves, most likely to not be possible or honored, at least not pleasantly, depending on length of line. One per person physically present (exceptions made for the elderly, the infirm, or children--who will all die if you use them to lie in order to score extra dithyramburgers). Final caveat: While no doubt hamartia will abound and exhibit freely, no anagnorisis is implied or guaranteed in this offer. Location: Ray's To The Third, 1650 Wilson Boulevard. (Unfortunately, the original Hell-Burger locations are jammed up in litigation right now and are not available for this celebration as originally planned). Time: 11:30 AM until the last burger is given away, both days. (Regular menu will not be available at The Third, but Ray's The Steaks and Retro Ray's will be open as (ab?)normal. Reservations highly recommended for both days). I put my pants on the same way the rest of you do--one leg at a time. Except when my pants are on I make great cheeseburgers. Don, you may retire the thread now.

I may have a very favorable, turn-key opportunity available in a high-profile location if anyone would like to put Kerry in touch with me via PM. No broker or other fees paid. Usual full disclaimers. Does not constitute an offer or offering. Good opportunity for other creative, close-to-the-ground, close-to-the-people, hands-on owner/operators as well. Emphasis on "may", bloggers and Post Toasties and -ists.

It's incredibly obvious isn't it? See, while Don does not avoid women, he does deny them his essence. The Russian women sense his power and seek the life essence, and the Russians therefore, naturally, seek to sap and impurify his Precious Bodily Fluids and destroy his Purity of Essence. A foreign substance is introduced without the knowledge of the individual. That's the way your hard-core post-Commie works.

Charles, I would have PM'ed you this but could not, so instead I will quadruple-space you. I can not tell you the many ways you and your family have saved me from a despondancy that without you I never would have survived. As much as I wish to say privately, I can only say publicly the love and appreciation I feel for you and your lovely, lovely family. Paltry as it may be, please accept this and know that I wait for the chance to be a better friend, Michael

Oh, and, with apologies to Young Goodman Zimmerman, who will give you Frankenshelter from the Frankenstorm? (Who'd've thought I could've worked some Hawthorne into my usual Nabokov/Pynchon/Shai Agnon/Primo Levi/Biggie Smalls schtick?)

Today gave me the opportunity to coin a phrase (which is so pitifully apt to a peculiar type of non-neighborhood restaurant--no offense to small mom and pops without the resources or local powerhouses with a conscience-- which has proliferated in and plagued the DC dining scene, and which could only exist here, oft-times with much ballyhoo from the Post and others, helmed by ex-TV game show contestants or license-fee only photogenic and pouty-lipped star-fuckable "celebrities" or those just provincially and pathetically wishing they were) while indulging in my shameless and, quite frankly, unhealthy (as many who know me know), possibly fetishistic, obsession with Timberland, Filson, Schott, Pendleton and Duofold (among others) gear before doing my rounds in Arlington--which was "a Members Only jacket in a Frankenstorm". I hope to meme the fuck out of this phrase, especially as it applies to restaurant fads and failures, and in fact first shared it with one Monsieur Carman, who happened to be dining at Ray's in SS--I think that's where, but can't be sure-- hopefully seeking solace from the wilderness and a lifetime of toil and blood where blackness is a virtue and the road is full of mud--but certainly on his own dime, as I can not imagine the Post expensing even a cashew at one of my joints at this point. All this to applaud, really, those who preserved the safety of their staff, as necessary, or served the public, as we all do as best as possible, when possible. And, if it comes up, think about who's wearing a Member's Only jacket in a Frankenstorm.

No need to worry. I have it on excellent authority that the only steakhouses that matter, as determined by the attentions of the major food writers, are Jean George Vongrechtin's J&G Steakhouse and Michael Mina's Bourbon. I can not tell you how relieved I was, personally, to be informed that I no longer bear the responsibility of serving the public in a meaningful manner or of providing meaningful employment opportunities, being of no significance one way or the other. Such freedom! If only the Landry people would come get me next...

One further point to add: When a restaurant is losing money, it does so catastrophically. When it is making money, it does so incrementally at best. Regardless, there is no in-between.

Sounds like you could have a great opportunity here, since the biggest factor in restaurant failure is blindness to the unforeseen "real" cost of capital and borrowing. (Conversely, sadly (as I will touch on below), the only ones "making" money in the restaurant business today are the ones who generate "income" BY borrowing money). As to your research, 33% COGS is a dream number; 10% GROSS is in a perfect world--3% to 5% NET and you are scoring well above average; if your labor costs are 30% you are dead in the water (25% is the maximum that allows for any type of profit--and this is the one area where costs can skyrocket out of control--and the effect of labor cost has a massively disproportionate impact on your bottom line)--also, don't forget that the actual cost of employing someone is 10% higher or more than the actual wages paid, with payroll services themselves being mind-numbingly expensive; and finally, unless you yourself are performing an active operational role which replaces the need to pay someone else to do the same work, forget about making money for the first 3-5 years at least--and I don't mean sitting in the office doing schedules and paying bills. (Meaning, you will be chained to the stoves, or the floor, for 3-5 years before your sweat equity is converted to real equity). To be honest, except in rare cases today, where opening capital was either self-funded or readily available at little-to-no cost, the only money being made in the business today is from either selling worthless franchises, or by selling investors on promised pie-in-the-sky expansion plans--a Ponzu Scheme, if you will. Not to be overly cautionary, if you are receiving a built-out space together with the other conditions you described above, and thus avoiding the cost of capital, and you can run the kitchen or the floor without paying someone else, you could have a real chance of making it worthwhile. PM me if you would like my number and I would be happy to discuss it further in private. By the way, while not being privy to actual facts, my guess is that Komi and Proof, not surprisingly given their relentless excellence and their patient, organic, growth, are the two stand-out (but not sole) examples of the exceptions I described above.

Bad translation. "Aluf" actually means "Major" in this context, not "champion". A few literal mis-translations as well from someone who wasn't there--especially missed was the allusion to Bialek, "I once had youth, and they were beautiful. Where is my youth now?". Sure is fucking hot, though, isn't it?

CCP!

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzdSTRCeSq4&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j59rd1tlVAk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vp7D1Bj5wPQ

And it may be getting even better. It's with great pride that I can say that one of the best co-workers I've had the pleasure of working with at Ray's, Tyler, is returning to his original fold at Proof after several great years of service with us. He's the one who looks like a younger, cuter Justin Bieber. I'd be mad, but it's a little bit like a Wilbur/Charlotte's Web thing versus a Willard/Ernest Borgnine thing.