Food, The Baboon Congress

Taco Confundo

146 Comments

Today’s post comes from Ben Hain.

I don’t understand the popularity of late night Taco Bell. I mean I’m right there in line too, Just why is everybody else here??
What is the appeal of Taco Bell late at night??

It can’t be just the food is it?

Dairy Queen is open right next door and I should’ve gone there! But I thought I needed something a little more nutritious than ice cream. So it’s 10 o’clock on a Thursday night and I am the ninth car in line. We’ve been here at 11:30 at night and been the 12th car in line. And the parking lot is full of cars too. I don’t understand –what is the appeal?

And why hasn’t the local franchise owner opened another one of these restaurants?

Rochester, a town of 100,000 people, has two Taco Bell’s; One out north and one downtown. One night Kelly got so fed up with the line at this one she went to the north one.

And there was a line there too!

I drove by Snappy Stop, but as I’ve had that a few times lately, well, I guess I was in the mood for Taco Bell. But there wasn’t a line at Snappy Stop. (Anybody know what Snappy Stop is? It’s just a drive-through burger place in a little building about 10’ x 20’. Hamburgers and hot dogs is all they do. Oh, and ice cream sandwiches. And their hamburgers are really good. Like Five Guys good.)

I dictated this while waiting in line. I’m still the seventh car in line at Taco Bell… Shoulda gone to Snappy Stop. Or Dairy Queen.

Seventeen minutes later I have my food. I could have gone home. But this chicken quesarito was really good.

I don’t understand.

What don’t you understand?

146 thoughts on “Taco Confundo”

  1. There’s a lot of stuff I don’t understand. One thing really bugs me when I drive past stuff that people have put out on the curb with a “free” sign. It seems like this always happens: you’ve had three or four days of nice clear weather, and the forecast says it’s going to rain tonight. And that’s when people choose to put their stuff out. Right. Before. It. Rains. Upholstered couches, wooden tables.

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  2. I don’t understand why some people in the Twin Cities still have strings of multi-color Christmas lights burning at night. I didn’t noticed anyone doing this when I lived in Southern Minnesota. Of course, it is only done by a few people and there is a much greater concentration of people here. Perhaps there are a few people somewhere in Southern Minnesota that are continuing to keep those lights turned on. Still, why would anyone leave their Christmas lights up at this time of year and turn them on every night.?

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    1. I understand putting them up around Halloween, I understand leaving them there until Memorial Day or even all year long.

      I do not understand turning them on before Thanksgiving or after 12th Night.

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    2. Oh. Sorry. That’s us.
      But we don’t call them ‘Christmas Lights’… we had colored lights around the deck so they were more ‘party lights’ even if they did look just like Christmas lights… those were replaced by plain white lights. but still around the deck and still on all the time and still called ‘Party lights’. So that’s different. Isn’t it?

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      1. Well, being from Copenhagen, and having spent many a lovely evening in Tivoli, I can attest to the charm of outdoor colored lights during warm summer evenings. We don’t decorate our house with lights during the Xmas season, but we do have solar powered lights draped from trees in the back yard – or rather, we did, until Hans cut down our one remaining tree last fall. Sigh.

        Ben, I understand the allure of party lights.

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  3. So many things I don’t understand.
    How can anybody not like coconut?
    Why haven’t all can makers switched to the pop-top lid?
    How come I’m the only one on my block with creeping Charlie on the
    boulevard?
    And, of course, why is it fair that I’m in a beautiful, tropical place
    and it’s pouring down rain right now???

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    2. Do you mean the pop-top lid that Campbells puts on their soup cans? I despise those things. I rarely buy canned soup, but when I do, I hate dealing with it. I find it very difficult to scrape the cream of chicken soup (the kind I get for the easiest supper-in-a-crockpot-and-favorite-of-youngest-daughter) out of the can and harder still to rinse the can clean before tossing it in the recycling bin.

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  5. i dont understand why when taco bell makes a 7 laer burrito it comes out so good. when i makeit it isnt even close. even their lettuce is better. the quac, the beans. my sandwhich is more farm kitchen looking, maybe healthier but htheirs is so good, sub way too. lettuce tomato pepper onion ovilves yellow pepper spinich cucumber more olives and a chipotle sauce… my mouth waters typing. wrap that sucker tight in a flat bread and wrap the halves seperatley i cant eat both halves now for 5 dollars… ill be back. one guys gonna comme out with gluten free bread that doesnt suck and own an interesting part of the market share.

    i dont understand many things in addition to this but these are the top two

    and donald trump

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    1. Understanding Donald Trump…look up Narcissistic Personality disorder…..Narcissistic psychopath….Cluster B Borderline Personality Disorder…Texbook Personality Disorder…..
      These are some labels used by psychiatrists….researchers…

      Howard Gardner, Neuroscientist-Prof. at Harvard ‘labeled’ him a “Textbook Narcissist”…and put him in the same category as Saddam Hussein amoung others….

      Google…there are several articles from noted Psycologists recognizing symptoms without having to exam him…he’s rather obvious in his behavior!

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      3. As a therapist for 30 years, this character also presents with sociopathic personality disorder – both are closely related, and both are untreatable because the very nature of them manifest as lack of conscience, a world view that everyone but he are to blame, and a complete absence of accountability. He stated in a recent interview that he’s never made a mistake because he’s always right. This fraud is a scourge to society and plays to the lowest common denominator there is.

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  7. I don’t understand why my wife likes Taco Bell.
    I don’t understand how the Taco Bell in Mankato finds those employees.
    A student of mine, son of a dear friend, friend of mine, now dry for 30 years said 29 years ago, “I used to go to Taco John all the time until one late night I wen tin sober.”

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  8. I don’t understand mankind. I tried looking up the words that comprise it, “mank” and “ind”, but found nothing. Maybe that explains why mankind is such a mystery.

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  9. The Taco Bell in our neighborhood went out of business years ago, from lack of customers, I presume, and stood derelict. I think I went there once and never went back. It was recently replaced by a beautiful vintage dining car that has been packed since it opened.

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    2. I have known two or three restaurants go out of business when they had lots of customers. We called in the afternoon for a reservation for seven people at Ground Round for the evening. We got there that evening and they were out of business.

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    4. The Hi-Lo Diner? We’ve driven by, and it looks beautiful (and constantly packed). Alas, I checked the menu online and there is nothing there for me to eat, except perhaps the fries and onion rings–even the dressings on the salads are non-vegan. But then, they clearly don’t need my business…

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      1. They’re still new and I suspect the menu will be subject to adjustment over the next year. Check back when some of the excitement dies down.

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  10. True story: a few years ago there was a Taco John on the south side of Madison Avenue in Mankato. One day I drove by and it was now right across Madison Avenue on the north side. Two weeks later I drove by and there was no Taco John. Two weeks later it was back in place on the north side.

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  12. Lawrence, KS takes great pride in keeping chains off of Massachusetts Avenue, which is a wonderful street on a nice evening. It is close to KU. McDonalds opened on Massachusetts in the fall as college started. In the spring they closed it for lack of business and tore it down.

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  13. I don’t understand . . . what was it again. . . I don’t understand . . . oh, yeah . . . I don’t understand why I forget things . . . what things I do not remember . . .

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  17. Lately, I’ve had an intense yearning for Kentucky Fried Chicken. Maybe because they’re advertising on TV? My local grocery store has a deli where I can buy the very same kind of chicken breasts, but KFC all in one meals sounds so much more appealing.

    On a different topic, I do not understand why I’ve developed an obsession with creating a life-sized dummy to sit atop a 2′ wide, 2′ tall stump left after having a huge tree felled. I can’t sleep at night because my brain’s envisioning how to pull this off. In my head, I’m searching the garage, yard, and house for the necessary materials. Last night, I mentally went to the fabric store to buy plastic with which I’ll sew a body form, then stuff styrofoam it into the plastic so that the rain won’t soak it. I realized that I have an old wig form for the face and a wig to top it off. I thought about putting my Obama face mask on it but I don’t want to disrespect the man. I’ve mulled over several positions and how a lawn chair with sawed off legs could hold it upright. I’ve chosen the clothes, gloved hands, and shoes for it.

    I honestly don’t understand why I’m wanting to do this, but something has to make a big tree stump interesting. And because I have too little to do.

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  18. I don’t understand, when I have a bad cold, as I do now, how on earth can my body produce so much snot. Where does it all come from? It seems like I would run out after a day or so of sneezing and blowing out copious amounts of the stuff, but it just keeps coming, with no end in sight.

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      1. It sure doesn’t feel like a miracle. It feels horrible. The best thing about it is I have an excuse to sit and read a book while sipping my favorite-beverage-to-sip-when-I’m sick, namely a concoction of fresh lemon juice, raw honey, boiling water, and a dash of whiskey. Nap time might be next.

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    2. You must have what I had back in January, LJB. I couldn’t believe the volume. either. I think Kimberley-Clark stock spiked higher in February as the January tissue sales reports came in.

      Chris in Owatonna

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      1. Well, I just hope it isn’t what I had back in January. It actually started in late December and I was sick until the end of January. It included ear infections in both ears and a whole lot of misery. By the time the month was over, I had been to Urgent Care three times and twice online and had a total of 4 prescriptions, 3 of them antibiotics.

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        4. Mine started like that, Chris, and then got complications. I’m hoping this one is just a basic cold. I can handle that.

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  20. I see these messages almost daily on websites that say.
    .”Two days ago I bought a grey MacLaren P1 after earning 18,512 DoIIars working on the internet. It was my previous month’s payout..just a little over 17k DoIIars Last month..3-5 hours job a day…with weekly payouts..it’s realy the simplest. job I have ever Do.. I Joined This 7 months. ago. and now making over hourly 87 DoIIars…”
    There are several things I don’t understand. Less than 500 units have been built. A Mclaren P1 lists for 1.1 million dollars. Assuming the author had to finance the purchase, that would mean a monthly payment of over $20,000 I costs $8000 just to change the oil. It’s impossible to get a quote on auto insurance. I don’t understand why someone would try to entice people into an internet scheme by using one of the most expensive cars in the world as the come on. But apparently the ploy works and people sign up for internet work otherwise the ads wouldn’t be out there so frequently. THAT is the part of this that I really don’t understand.

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  21. I don’t understand why MNDOT has decided to p-off as many drivers in the Metro as possible this spring. There is genuine idiocy along the 35E MNPass project, now involving the stretch between 694 and Highway 96. First they make the Highway 96 bridge two lane (from 4 lane) so they can work on the north side of the bridge (which has now been torn down). At rush hour northbound traffic trying to exit 96 gets backed up onto the freeway. The County Road E exit was the perfect way for me to avoid 96 and still get home easily. Now MNDOT has closed the exit ramps to and from County Road E on the northbound side – and the detour for it is……….Highway 96!!!! And to top it off, now northbound 35E is down to one lane. GRRRRRRR!!! It seems as if every detour on the east side takes one through another construction site. Will this never end?

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    2. Well it a went so well last year….

      Once again I am without Randolph, which is how I get pretty much anywhere, complicated by the fact that side streets off of it randomly close.

      Of course I have a straight shot and open road all the way downtown, where I have no reason to go.

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    3. If it is true that misery loves company then the west metro feels your pain. 169, 100 are both a horrific mess right now. And of course the bridge is out on 7 and the 169/494 interchange will most likely never make sense to anybody….

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      1. and with 100 down it certainly makes sense to close 494 at 394 and close those exits at the same time. brain surgeons they aint. i just heard they closed 280 for the season just to keep thos 94 drivers from feeling left out of the fun

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    4. Hwy 14 west of Mankato will have a detour. Hwy 169 north of Mankato has a detour on it. Ignoring an obvious other choice for either detour, they have decided to make them the same detour for five miles.

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    5. I had the experience in Duluth last summer of trying to get to my mom’s apartment after dropping my friend off at the car rental place. I ran into street construction and then detours and when I took the detours, after a few blocks, the detours had detours. There’s a bunch of one way streets around my mom’s apartment, so between the detours upon detours and the one way streets, I felt like I drove an extra 25 miles, mostly in circles, just to get to where I was going.

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  23. Good comments today people. I see there are so many things we don’t understand…

    Kelly and I will be spending Sunday up in the great Metropolis… Going to see ‘C’ at Theater Latte Da and then ‘The Who’ at night. (post-poned from October).
    I don’t really understand what keeps these old rockers going and going.

    Anyone got supper suggestions around Target Center?

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    3. But seriously, I don’t get out much, so the only thing I can think of is Black Sheep Pizza on Washington Ave. Good stuff.

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  25. I don’t understand why it is that – even though I’m mostly out of the theater and set building madness – the first nice days of spring are inevitably days I need to be indoors for something. When I was building sets there was often a loading dock door I could open so I could at least see and smell the outdoors…last weekend I was inside all day Saturday (a gorgeous day) at a conference with nary a window or door to open. Yesterday I could have been outside most of the afternoon but it was grey and not inviting. Today should be lovely and – you guessed it – I am committed to being indoors at least part of the afternoon and most of the morning. Sigh.

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  26. I don’t understand how clueless some folks are. New carpet is being installed in my work building. The installers, not hired by my agency but supplied by the carpet store, were so clueless as to smoke marijuana in the building while they were installing the carpet one evening this past week. It is ironic that people in our addictions department caught them.

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    1. Wow I’m hoping that you’ll complain and have the carpet store pay for an independent inspection of the work. Just because a job looks good from the top is no guarantee that the project will last as long as it’s supposed to. If corners were cut and inferior workmanship applied, you end users might not become aware of the faults until after any warranty has expired. I would insist on the inspection and an extended warranty period.

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    2. Btw. My nephew, who did flooring in North Dakota for many years, has the names of several inspectors. He adds that you folks can consider yourselves lucky it was just marijuana being used. Floor layers in North Dakota are notorious for meth use.

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  27. BTW the reason we got to Taco Bell often is that three soft shell tacos give Sandy a good meal, exactly the right amount of carbs.

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    1. i always wondered why taco bell didnt serve breakfast. bean burritos are my idea of the perfect breakfast. a couple of months ago they started offering breakfast. great idea but the menu was all 6 dollar meals. they recently becan to offer 99 cent breakfast items and ill bet it takes. a breakfast burrito with all the variations possible with their basic line of ingredients is about perfect. if they added eggs to the mix and offered with meat veggies and sauces they could own the breakfast biz
      rice cheese quac salsa tortillias… emmmm
      6 am or 3 am its good food early or late. too bad they cant serve beer and tequilla. then thed ave a crowd. put a mariachi ban in the joint at 7 on friday and satudray nights and watch it go crazy

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    1. I see from the comment section that some folks were more forgiving of Daltrey than the reviewer. What did you think, Ben? And I see from FB that you had dinner at Gluek’s, and a really full day. I can barely do two shows in a week, and you packed two into one day, I’m impressed.

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      1. I agree with the reviewer… In 1983 I remember Roger jogged in place AS HE SANG the entire song ‘Who Are You’. And the mic twirls… and Pete jumped and wind-milled… but yeah. We’re not that anymore… I had very mixed feelings when I got these tickets in 2014…
        I think if I didn’t have anything to compare them too I would have liked it better.

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        1. Wow, that’s what I call optimism, buying tickets to a 2016 concert in 2014. I’m at a stage where I don’t buy green bananas anymore.

          Liked by 1 person

        2. just saw a concert today in cali whith stones dylan paul maccartney the who neil young and ait is a 3 day weekend fest. sounds too good to be true no atter how old we all are. wish i could buy 400 dollar tickets

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  31. I understand that one of the most difficult tasks in the world is to get two 2-year-olds to take a nap at the same time in the same room.

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        1. I wish I was out, under standing… too much other work in the way of that. There is work and there is ‘work’ work… and that’s in the way of work ‘Work’ work.

          Liked by 2 people

  34. Poster advertising a book called I Wish You More in B & N window.
    I WISH YOU MORE
    Only $7.99

    In Cub you can have free testing for diabetes, once you get past the big display of frosted bakery treats.

    Liked by 2 people

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  35. I understand that for the first time since the 1880’s, a wolverine has been verified in McKenzie County in ND. That is exciting.

    A text from Daughter today “Carson Wentz is in my kitchen!” (See the latest NFL draft results. He is a quarterback from NDSU drafted by Philadelphia). I asked “Why?” He was helping a friend move out of daughter’s rental house.

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  36. OT – Just spoke with Krista. The two closings that were supposed to take place today (her old home in Waterville, and her new home in Northfield) didn’t take place as scheduled. Some paperwork snafu involving a $375.00 electrician’s bill (that has been paid) threw a wrench into the whole process. Needless to say, Krista is very disheartened, as are the young couple who are buying her old home, and the woman from whom Krista is buying her new home. All three in limbo tonight due to some bureaucratic delay. Hopefully this will be resolved tomorrow, but there’s really no way of predicting when this will be fixed. Stay tuned and send her some positive energy; she needs it.

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  38. Rise and Shine Baboons! I am near the end of a work marathon since I forgot to log on and never came back.

    Tomorrow the State of MN DHS does their site visit at my place of visit, then I HOPE I get my life back. See you more soon!

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  40. Morning all! I’m back from my trip and SO SO SO happy to be in a cooler climate. Costa Rica was wonderful but very hot and humid. Makes our hot and humid seem kinda wussy.

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  41. I was not going to put up Summer Camp, Part II, but for lack of posts I will put it up. Maybe Dale will have the good sense to reject it.

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Submitted a 900 word piece of fiction. If Dale chooses to uses, I ask that you will just go with the flow of the question.

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  43. Growing up in Ames, Iowa, there was a favorite hot spot for those going out to eat a certain kind of burger. It was called “Maid Right” and had a flavor like no other burger in the world, It was actually “loose meat” as Rosanne used to say and was messy, but oh boy was it tasty! I still miss those meals!! About 12 years ago – and to my utter astonishment and delight, a Maid Right shop opened up 10 minutes from my home. I was there at the opening and continued eating Maid Rights for several months until the franchise closed its doors.

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        2. A former anything that you have chosen, sure, but some things you can’t change. Where you were born or grew up, isn’t one of them.

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      3. There was one in Rochester for a while… but the people wouldn’t get out of the Taco Bell line to try it.
        It didn’t last long. I never got there.

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