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“Oh, it’s like Amelia Bedelia,” said the woman hosting the graduation party my family and I attended on Saturday. I had no idea what she was talking about. Another woman chimed in that she uses the books to educate her child who has Asperger’s. The first woman got her copy of “Come Back, Amelia Bedelia” and showed me the page that said:
Amelia Bedelia got the cereal. She put some in a cup. And she fixed Mrs. Rogers some cereal with her coffee.
Amelia’s mistake is similar to my plan for today’s Coffee/Oatmeal Taste Test TweetUp. However, the literal-minded housekeeper used cold cereal, possibly corn flakes. I think the combination of maple & brown sugar oatmeal and dark roast coffee might be delicious. We’ll find out at 1:00 p.m. today at the Pilot Travel Center at 314 Lovell Road. You get to choose from among the various flavors of oatmeal and coffee that they have. Pilot will provide free oatmeal and coffee for all those who show up and are daring enough to combine the two.
Stay, Lost
Four years ago my daughter helped organize a “Lost” viewing party for that season’s finale episode. As the show wraps up tonight, she will be doing it again. Throughout the afternoon, she has been sending me picture messages with some of the more interesting items being prepared for the party. Somebody made copies of Mr. Eko’s stick, Dharma beer cans and Hurley’s lottery ticket.
The party’s food had a “Lost” theme too. My daughter made a mango salsa and re-labeled a bottle of ranch dressing. Another party-goer made a Dharma cake. My favorite photo so far is of the fried chicken from Mr. Cluck’s Chicken Shack. To quote the Facebook status of a friend of my wife, “Hurley, I think I’m going to miss you most of all.”
If U Cn Rd Ths Msg
Mentions of coffee seem to turn up regularly on the social media sites I use. I’m as guilty as the people whose Twitter feeds I read. I “follow” at least four purveyors of coffee, hoping to hear about freebies and discounts on the caffeinated elixir. I have written blog posts about my experiences with them too.
Although my blog entry focused on their panini, the topic that sparked the conversation that led to my trip to The Tin Roof Café was their gourmet coffee from the Vienna Coffee Company. Somehow that morphed into the discussion about their Twitter feed that got me a free sandwich.
Last month, Javerde Coffee Company hosted a Java TweetUp. They use Twitter and Facebook extensively. I like the way they engage in conversation with local Twitterers but I don’t love their recurring digs at “charbucks.” I will go for coffee wherever my coupons take me.
I’m still waiting for Weigel’s to catch up to the other retailers that are both bigger and smaller than it. They’ve started using Twitter but I haven’t seen anything about a free cup of their delicious Kona coffee. It’s all advertising slug lines so far.
The local big dog in the coffee wars seems to so far be winning the social media battle. Pilot Travel Centers is a national chain based here in Knoxville. They blasted onto the Facebook and Twitter scene by offering a new assortment of free and discount coupons each month. They also initiate conversations on both platforms, one of which led to me giving away oatmeal made with coffee instead of hot water this coming Monday.
Here’s the conversation that started Thursday:
pilottravel: calling all oatmeal lovers! we want ur feeback. what flavors would u like 2 c @ Pilot? do u get coffee w ur oatmeal? tell us what u like!
FrankMurphyCom: Someday I want to try making oatmeal with coffee instead of hot water.
pilottravel: @FrankMurphyCom making oatmeal with coffee…..hmmm….i like it!
FrankMurphyCom: Surely someone must have tried this. I wonder if it’s good
FrankMurphyCom: I need to allot a starch and try this soon! RT @KnoxvilleRob for that warm, twitchy morning feeling. #coffeeoatmeal
FrankMurphyCom: It now rates hashtag #coffeeoatmeal RT @AllThingsSassy Oatmeal with coffee isn’t bad, but it was an accidental taste-test…
pilottravel: ok, looks like we need to do a taste test with #coffeeoatmeal. Which coffee do u think would go best?
FrankMurphyCom: Where & when do I show up?
Pilot’s Lynsay Caylor sent me a Direct Message to see if I was serious. We started DM-ing back and forth and by Friday afternoon we had worked out the details as revealed on my Twitter feed:
FrankMurphyCom: I’m hosting #coffeeoatmeal taste-test tweetup Mon 5/24 1pm @pilottravel next to Wendy’s on Lovell Rd You get free oatmeal to mix with coffee
Hope to see you on Monday afternoon at #270, as the insiders call it.
Stop Callin’
Young customers at Big Ed’s Pizza are allowed to use the restaurant’s phone to call home for a ride. The old-timey telephone has been there since before their parents, and possibly grandparents, were even born. While I was there on Sunday, Lew Tippie told me that it’s funny to see the kids try to figure out how the rotary dial works.
The antique phone brought to mind a video I saw last weekend. A Twitter user posted the link and made sure I would see this cover version of Lady Gaga’s “Telephone.” I liked NPR’s spoof of it too. My favorite recent version was on “Dancing with the Stars.”
Roofies
A woman walking alongside me during the Kids Helping Kids Fun Walk wanted some advice on marketing her new business. She is selling Dove Chocolate via direct sales, similar to Shaklee or Pampered Chef or Tupperware parties. We brainstormed several ways she can use the Internet to make herself a credible source of chocolate information and fun. I was telling an associate named Paul about the conversation when he said, “You’ve got to tell that to my girlfriend, Summer.” Within the hour we were on our way to the restaurant she owns, The Tin Roof Café in Sevierville. I would get a free lunch in exchange for a few marketing ideas.
The Tin Roof Café is literally a stone’s throw from the parking lot of the popular Applewood Farmhouse Restaurant. From that angle the Tin Roof looks like a private home, not a restaurant. I bet a lot of the tourists waiting for a table at Applewood would love to try the Tin Roof, if they only knew about it. Meanwhile the locals often confuse the Tin Roof Café with a bar on the Cumberland strip, which is unrelated.
I had a feeling the meal was going to be good when we saw Regis Philbin’s friends Mary Kellogg-Joslyn and John Joslyn ordering lunch as we walked in. They own the Titanic Museum Attraction in Pigeon Forge and Branson. I was also tickled by the fact that the two servers were named Rachel and Monica.
Since we couldn’t eat everything on the menu, Summer made a special sampler plate for us with smaller versions of three outstanding panini. For dessert, she served us a delicious drink called the Tennessee Sunshine, which contained orange juice, raspberry syrup, and cream over ice. I heard a rumor that the orange juice might actually be SunnyD, which is not a bad thing.
Keeping Up with the Boneses
Dr. Bill Brockton is a fictional character based on the knowledge of Dr. Bill Bass and the personality of Jon Jefferson. Some of the people in Dr. Brockton’s world share names with their real-life counterparts. For example, Dr. Arpad Vass of ORNL and Helen Taylor of East Tennessee Cremation Services are in the Body Farm novels as themselves.
Dr. Vass and Ms. Taylor were among the guests at Big Ed’s Pizza on Sunday. The Bone Zones team of Susan & Jim Seals and Mary Jo Tarvin organized the party to celebrate another successful Jefferson Bass promotion tour. Mary Jo wrote a clever poem using the names of twenty people they wanted to thank. Since I had helped out at the book-signing event for “The Bone Thief” in Oak Ridge, my family and I were invited. Big Ed’s was chosen as the location because the iconic pizza place is featured in “Bones of Betrayal.” Lew Tippie and David Neusel played host and posed with us in front of the huge portrait of the late Big Ed Neusel.
I was excited to meet Dr. Vass and to introduce him to my son. They started talking about the electronic sniffer Dr. Vass invented and the musical notes it plays when it finds a buried corpse. He offered to show it to us someday, assuming we can get security clearance for admission to the national lab.
Dr. Al Hazari of the chemistry department at the University of Tennessee was there too. He is mentioned in “Death’s Acre.” Next month he will record a public-service interview with me about his forensic chemistry summer camp for middle-schoolers.
I had to ask Dr. Bass and his wife Carol about the pineapple on their table. They said it was there as a joke because some characters order a pizza topped with pineapple in “Bones of Betrayal.” It’s not actually one of the choices offered on the notoriously simple Big Ed’s menu. I’m not sure I would have caught it if I had been proofreading that book.
Upfront? ‘Mon Back!
A few of the nice folks at WTNZ said it wouldn’t feel like the upfronts without me. As has become my annual tradition, I accepted Kimay Bloch’s invitation to watch the closed-circuit feed of Fox’s presentation to advertisers on Monday afternoon. The event started and ended with the cast of “Glee.” Jane Lynch did some jokes in character as Sue Sylvester. A video montage from the show included some interesting footage of the cast performing “Bad Romance.” The cast sang “Like a Prayer” to close out the festivities.
Knoxville’s David Keith is in the supporting cast of a new con-man drama called “Lonestar.” He plays the father of the main character. The son wants to quit the con-man life and become the guy he’s pretending to be.
Two new Fox shows will earn spots on my DVR-ing schedule. Former WAVA intern Greg Garcia has created another quirky comedy called “Raising Hope.” Some “Arrested Development” alumni have a new show called “Running Wilde” that looks pretty good too.
I asked my friend Kimay if I could speak with someone about their nightly telecast of “Access Hollywood.” The station has permission to edit the show down to 25 minutes and air it at 10:35 p.m. I want to see the whole show, preferably earlier in the evening. Since that is unlikely to happen, Kimay suggested I record the show when they air all 30 minutes of it at 4:00 a.m.
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