Wendy’s has out-Oreo’d the Oreo in Oreoification

Friday you’ll hear me and Franklin discuss the Oreoification of the Oreo cookie, though the real leader in Oreoifying these days goes to Wendy’s and its famed Frosty dessert. It took them 37 years to come up with vanilla as a flavor alternative; now the options exploded into permutations usually reserved for perfect brackets and BK Whoppers.

Stop into a Wendy’s today and you’ll have a choice of 14 different Frosty flavors, each one a little more ridiculous than the last. It’s all cheating, of course, as the flavors are just toppings to the traditional vanilla and chocolate, but if we were calling “pineapple” a different flavor then I guess Pop-Tarts Strawberry Frosty Fusion’s one too. Monday Wendy’s announced the three new “fusion” flavors: Pop-Tarts Strawberry, Oreo Brownie, and Caramel Crunch. Couple this with the “swirl” flavors introduced last month (strawberry, caramel, and brownie), and yes, you really do have 14 different options. I’d trade it all for that Orange Dreamsicle to make its return, but in the meantime I guess fusions and swirls will have to do.

At nearly eight dollars (for a large) and over 1100 calories they’ve really gone the bigger-is-better route on these, so think about sharing with a friend before diving into one.

If for no other reason than to split the bill.

Black Bears on top again

In the first half century of hockey in Binghamton, New York (a.k.a. Hockeytown), the various teams involved collected exactly one championship trophy. That was the 2011 Binghamton Senators.

In the past two years the Binghamton Black Bears have won twice as many, their second Commission’s Cup title coming last Friday night with a victory over the Carolina Thunderbirds. The scene was nearly identical to that of one year ago, as the BBB again made short work of its playoff opponents. Binghamton is 14-1 in the postseason the past two years, and hasn’t lost at home, playoffs or otherwise, since December of 2024. That’s a winning formula.

Sure, Franklin and I will talk about this Friday on Math and Musings but might as well start the party early, eh?

Hockey crown is on the line tonight

Today on Math and Musings Franklin and I discuss Part Two of our trip to the old country: Binghamton, New York, home of hockey and horseracing, where pizza is still called “hot pie” and Dunkin’ is still Dunkin’ Donuts.

Big news from my hometown today is Game Three of the Federal Prospects Hockey League championship series. Binghamton is up 2-0, and could close out a series victory tonight. That would be back-to-back titles for the Black Bears and another exception to the rule that Binghamton is never in the news for anything good.

Enjoy.

Told’ja so, 22 years in the making

Most times when someone says I wrote the book on that it’s just an expression. Me? I’ve got a few. But this one isn’t what you’re thinking.

It was more than 20 years ago, I wrote what I guess was my first book, a published version of my senior honors thesis at Binghamton University. Like a young John F. Kennedy I turned my school project into something a little more, perhaps not gaining the traction of JFK’s Why England Slept but it made its mark in Binghamton in 2003.

I called the book While Federalism Slept, I thought a clever play on Kennedy’s book and a description of my own theses: that the federal Community Development Block Grant program begun in the 1970s was in fact harmful to the communities it supposedly helped and should be eliminated.

Fell on deaf ears at the local and national level.

Fast-forward 22 years, and imagine my surprise that one Donald J. Trump, president of this fine nation, is proposing elimination of the CDBG program.

A part of me is a little disappointed I’m not getting any recognition in this, but like most school projects, I’m not in it for the glory or the money, just happy to help.

And getting to say I told’ja so.

There’s really no way to prepare for The Rehearsal

“I’m not sure what it means, but it’s interesting.”

That’s the final line of last night’s episode of The Rehearsal, probably the strangest half hour of television I’ve ever witnessed, and I’ve witnessed some strange television.

Should I try to explain the episode?

It starts with President Obama announcing the killing of Osama bin Laden and ends with a cloned dog not assisting a diabetic emergency.

I haven’t posted about Season Two of The Rehearsal yet because, well, it would require trying to explain something like the above.

Three episodes in I simply say, it’s good, and deserves your watching.

I’m not sure what it means, but it’s interesting.

Rogen’s The Studio brings it

Yeah, I’m a little late to the party on this one, but let the official record show (finally) that Seth Rogen’s new series on Apple TV+, The Studio, is up there with the best of what Rogen (and Apple TV+) has to offer. I’m a completist when it comes to Rogen projects (and a bit of an Apple TV+ completist as well), and this one isn’t just to fill in a gap.

The Studio places Rogen somewhat against type, playing the successful head of a movie studio and among Hollywood’s elite. In most of his screen appearances Rogen plays the everyman, but here he’s at the top of a corporate ladder, owner of a classic car collection, and doted on by his flunkies.

But he’s not without his flaws and insecurities. And that’s the genius of The Studio.

Any comparison to Woody Allen in 2025 invariably will elicit negative opinions (nothing to do with art), but The Studio definitely has a classic Allen vibe minus all politics and, well, other things. The jazz, the neuroses, the respect for old Hollywood and cinema writ large–it’s all there, and all good to watch.

Is Rogen the heir apparent to Woody Allen? Talented? Prolific? A certain Jewish touch of self-doubt?

The world needs a clean version of Woody Allen and this may be it.

Awesome.

Hockeywise, I’m blessed

I’m hardly the first person ever to note this, but Game Four in a seven-game series is by far the most decisive. Sure, each game counts the same, but the difference between a 2-2 series and a 3-1 series is the difference between apples and baby wolverines.

With their Game Four come-from-behind victory last night in Montreal, my hometown NHL team (that would be the Washington Capitals) has taken a commanding 3-1 lead in its first round playoff series. Red sweaters are coming out of the closets all over the DMV, and the sound you hear is wingtips, sneakers, and sandals of all varieties stepping onto the bandwagon.

A few miles up the road (or down the road if you’re coming from Montreal), my actual hometown hockey team (that would be the Binghamton Black Bears of the Federal Prospects Hockey League), is also engaged in a postseason tournament. After a dominating regular season, the defending champion BBB have sailed through their first two rounds of playoffs, poised to take on the Carolina Thunderbirds in the league finals starting this Friday.

It wasn’t the only reason I was in Binghamton this weekend, but yeah, I was at the game two nights ago.

Yup, I’m on this bandwagon too. (I’m the one wearing Skechers.)

Mid-Century Modern is surprisingly hilarious

One of the more ridiculous shows on “TV” these days is Hulu’s Mid-Century Modern. Sort of a gay version of The Golden GirlsMCM follows the lives of three fabulous gentlemen, friends for years but never paired in any ways, living together and leaning on one another after the unexpected death of a fourth. Starring Nathan Lane, Nathan Lee Graham, Matt Bomer and a host of high-profile guests, this is where you find hilarity in the streaming universe: gays making easy gay jokes about each other. Perhaps with lesser actors it would just be silly or mean, but damn it’s hilarious with these three. They make in-group humor like the best of old-school Jewish comedians, again sort of channeling The Golden Girls, getting in gratuitous digs against those outside the group as well. All low-lying fruit and all hilarious. Today’s the day I come out… as a Mid-Century Modern fan.

I’ll admit that one episode wasn’t enough to get beyond the silliness. Watch the first one and it just seems childish. But give it a chance, be part of the fabulousness for 24 minutes a shot, and keep in mind you’re not watching Citizen Kane. The jazzy score is an added bonus, as are the stylish sets, way more conservative than one would expect. Of course the men have money, and of course they spend it, and it’s fun to live vicariously for a bit, even as, well, someone outside the group. I’m exactly the person that should be made fun of in these scenarios, and yeah, they get us normies good… but the real laughs are when they do it to themselves. There was a time in which this was standard in comedy: Jews making fun of each other, Blacks making fun of each other, and then we all got too sensitive for any of it.

Mid-Century Modern has no such issues.

Do yourself a favor and invest a few nights in watching Season One of Mid-Century Modern. It’s beyond “guilty pleasure”; it’s just plain good.