On the Menu

This is how I know I’m getting old if not old school, my irritation over media coverage of the Bears’ new menu selections this season at Soldier Field.  I don’t care about the Hot Bob sandwich, Lake Shore Drive Hoagie or the plant-based burger.  Not...one…bit.

My father, along with my mother, paid for my education through college along with sundry medical bills the result of asthma and whatnot (think broken arm, for example).  So, it’s not like Ed Bukowski was cheap.  He simply didn’t believe you go to a sporting event to eat.  Neither do I.  You go to a sporting event to watch the game at hand.  Eating comes later, if at all.

I’m grateful for each and every White Sox game my dad took me to.  I can still recall a lot of them, enough to say with certainty I didn’t eat anything beyond a box of popcorn.  After the game, my father invariably found a hot dog stand for us to go to; he seemed to know all the hot dog stands in the city of Chicago.  And then we ate, like South Side royalty.

Not long ago, a journalism student interviewed me about Comiskey Park; I’m pretty good at conveying reasons the park shouldn’t have been torn down.  After we were done, he related to me how cool it was that at one new stadium fans could place their food order at the concession stand via text, and I couldn’t have cared less.  Did I mention how old I’m getting?