A Sky Lined with Cheese: Cincinnati Five-Way at Skyline Chili

by

Travel has taught me to eat like a local whenever possible. Journeying to some far-flung destination only to chow down on a standardized, same-as-in-Peoria burger can only be justified in the direst of circumstances—say, an overdose of shepherd’s pie in Dublin or a surfeit of souvlaki in Athens.

Thus, armed with a desire to get to know my surroundings on a quite literal gut level, I convinced my boon traveling companion to stop in an exotic locale during a recent road trip: a fast-food strip just off the I-70/I-75 intersection in Dayton, Ohio, where the highway overpass stanchions are festooned with carvings of soaring jet fighters. All for a Cincinnati Five-Way from regional chain Skyline Chili.

Finely ground meat with a savory/sweet spice mix in a tomato-y sauce characterizes Cincinnati chili, though given the fierce regional rivalries between types of chili, a rivalry almost on par with those of barbecue aficionados, there are some who claim that it’s not chili at all. There’s meat, there’s spice, there’s a thickish sauce—close enough for me.

Traditionally, Cincinnati chili is served atop thick spaghetti with an accompaniment of oyster crackers and then garnished in some number of “ways” corresponding to the number of ingredients: three-way is your basic chili, spaghetti, and cheddar cheese; four-way adds either beans or diced onions; and five-way (which is the only true way) combines it all.

Many midwestern fast-food/casual restaurants serve either the full five-way or a stripped down Chili Mac version (just chili and spaghetti) as a menu staple, and I’ve sampled it over the years from more than a few, but never from Skyline Chili.

So, a plate of Cincinnati Five-Way was duly ordered and came out from the kitchen in a matter of moments, piled high, oh so high, with thinly grated cheddar cheese, making for a towering first impression:

Cincinnati Five-Way Chili at Skyline Chili

I’m not certain if they grate their own cheese on premises, but it lacked that usual fast-food bagged cheese taste, and it melted nicely into the hot chili beneath, an important consideration given that a Cincinnati five-way is purely an experience of all the parts at once. No solo players here—one simply does not sample a bit of spaghetti then a bit of chili.

The chili itself, the first amongst equals in this gustatory assemblage, had a decidedly sweet taste, with far more cinnamon than I’m used to in Cincinnati chili. The overall impression was savory, but the sweet bite lingered, perhaps accounting for the squeeze bottles of hot sauce at every table. The onions had a nice dice to them, allowing for good coverage of the dish, while the beans I found lacking in quantity, making the overall dish closer to a four-and-a-half-way.

As is the bane of most fast-order pasta, the thick spaghetti was on the overcooked side, but not terribly so. I imagine that if we had gone during the lunch rush we’d have fared better with the spaghetti. The pasta was well drained, though, so that the bowl was not awash in pasta water, a perennial challenge for this dish. One wants the oyster crackers to soak up the remaining chili sauce, not water.

Overall, the experience was satisfying for fast-food chili. As my traveling companion put it, not a food one would crave to an extent that an eight-hour road trip would be undertaken for it, but definitely worth stopping for on the way to something else. Not every meal can be life-altering.

Plus, they have a drive through window. I don’t quite comprehend how one would go about eating a Cincinnati five-way on the road, but the mere fact of that window’s existence makes me happy to live in this country…

Dr. No: A Brief Appreciation

by

With the James Bond movie franchise celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the release of Dr. No, it behooves us to look back at that first (sort of) film adaptation of Ian Fleming’s super-spy in light of the twenty-odd films that follow.

If the Bond films are anything, they are predictable insofar as they hit certain marks, like a stage actor giving her hundred-and-thirty-fifth Wednesday matinee performance. Viewing a Bond film, one expects to see the opening pre-title shot when Bond turns and fires at the gun muzzle camera, the moment when Bond says, “Bond, James Bond,” the shaken-not-stirred martini, the super-villain’s overly elaborate lair, the love interest with the risqué name, the repartee with Moneypenny, and the end shot of Bond and whatever damsel survived drifting off together in space/at sea/what have you.

Little to the left . . .

In looking at Dr. No, it’s striking how many of these benchmark moments are established from the very first film. The film starts with a decidedly off-centered Bond whirling to shoot the camera, and after you suffer through a title sequence of flashing and blinking circles (reminiscent of a computer panel display), Maurice Binder brings out sixty-eight seconds of his soon-to-be-trademark dancing silhouettes.

Trademark Binder

The pre-title action vignette does not make an appearance in Dr. No, and indeed, the film does not introduce Sean Connery as Bond until roughly seven minutes in.

The introduction remains, however, the finest “Bond, James Bond” moment in the entire series. Never has a cigarette dangled more insouciantly from curiously dispassionate lips. And, of course, no changing of chemin de fer to poker as in Casino Royale.

Bond, James Bond

Most notable about Dr. No, though, in light of the films that follow, is not the combination of humor and seriousness (which frankly surprised me, as I remembered Dr. No as a mostly serious-toned film), but rather the signal lack of gadgets. Bond uses no gadget more exotic than a geiger counter. No suitcase gyrocopters or souped-up Aston Martins for this Bond.

Indeed, the film features very little of what a modern audience might call action—a perfunctory fight in Dr. No’s nuclear reactor lair (the first of many Ken Adam’s lair designs), a car chase, a few punch-ups, some dismal pistol shots at a flamethrowing tank, a murder in cold blood (by Bond), a mob scene when the lair explodes, and an icky spider. There’s no huge climactic action set-piece as one finds in later films. Dr. No simply gets thwacked and falls into the nuclear reactor at the end without so much as a grandiose retort.

Absent the gadgets and elaborate action sequences, though, Dr. No provides the cinematic framework for all the Bonds to follow, a framework that has endured for fifty years.

Paint by Letters: The Lettering of Cul de Sac

by

As we near the point where Richard Thompson will close his daily comic strip “Cul de Sac,” I wanted to look at one of my favorite aspects of the strip: the lettering.

Excerpt from Sepember 14, 2010 Cul de Sac via gocomics.com

Take, for instance, this excerpt from the September 14, 2010 strip, part of the pangolin arc.

The expressive range of Thompson’s lettering conveys much of the emotional impact of the strip while still remaining secondary to the words themselves, integral to the content though not overwhelming it. Without the contrasting lettering in this particular strip—normal to start, then thick and shouty, then the light, all-caps conclusion underlined with, yes, plaintive squiggles—the joke falls not flat but, rather, unremarkable. But with that lettering, it all comes together as a whole. Even the slightly oversized question mark plays a role, helping the reader see Alice as a small, quite anxious, probably disturbed pangolin. That third panel is utterly plaintive and quite brilliant.

Thompson himself speaks to the notion of variable lettering in his Cul de Sac Golden Treasury, noting:

Emphasizing the right words is a tricky business. Like too many exclamation points, too much emphasis loses impact and everything turns into a shouting match. Choosing the right form of emphasis is tricky, too, as there are many of them and each marks a different change of tone. You’ve got the simple underline, the double and multiple underline, the wiggly underling, the boldface, the drop shadow block caps, and on and on. (188)

Ever since I read that note in the Treasury—and it’s full of insight on the strip and Thompson’s creative process—I’ve paid particular attention to his lettering and that of other cartoonists as well. Other strips use similar variable lettering techniques, but in combination with Thompson’s unique line style and frequent cross-hatching, the overall effect of the lettering in “Cul de Sac” makes the strip a delight to read again and again.

It will be missed. So hurry up and get the next Treasury out!

You Got Your Back to the Future in My Doctor Who

by

Why, yes, indeed, that is Matt Smith, the Eleventh Doctor, getting out of Marty McFly’s DeLorean, or at least a close approximation thereof (one notes the lack of a flux capacitor).

Matt Smith and a DeLorean by Jill Pantozzi at https://www.themarysue.com

Jill Pantozzi at TheMarySue.com captured this shot (and more!) of the cast alighting from DeLoreans at the recent premier of Season Seven of Doctor Who (well, actually, Season Thirty-three if you’re counting properly, Season Thirty-four if you count the Eighth Doctor’s TV movie, which may or may not be proper). Season Seven kicks off today in the UK and in the US.

This mash-up of Doctor Who with Back to the Future comes not too long after Matt Smith was spotted with an Omnitool from Mass Effect strapped to his wrist at San Diego Comic Con this summer. The Doctor certainly gets around, no matter what style time machine he uses.

(Image courtesy of and © Jill Pantozzi via TheMarySue.com)

End of the Road for Cul de Sac

by

Alice and her sword Michael Cavna on the Washington Post‘s Comic Riff’s blog breaks the news that Richard Thompson will be bringing Ruben Award-winning daily comic strip “Cul de Sac” to a close on September 23rd of this year:

Richard Thompson, widely acclaimed among his peers as the best all-around comic-strip creator working today, won’t still be wearing that crown in six weeks. That’s because Thompson has decided to stop working as a comic-strip creator: He will end his beloved strip “Cul de Sac” on Sept. 23.

My feelings run towards the selfish here, because I have found “Cul de Sac” to be a refreshing, humble, and brilliant strip, awash with visual and linguistic delights. But I can only thank Richard Thompson and wish him the best, and I hope to see his work appearing here and there, even if not in a daily strip.

If you haven’t picked up the collections of his strip or the tribute book (with proceeds going towards Parkinson’s research), there’s no better place to grab them than through his own site.

And, yes, Alice, your little plastic sword impressed quite a few of us.

Space, the Fiddly Frontier: Asmodee’s Eclipse

by

Fiddly is always expressed as a function of bits. A fiddly game, then, is a game with either lots of bits or lots of manipulation of bits. Eclipse, a new space exploration/expansion/extermination/exploitation (4X) Euro game from Asmodee, satisfies both conditions, with hundreds of wooden cubes and lots of little plastic spaceships and a gazillion punched cardboard tiles that get shifted and adjusted over and over through the two hour plus play time.

The fiddly nature of Eclipse helps provide a sense of immersion in the game’s theme of galactic civilizations expanding, exploring, and exploding one another through well-designed player mats that track the state of the player’s empire and various technologies. One watches his or her civilization grow (and, yes, shrink). But such fiddility comes at a time cost.

Behold my mighty empire!

Recently, Pablo Garcia-Silva, Michael Vogt, and I put Pablo’s copy of Eclipse through its paces at Labyrinth on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. It took us about half an hour to punch the counters and get all the wooden bits and info counters sorted on the various player charts, but once everything was in place, we roared out of the wormholes and finished eight of nine turns in about two hours. I imagine that, with the pieces now roughly sorted, set-up will take less time, probably on the order of ten to fifteen minutes, an acceptable amount of prep time for those of us used to wargames but perhaps a bit long for those weaned on Euros.

The gameplay itself is mostly economic engine/worker placement (take a different action every round, increasing your mandatory end-turn money expenditure with every action), with some simple combat, random board generation, and awesome ship building thrown into the mix for good measure. Victory goes to the player with the most victory points at the end, earned through combat, territorial acquisition, and technology research.

Combat is perhaps a bit simplistic for the wargame crowd, but even having combat in a Euro game is rare enough that I won’t complain. Besides, getting to load up your ships with plasma cannons, gluon computers, and tachyon thrusters makes up for the buckets-of-dice combat resolution.

Flight of the Dreadnaught

One never has quite enough resources to do everything, but there’s always the tantalizing possibility that if you over-extend, you can steal away an opponent’s resources to cover your own shortfall. I can see where an group given to analysis paralysis would hate this game—lots of potential paths to victory and avenues to failure—but if the group is as interested in having fun and flying little plastic spaceships and making poor science fiction puns as it is in maximizing efficiency in an economic engine, it’s a keeper. And at a hundred dollars retail, it better be.

This is another game I see getting a lot of play in the late-night game convention slots just for its support of up to six players and the glorious tableau the game presents on a table. Plus, you know, you get to make spaceship noises.

Once again, my thanks to the crew at Labyrinth for their gracious hosting and to Pablo and Michael for a great afternoon of gaming.