Iowa: Land of James T. Kirk
Friday, September 12th, 2008OK, this was very silly. I was cruising around the internet, looking for more pictures of kettles for my kettle corn popper machines page. Since I’ve done a ton of research on this, I might as well toss it all onto one page and hopefully get some Google Adsense clicks. (Yes, I’ve sold out, I’ve now started putting Adsense ads on this blog. Aren’t they annoying?) I discover this shot:
I’m thinking, “boy that sure looks like MY Northbend kettle..and MY blue long sleeve t-shirt with dark gloves…and MY blue cooler…and MY yellow tent.” The image was prominently displayed in the center of www.kettlepopper.us. I grab the image and do a screen capture of everything. The photo looked very familiar, but I couldn’t figure out who took it. I fire out this email to them:
And I couldn’t help noticing in the photo you have shown – that *I* too have a North Bend Originals popper, pop under a yellow tent (you can see it in the corner and by the color balance of the photo), use dark gloves with a blue shirt, BOLTED A PIZZA SERVER TO A POLE to stir kettle corn, and have the same color ice cooler.
Wow! Small world isn’t it?
Eric Bickernicks
Velma’s “Wicked Delicious” Kettle Corn
Later that night I’m arguing with Velma. I tell her that’s me and our tent in their photo. She thinks maybe it’s not. No, I tell her, that’s definitely me in that shot. I explain (once more to her) that I’m a guy and I’m a VISUAL creature…I can recognize my greasy torso and gloves anywhere. Maybe you’re wrong she says. It then hits me. I go searching for this newspaper article that Steve had mounted on a plaque. That was it! The Springfield Republican newspaper had done a little article on us for their September 13, 2006 issue. It matched perfectly! I quickly run upstairs and fling the now moldy plaque onto our bed while Velma was reading. Everyone please take note: I clearly WON that argument with my girlfriend on the night of September 11th, 2008. Next case your honor.
Steve got the same email and sent this out to them:
On Wed, Sep 10, 2008 at 2:30 PM, <steve@somewhere.net> wrote:
Time for a cooler inspection…. if the same drinks are in there, this is getting freaky, Man.
We get this back for a reply:
From: “Dan Somebody” <kettlepopper@somewhere.com>
HELLO ALL! LOOKS LIKE YOU NEED MORE BUSINESS IF ALL YOU WORRY ABOUT ARE OTHER PEOPLES WEBSITES!
That’s pretty funny. Now…wouldn’t you be concerned if you saw yourself on the front page of a competitors website? What kills me is somebody in Iowa needs to steal a shot from an East Coast newspaper to put on their website. They obviously MAKE kettle corn. How hard is it to pull a camera out and take a lousy shot of themselves making it? On top of that, I went back and found the embedded text info within their picture. It had my name in it! (I could’ve won my argument even sooner if I had known.) I guess they only recently got computers out in Iowa, since they haven’t figure out how to turn off the ALL CAPS button. And why are their votes considered so important every 4 years? What gives?
