HOT DOG!

Reflections on a beloved friend’s passing — and growing older

Everyone loves a hot dog, even a mostly plant-based foodie like myself. Wave a Carolina dog — slaw, chili, onions, extra mustard — in front of me, and I cannot be responsible for what happens next.

And now? There I was, standing next to the Wienermobile, all 27 feet of it, parked curbside with its gull-wing door lifted so that gawkers could marvel at the luxurious interior, which included six bucket seats upholstered in bright red and yellow, as well as a squiggle of yellow painted on the floor.

In Wienermobile culture, red equals ketchup. Yellow, mustard. That’s why the keepers of the wiener, two young dynamos named Keagan Schlosser and Chad Colgrove, were dressed in red and yellow pullovers. They invited the crowd to stick their heads inside the Wienermobile, pose for pictures and take home individually packaged, red plastic Wiener Whistles.

I asked Keagan if I could, for journalistic reasons, arrange for a ride in the Wienermobile during their stay. She said that would be “bun-derful.” Two days later — after the Festival of Lights and the Christmas parade — I climbed aboard for a Sunday morning spin.

Keagan asked where I wanted to go.

In a perfect world, we would have picked up my 90-year-old mom from church, the Wienermobile’s jingle-horn tootling just as the postlude faded.

My mom would have been slightly — OK, a lot — aghast, but also flattered. Ultimately, I thought, she’d cave to peer pressure from church pals who would want a ride, too.

As it turned out, my mom stayed at home with a mild illness that morning. Damn it.

My second choice was the Guilford Courthouse National Military Park because it, too, represented a significant piece of American history. Plus loads of people walk there on Sunday mornings. Off we went, as Keagan and Chad, both 23, shared how they became regional wiener drivers.

A native of Carbondale, Illinois, Keagan — who is no relation to the Greensboro Schlossers, sorry, guys — was about to graduate from the University of Wisconsin last spring with a degree in journalism. She’d interned at a local TV station. But the news biz was too serious, she felt, so she started looking into Hotdogger jobs, one-year gigs offered to recent college graduates by Madison- based Oscar Mayer.

Her journalism professors encouraged her to go for it. I repeat: Her journalism professors urged her to shun the Fourth Estate in order to pilot a giant fiberglass wiener around the country for a year.

I could not argue with their advice.

Chad, on the other hand, had known about the Wienermobile from the time he was a tyke in Boise, Idaho. Every year since he was 6, his family would sniff out nearby Wienermobile appearances and snap a picture of Chad grinning beside the seventon sausage.

As a teen, Chad rolled his eyes at this tradition, but his mom insisted, saying, “You never know. You might want to drive it one day.”

Naturally, Chad submitted all of those pictures with his job application, and he was chosen as one of 12 Hotdoggers from among 2,000 applicants.

“My mom literally started crying,” he said.

“I think my family was a little more confused,” said Keagan, explaining that they’d been pulling for graduate school, but they softened when she told them that it was harder to get into Hot Dog High than to be accepted at Harvard University.

Among the things Keagan and Chad learned in weenie school:

*The original Wienermobile was created in 1936, in Chicago, by Oscar Mayer’s nephew Carl. The opencockpit novelty car gave out samples. After a fleet of Wienermobiles was deployed in 1988, they stopped dispensing free hot dogs.

*There are six Wienermobiles cruising America’s “hot dog highways,” stopping for gatherings such as car shows, sporting events, parades, festivals, as well as promotional appearances at stores that sell Oscar Mayer products. (Track the Wienermobiles at https://khcmobiletour.com/wienermobile)

Wiener Whistles

*Built on GMC cab-forward truck chassis, Wienermobiles are powered by 8-cylinder gas engines. They get roughly the same gas mileage as a large SUV. The bodies are fabricated 40 miles from Greensboro at a Pfafftown company called Spevco Inc.

*Jay Leno drove the Wienermobile for a 2017 episode of Jay Leno’s Garage. Actor Tim Allen blew a Weiner Whistle in the 1994 movie, The Santa Clause. Bible-thumping Ned Flanders, of all people, drove the Wienermobile in a 2019 episode of The Simpsons. Inexplicably, Jerry Seinfeld has not asked to borrow the Wienermobile for Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.

*The best place to wash a Wienermobile is a fire station. “We ask them if we can use their scrubby brushes and water to clean our wiener,” says Keagan. So far, they have not been refused. “Firemen love the Wienermobile,” she adds.