Full (of crap) from a value meal

Has anyone else noticed that every single ad for a value meal from any chain at all touts its giant size in comparison to some kind of eensie-weensie value meal from another restaurant? What restaurant is this? If they all have huge value meals, then who has the little ones? You used to see direct competition between McDonald's and Burger King where they really went at each other, but has the competition become so scattered (among Taco Bell and Subway and all of them) that they're reduced to attacking some kind of made-up chain with overpriced food on their value menu?

Which doesn't even enter into the question of the questionable nutritional value of these value meals. Like it's our inalienable American right to get giant burgers for a dollar that will all end up killing us.

Killing us deliciously, but still.

In music news, I've been listening to Death Cab for Cutie's Transatlanticism recently. A great turn-of-the-year album. That and a bunch of Miles Davis from the Prestige years (the first great quintet with Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, John Coltrane and Red Garland) and this Chess Records compilation called Killer Fretwork, which has some great guitar nuggets by people like Bo Diddley, Howlin' Wolf, and plenty of other lesser known blues performers.