Hasta La Gadget!

As you’ve seen in the foreign press, all of Japan is starving and the condition is really terrible on the ground. See this gallery of horrible Tokyo panic photos to see what I mean. Tokyo Dandy has an even crazier view from street level.

Today the reality of our dire situation hit me the hardest. Viron was out of the pâté de campagne, so I was FORCED to settle for the poulet rôti for lunch.

It’s a nightmare out there people. Get out of Tokyo NOW before you find yourselves eating at Subway. Look at this bakery! Do you see a single baguette? No! I had to wait TEN MINUTES for them to finish baking them fresh in the back.

As you can see below, there’s a serious shortage of thon crudités and mozzarella.

Until France steps it up, moves out of their wimp-cave in Osaka, and starts supplying more sandwich aid, the real human toll of the disaster in Tokyo is only going to grow larger. We might even be drinking tap water once it all goes down.

SERIOUSLY
Right now, Tokyo is doing fine. Lots of people were out and about today, and the “shortages” of food and supplies are laughable to any older person here who experienced bombing of civilians by the United States during the war. Hang in there, and remember that there are a whole lot of people worse off than you just 150 miles north. Help them out through the charity of your choice. Better yet, go there yourself, bring money and supplies, and help them rebuild. That’s our plan.

In the meantime, check out this post on the growing food shortage in Tokyo. No beer? For a couple of days?? I’ll go nuts!! Also, TokyoCooney is keeping track of the dessert front.

It’s not as easy as it once was to carve our a living for oneself battling giant space aliens. It’s always a good idea to have a plan B. Take this Ultraman-esque Chinese robot, who’s now employed full time as a noodle chef.

Coca-Cola’s recipe is said to be one of the best kept secrets in all the world (particularly now that we all apparently know what goes into a bucket of KFC)–you know, the one that only two people in the world know, so they’re not allowed to fly on the same plane, because if it were to crash, we’d be plunged into an age of Coke-free darkness.

The ingredients used in our beverages are listed on the product labels and many people have tried over time to crack the secret formula of Coca-Cola. That secret combination of ingredients holds a special place in the history and mythology of Coca-Cola -something we continue to celebrate as we mark our 125th anniversary this year.

Among the ingredients are: alcohol, orange oil, lemon oil, nutmeg oil, and cinnamon.

Taco Bell tried the whole aggressive approach, after being sued for falsely claiming that its beef is, well, not actually beef. The fast food chain bought full pages in some of the country’s biggest papers, for a letter from the company’s president carrying the headline “Thank You For Suing Us.”

The company’s new approach is a lot more gentle–bribe people into liking it. Literally. The first 10 million people who like the chain on Facebook will get a free taco. Easy enough. The hard part, no doubt, will be leaving the restaurant with just the free taco–not to mention the next morning when you wake up in your car surrounded by Chalupa wrappers.

Well, sort of. The machine doesn’t actually make hamburgers, nor does it store ancient burgers in vacuum-packed bags. Actually, the whole thing isn’t too dissimilar from the concept of the automat, which really predated fast food as we know it. Still–it qualifies as a hamburger vending machine, right?

The machine is located on the exterior of a hamburger shop in Tokyo’s Katsushika neighborhood. Stick 100 yen in the slot, and you’ll get a relatively fresh burger manually placed in the slot by an employee on the other side. You can only get plain burgers, though–and only one at a time. If you want more, you’ll actually have to walk into the restaurant.