The NATO summit is in Chicago today, and with all the security and street closings, we can't even get to the office let alone to Burger King to try the new HoverWhopper.* We'll be back next week with more life-threatening gluttony.

*We have the technology, BK. Make this happen.

This weekend we're joined by rock duo Kyle Gass and Jack Black of Tenacious D. Here's Jack's version of what the band would sound like if they sang break-up ballads and not parody satanist heavy metal rock:

Monday 2:29pm: Peter's out of the office so we turn the Man United vs. Man City game on the big newsroom TV that hangs over our cubicles and wish we were European.

Monday 2:31pm: An intern who shall remain nameless extracts a People Magazine pull-out poster of celebrity women entitled "Beauty at Every Age" and hangs it in Peter's cubicle.

Tuesday 11:53am: All the potentially funny news stories I've found so far today have either been retracted or discredited by now.

Tuesday 3:20pm:

Ian: Does anyone know Vladimir Putin's middle name?

Peter: Yeah, it's "The."

 

Tuesday 3:45pm: Eva encourages the reintroduction of the phrase, "Good one, Captain Obvious," after Mike hurls it at Peter. Good one, Mike. I second the motion.

Wednesday 10:16am: Mike and I begin an energetic discussion about "Girls."

Wednesday 11:16am: Mike and I conclude an energetic discussion about "Girls."

Thursday 2:00pm: Carl comes into the office on days when we record the show in Chicago. While everyone else puts the final touches on stories before the read through, Carl and I go into a sound booth to tape the voicemail messages for last week's winners. Needless to say, my time in that booth with Carl has become the closest I've ever gotten to knowing what Seven Minutes in Heaven is all about.

This week surpasses all possible glorious expectations. The kids over at Re:Sound ask Carl if he'd be willing to read "Goodnght Moon" for a show they're working on. And I get to record it. And it is spectacular. So spectacular I ask Carl to read it twice. Not because he needs to, but because I know the mathematical impossibility of encountering anything so swoon-worthy again in my life.

Friday 11:11am: Emily gives us all signed copies of her new book, "Project Jackalope!"

Friday 12:00pm: Peter asks where the People Magazine's "Beauty at Every Age" poster came from.

Friday 1:54pm: Lorna takes a break from editing and starts flipping through the magazines that have piled up on our conference table. She finds a Q&A column dedicated to answering the question, "How do I arrange pillows on my sofa?" Everyone agrees that it is the most useless Do It Yourself guide of all time and Mike and Ian plan to feature it on "How To Do Everything" or maybe a new show called "How To Do Things You Really Don't Need To Know How To Do."

People sometimes ask if restaurants ever send us sandwiches to eat on Sandwich Monday. That would be a huge breach of ethics, but no, it doesn't happen often, which is a shame because we like sandwiches way more than ethics.

This week the Travel Channel sent us a sandwich called "The Four Courser" from 50/Fifty in Chicago, for something they're promoting. It's:

Hand-pulled pork shoulder, gouda bechamel, fried jalapenos, potato chips, and a mac and cheese stuffed waffle.

Ian: As promotional items go, this is tastier than the bucket of chum Discovery Channel sent us for Shark Week.

Peter: I enjoyed the screaming New Jersey housewife Bravo sent us. Because she also brought waffles.

 

Mike: The waffle is like an airbag protecting the meat.

Ian: Speaking of which, has anyone seen my seatbelt extender?

Eva: You could sit on one of these and have a fairly pleasant, cushiony plane ride to wherever you're going. But if you choose to eat it instead, you'll also have a cushiony plane-ride, so it's really a win win.

Ian: Chips, pulled pork, mac and cheese, waffles? This sandwich is like a Voltron of bad decisions.

Mike: The perfect side for this is chili cheese fries stuffed with onion rings topped with nachos and a pancake.

Peter: Can I say everything was cool — the hand-pulled pork, even the waffles — but the fried jalapeno chips are just weird? It's like a guy wearing a swimsuit showing up to a formal dinner. A spicy fried swimsuit.

Ian: I know "hand-pulled pork" is supposed to be appetizing but I don't like to think about human hands on my pork. I'd like "Robot-pulled pork."

Eva: This sandwich is great because it covers all the food groups, according to the Food Pyramid used during the Taft administration.

Peter: I think it was the great Egyptian food pyramid. Explains the goat innards.

[The verdict: Not bad at all. I promise we wouldn't have eaten it if it hadn't lived up to our own standards (meaning it had to be disgusting).]

I happened to visit Portland, OR and somebody on Twitter told me I needed to go get a sandwich at Big Ass Sandwiches, a new foodcart in the Foodcart Archipelago of downtown Portland. Since (A) I do everything I'm told to do by Twitter, and (B) I was hungry, off I went.

I was greeted and, somewhat strangely, instantly recognized by Lisa Wood, co-proprietor with her husband Brian. This was somewhat strange because I am in radio, and thus my face is not well know, and hadn't even really said anything other than "Hello." So be assured: your Big Ass Sandwich will come dripping with extra NPR-geekery.

 

Per Lisa's instructions, I ordered the Big Ass Sandwich with Roast Beef with spicy sauce, and then – again per her instructions – I walked around the corner to some picnic tables to attempt to eat it. Lisa said: "Unwrap it from one end, like a burrito." She did not say, "Cradle the thing like a baby, because that's about how big it is," but I did that anyway. Sometimes my spirit of humble obedience is anticipatory.

Big Ass sandwiches are indeed, as advertised big, although since both ends look the same, it's hard to identify its ass. I apologized to one end for possibly getting it wrong, and started on the other.

The roast beef – made in-house – is tender and moist, and came dressed in home made bechamel sauce, grilled onions, spicy sauce... and french fries. Like the notorious and beloved Primanti Bros. in Pittsburgh, Big Ass doesn't believe in French Fries on the side. They don't want to make you choose between a bite of sandwich and a bite of french fries, they want you to have it all, right now.

But, also unlike Primanti Brothers, this is a high end sandwich, and you're not expected to be drunk when you eat it. That's a delicious fresh ciabatta roll, excellent roast beef, and a superb creamy bechamel. Putting all those yummy things into one package, and smushing it together is just a step shy of ordering a five course meal at some high end bistro and throwing it all in a blender.

[The Verdict: There are a lot of great food trucks in downtown Portland, but for sandwich lovers, these are big and delicious in the classic style. Ask, though, for your french fries on the side.]

Over the weekend, I attended the White House Correspondents Association Dinner as part of the NPR contingent. On Saturday morning, before the party, I went to Walter Reed Hospital in Bethesda to visit with some wounded soldiers and marines, and I wrote up my experience here.

Our guest this week, movie director Barry Sonnenfeld, is often photographed wearing a cowboy hat and boots. And when we asked him about this penchant for western gear, he revealed he also directs all his movies atop a saddle on wheels. He sent us proof.

Monday, April 9^th

12:34pm: Planning Meeting. The show's going on the road to Boston this week. I bop my head and sing "Dirty Water" until I realize the rest of the staff is from Texas, Minnesota, Illinois, and West Virginia and they're giving me weird looks / don't appreciate the significance of that song.

12:40pm: Emily goes over the itinerary for the trip. While she focuses on important stuff like making sure the host and producers make their flights, everyone else spends most of their time discussing what they want to eat for dinner tomorrow night. Whether they end up getting Pad Thai, chowder, hamburgers, seafood, pierogies, beef paprikash, stroganoff, or wellington, no one can say they don't have their priorities straight.

 

Tuesday, April 10^th

9:50am: Ian bets Peter he can't make it a full week without tweeting. The whole staff is encouraged to monitor his Twitter account this week to keep him honest. So far @petersagal's looking good, but social networking is this man's kryptonite, so stay tuned.

Wednesday, April 11^th

9:15am: According to Emily's itinerary, everyone gets on a plane to go to Boston. Since I'm staying behind in Chicago, I may or may not set my alarm a little bit later than I normally do.

Thursday, April 12^th

11:27am: I look around the office. The place is deserted. I decide to take a walk. Interns get lonely too, you know.

Friday, April 13^th

5:30pm: Peter reappears on Twitter. Turns out he only operates in standard business weeks.

Wednesday, April 18^th

3:32pm: Mike breaks out his nylon WGBH frisbee. I don't know how much someone needs to pledge to a station to get one of those, but I do know that Mike is a generous guy.

After competing to see who can throw the furthest, we end up making up a game we name "Frisbee Bocce," where we try to toss the disk closest to a rubber band ball target. Several people from other shows come out to the hall to politely see what all the cheering and jeering is about. Lorna has an impressive showing, as does Mike.

Unfortunately, without Carl here to keep score, we have no way of knowing who won.

Thursday, April 19^th

12:55pm: I'm surprised to learn that my co-workers are unfamiliar with the culinary art of "Microwaving a Peep."

Fortunately there is an inexplicable surplus of Peeps in our office, so I pop a few fluorescent pink marshmallows into the electric oven for about 45 seconds on High to demonstrate.

The Peeps do not disappoint. The sugar lends a sweet, caramelized smell [Ed. Note: it really just smells like burning] to the office that lasts for hours [Ed. Note: that part's true], and the melted gooiness far surpasses their regular post-Easter staleness. But mostly, the trajectory of the Microwaved Peep Life Cycle is a cautionary tale. Like the Peep, when we sit in a sealed room, the target of millions and billions of microwave rays, we too may suddenly and outrageously increase in size, only to deflate into a strange, dejected puddle of our own purple food dye.

Our friends at member stations WUSF in Tampa and WLRN in Miami are having a bit of a spat over which city can claim the real Cuban sandwich. No matter where you are, you can read their arguments over at NPR's Salt blog, and vote for your choice.

We don't have a dog in this fight, but we do ask both stations to email us a dozen Cuban sandwiches right now so we can be informed voters.

What: i saw her standing there

A classic tale of Romeo-and-Juliet-style forbidden love: boy loves girl, girl loves boy, but boy can't have girl because girl is zombie. Every time boy tries to give girl hug, girl eats boy's brains. We've all been there.

Boy comes up with solution: put girl in cage, where he can admire her from afar but still live out normal lifespan. Everyone is happy, except girl, who's getting very hungry. Play on to find out what happens in the end!

Gamplay: Left/Right arrows to move, space bar to shoot zombie gun, fat fingers to lose game.

Takeaway Lesson: Don't actually put your girlfriend in a cage.

What is the noun is for the substance of which Doritos is made? We all know a Dorito is a triangular corn chip covered with orange flavor dust, but what is it made of? Is the essential substance of a Dorito "Dorito," or "Dorito Sheetrock ," or "highly processed fried corn meal infused with sugar, orange food dye, and glue?" Whatever it is, Taco Bell's new "Dorito Loco" comes in a taco shell made of it. We tried the Dorito Loco Supreme, which costs 30 cents more but you're worth it. (What do you get for that extra 30 cents? Thirty pennies added to each taco, for crunch.)

Mike: This is good.Like really good nachos!

Eva: Everything about this is disgusting, and I love it.

Peter: I don't like it. I open my mouth and take a breath before biting it, and get a lungful of powder. It's part taco, part asthma inhaler.

Eva: Dorito's orange powder: The fat man's cocaine.

Peter: Next time somebody thinks they've hit bottom, they should ask themselves, "Sure, I've lost my job and my spouse, but am I eating a Dorito Supreme? No? Then party on."

Eva: Just like with regular Doritos, you can't eat just one. Which must be why I just absent-mindedly ate 23 tacos.

Mike: This is the perfect combination of two things that are terrible for you. As if ammonia and hydrochloric acid, mixed together ,tasted like chocolate.

(Eva is offered another.)

Eva: No thanks. I ate the first one, but now I feel really bad about it.

Mike: Exactly. I'm trying to find an analogy, for something you do, but don't enjoy. It's like shooting Lenny at the end of "Of Mice and Men."

Peter: Think of the tacos, Lenny! Think of the Tacos!

[The verdict: If you like Doritos, in all their orangey glory, you will like these, but just a little while later you will regret everything you've done to lead you to that moment.]

Steam has changed all of our lives for the better. The steam engine changed history (it allowed Marty McFly to return to the present in Back To The Future III). Without steam, saunas would just be a bunch of naked guys in a room. And most importantly, steam makes bao possible.

We visited the Chicago chain Wow Bao (it rhymes) (warning, their website has an autoplay video).

Ian: It's like a cloud. I wish actual clouds were filled with pork. Because you know, pork rain.

Robert: Every cloud has a damaged stomach lining.

 

Eva: A bao is what a pop tart looks like when it's eaten too many pop tarts.

Mike: This barbecue pork dumpling is like an anatomy model of my stomach after I've eaten ribs. It's educational and delicious. It's edulicious!

Ian: If I were Wow Bao, I'd call the beef ones "Cow Bao" and the pork ones "Sow Bao." And the glass shard ones "Ow Bao."

Eva: Yeah. I like food I can order in as few words as possible. Saves the ol' mouth muscles for chewing.

Ian: What if Wow Bao is what dogs have been asking for all this time, and they just talk backwards?

Eva: And they spell weird.

Ian: I guess they've also been asking for crab.

[The verdict: very delicious. And before you say it's not a sandwich, I refer you to the The Neuhaus Rule.]

[Hi. I'm Kate the "Wait, Wait" intern and this is a new section of our blog where I'll be reporting on the latest happenings around the office every week. You may recognize me from other "Wait, Wait" blog posts, most notably the March 9-10th "What's a Beaver-Bear Mascot Doing in the Workplace?" promo video in which my unsteady camera work became a popular point of online discourse.]

MONDAY 4:23pm: Ian plays Kenny G.'s classic, "Silhouette," at his desk for the fifth time today. He keeps alternating the volume so that the soft harmonies gradually creep in and take over the office before the rest of us begin to realize why we feel so sensual.

 

WEDNESDAY 11:17am: We discuss Justin Bieber. Again. Because the Biebs comes up in the news cycle a lot, the group holds informal bi-daily Bieber discussions (I don't think they actually know how often they talk about him). Eva mentions that she recently watched his "Never Say Never" documentary and came to the conclusion that whether or not Justin Bieber is worthy of his hyperpop stardom, he is really good at wearing white. And that's not something everyone can do.

Seriously though, they talk about him all the time.

THURSDAY, SHOW NIGHT, 06:30pm: We all head over to the Chase Bank Auditorium (the one in Downtown Chicago) to record the show. It's Carl's 78th birthday so we surprise him with pies and sing to him before he goes on stage. Happy Birthday, Carl!

THURSDAY 07:36pm: The show was supposed to start six minutes ago.

THURSDAY 07:37pm: The show starts!

THURSDAY 10:06pm: The show concludes. Leaving the auditorium, I see Mike get in a cab and then get out two blocks later. He forgot he drove in today.

FRIDAY 10:30am: I get Peter a fresh cup of coffee. He tells me I'm really good at what I do. I feel proud.

Major League Baseball stadiums have so many treats to offer: hot dogs, hamburgers, nachos, Human Growth Hormone. Just in time for Opening Day, Poag Mahone's in Chicago has combined three out of four of those in the Ballpark Burger: a hot dog topped hamburger, with a side of nachos.

Mike: This is a fine duet. It's like Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers doing Islands in the Stream.

Ian: What part of the Kenny Rogers does this meat come from?

 

Ian: The hot dog is that annoying guy who doesn't have a car and always has to catch a ride with cheeseburger.

Robert: To his credit, he does provide gas.

Mike: The hot dog and hamburger are just crammed in there together and neither one can escape.

Robert: Just like my mother and father and—

Mike: Whoa whoa. Somebody needs to visit the Hamburger Psychologist.

Peter: I'm removing the hot dogs. Too hard to eat.

Molly: They should have done a hot dog rinse. Like vermouth with a martini, just rubbed the hot dog on the burger to get its smoky essence, then thrown it away.

Robert: Now I'm ready for the seventh inning retch.

Peter: This isn't right. Combining the hot dog with the hamburger.

Mike:It's like the End Times.

Ian:Yeah, I think this is prophesied in Lipidations 34:3.

[The verdict: delicious components, but difficult to eat. Some disassembly required.]

You can do just about anything with Cadbury Creme Eggs, short of sitting on them until they hatch (we tried, it was a bad idea). There's Cadbury Creme Eggs Benedict, Cadbury Creme Egg Lady Gaga Transporter, and Deviled Cadbury Creme Eggs, which we tried a version of here.

Eva: This is a good eggsample of something delicious.

Ian: Yeah, eggs-cellent! I can't feel my eggs-tremities!

 

Kate: It's an unfertilized marshmallow and corn syrup delight!

Ian: The rooster who fertilizes this says cock-a-diabetes-doo!

Eva: This is the egg you get when a hen mates with a Peep.

Peter: The love that dare not speak its nutritional information.

Ian: These are pretty sugary. Something tells me this year's Easter Egg Hunt is going to be won by Horde of Hungry Ants.

Ian: The Easter Bunny who brings this is just making more work for the Tooth Fairy.

Peter: The Easter Bunny who brings this will be in a mobility scooter.

[The verdict: inferior to the original Cadbury Creme Egg, which just shows you not to meddle in God's creation. This takes one of my favorite savory dishes and combines it with one of my favorite sweet dishes to make a pretty terrible dish.]