22 OCTOBER <strong>2010</strong> | UNITED.COM CHICAGO BARK TO SCHOOL Before class, Mark Reitman is brainstorming marketing taglines for Hot Dog University, the twoday training program for aspiring Chicago-style hot dog cart and stand owners that he founded fi ve years ago. “How about this: ‘The nation’s college for encased meat knowledge’?” he asks. “Nah, not tasty enough.” This course on franks combines tips on marketing and purchasing with practical training on the North Side, at a hot dog cart outside the Vienna Beef factory, which has partnered with the school. Among other secrets, students learn to heat dogs to no higher than 150 degrees to prevent a rubbery texture, and that all utensils should be red or yellow, to evoke toppings. The class begins, and the 25 students take their seats. Since Reitman opened his doors, the student body has grown from 18 his fi rst year to an expected 140 dispatches this year. One student is Peter Lin, who plans to set up a cart in Philadelphia, where there’s an abundance of cheesesteak but few Chicago-style dogs. He works for a company that makes equipment for the pharmaceutical industry; it saw business drop by 50 percent last year. “I feel like I have to diversify,” he says. Then there are some students who are simply big fans of the frank. “It’s a fun business,” whispers Steve, who is diligently taking notes in his spiral-bound notebook. His day job is in asphalt. “People are generally in a good mood when they’re around food, and what’s more fun than a frank?” Student Julie Dyne takes a big bite of a dog loaded with onions, mustard, hot peppers and neon green relish. The course requires a student to eat a dangerous amount of dogs, but Dyne is philosophical. “I’m having a salad,” she says. “I’m putting lots of relish on it.”—EMILY STONE MOUNT HOOD, OREGON Shine a Light What’s the best-selling souvenir in the gift shop at Timberline Lodge? Visitors to the WPA-era inn perched just beneath the summit of Oregon’s Mount Hood don’t go for the Timberline toothpick holder or porcelain dinner bell— both of which are charming in their own way. They want the black hooded sweatshirt silkscreened with the maniacal visage of Jack Nicholson shouting “Here’s Johnny!”: a still from Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 classic, The Shining. Never mind that Kubrick fi lmed almost the entire movie on a soundstage in England. Because the fi lmmaker spliced a few seconds of aerial footage of Timberline’s facade into The Shining’s ominous opening sequence, Oregon’s mountain home away from home remains a mecca for horror movie fans. “I really like that when I watch The Shining, I see the lodge,” says Timberline assistant general manager Scott Skellenger. “It’s the fi rst thing you see in the movie, so in people’s minds, this is the hotel The Shining was fi lmed in. They come in here thinking some little kid’s gonna be riding a trike down the hallway, someone with an ax is gonna come fl ying through the door.” Which makes Timberline a natural destination for Halloween revelers. Two years ago, Nike rented the entire lodge and threw a Shining-themed costume ball for several hundred guests who dressed up in ’20s formal attire. They mingled with actors recreating scenes from the movie, including a Jack Nicholson look-alike who sat at a table typing “ALL WORK AND NO PLAY…” all night. Still, wouldn’t you expect a 75-year-old hotel to be haunted by spirits less benign than a few die-hard horror movie buffs? “I lived for twenty-some years of my life at Timberline, and I can assure you there are no ghosts,” scoffs lanternjawed employee Jeff Kohnstamm. And he should know: Like the Overlook Hotel’s Jack Torrance, he’s the Timberline’s caretaker.—TED KATAUSKAS
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