Doggone.

Today, I bought Brain Age, but I will not speak of it yet.

Many of you remember (and some of you mock) an audio post I made a trip to Rubin's Red Hot, "an absolutely fabulous hot dog place by my house." On my way home from my purchase, I swung into the drive-through of Rubin's Red Hot because it was a bit late, I didn't want to cook food. When I got to the window the owner recognized me enough to realize that I hadn't made my usual order. He was a bit nostalgic about his "good customers," which confused me until he said that next Friday, he'd be closing the shop.

Rubin's Red Hot was right next to an on-ramp for the 405, which meant that it was always a bit of a loud place. But last year, Caltrans started a major construction project on several of the on-ramps and off-ramps around that area, and it had a devastating effect on his business. For several months, the sidewalk was closed right next to him, and on the other side, there was a large sign telling pedestrians to cross to the other side of the street. It made getting to the hot dog stand extremely difficult.

One of the nicest things about Rubin's Red Hot has been that it's close enough to my house that I can walk home a bag of food to eat in my kitchen, knowing that the cheddar fries will still be hot. It's about three minutes, most of which you can hear on that audio post I mentioned. But when the sidewalk was closed, getting to the shop required both some long waits for stoplights and some very annoying backtracking. And, of course, all of this extra time was in and around the brain-pounding noise of construction. Even when the sidewalk was opened, the construction took a while to die down to tolerable levels. And Caltrans had removed a fence and some trees that had helped to keep the place a bit more separated from the freeway.

All of these problems were apparently combined with hassles from the landlord; so Max Chong, the hot dog man around the corner, will be going away forever.

Now, I have no idea whether some other owner might come in and try to sell hot dogs too. It certainly seems a waste to get rid of the facade, which is an imported section of the Chicago El. And regardless of what happens, I'll still be in walking distance of The Wiener Factory, which does have better hot dogs. But The Wiener Factory is too far away for me to walk the dogs home, and losing Rubin's is a loss for the hot dog heritage of the San Fernando Valley. No, really, I'm serious. The LA hot dog experts at Hot Dog Spot explain it in their review of The Wiener Factory:

We sat and enjoyed the "Hot Dog Afterglow" for a while, watching the cars whiz by on Ventura Blvd. Steve pointed out that we were sitting smack dab in the middle of the hot dog "Miracle Mile", with Carney's and QT's Chicago Dogs just a bit to the East, and Rubin's Red Hot and The Stand a ways to the West. That's an awful lot of good eating in a relatively small area. We're not entirely sure how Ventura Blvd ended up housing so many hot dog joints, but we're pleased as punch that it did.

Well, one star of that Miracle Mile is about to go dim. If you're in Los Angeles (and you eat meat) take some time to taste something special before the old dog runs out of tricks.

(P.S. to joecab: Read the Wiener Factory Review completely and then tell me when you'll be in LA again.)

SatNYTX: 25:15.