As you expect from a memoir, the focus is personal recollections. To
me, this was the least interesting part of the book. I have little interest in
reading about a young guy falling in love with half the pretty women he meets
and trying to get laid. Too many
television
shows and
films
are already built on that premise. Ihlenfeld writes for television now, so he
may have been playing to a strength. There is a little bit of a coming of age
story; a year in the Wienermobile calls for resourcefulness.
There is a little
history
of the Wienermobile in the book. I found this to be some of the most
interesting stuff. If you have only a casual interest in the Wienermobile,
don’t worry. The history parts are short an dispersed throughout the book. It
is not the focus of the book, but it adds something good. Sure, Hotdogger is a
silly job in some ways, but it is connected to a long history of successful
marketing.
The book is a little bit
travelogue. I
wish there could have been more of this. I don’t normally read travel books,
but the context of it made me open to reading about the destinations. Perhaps
the problem is that too many of destinations were
county fairs,
Walmarts and
grocery stores. You can only go so far to make them interesting, especially
when your memory of the is clouded by exhaustion (and I suspect the occasional hangover).
I enjoyed the book , though. It is an interesting mix of the personal,
historical and
geographical.
It’s a glimpse into something few people experience. And while I don’t mean to
offend Ihlenfeld if he is still working there, it is much better than
Family Guy.
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