August 2026 – World Diner Domination

By Joe Tatulli

Disclaimer: I have been to a play or two on Broadway and I have experienced the live performance of “O”, the Cirque d’ Soliel production at The Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. Amazing experiences. I have seen The WHO destroy everything on stage live at the now extinct (demolished in 1989) RI Auditorium in 1967, and I have seen Jimi Hendrix light his guitar on fire, live on stage at the now extinct (demolished in 2002) Marvell Gym at Brown University on Elmgrove Avenue, Providence in 1968. Each of these experiences were memorable spectacles of showmanship. What I experienced at The Hartland Diner borders on the same, a spectacle of showmanship. Think hyperbole in The Alice In Wonderland or The Wizard of OZ genre.

Do you ever ponder? I ponder a lot, maybe more than most. I ponder about a lot of different things. Big things like the meaning of life, my family and other important relationships. I also think about things that are important to me like who and what to support when it comes to politics and culture, which charities or non-profits to give my time and money to, and even less critical things like what restaurants I like and don’t like. We may or may not agree on this issue or that, but my basic go-to strategy on pondering is to spend some time thinking about all the variables before making up my mind and then to keep thinking even after I’ve concluded where I stand on this issue or that. “Joey, what the heck are you talking about?”

Have you ever been to the Hartland Diner in Hartland, VT? I have and let me tell you about it. First off let me add that this brief article is not about anything important like the meaning of life, or what kind of motorcycle you should ride. It’s about an experience I had riding home from the recent MOA Rally in Essex Junction, VT. Bill (Kenney) and I travel together a lot and have for the last ten or so years. We’re, let’s say, compatible. Breakfast is usually our first meal of the day, and we like to eat at a local place, in a small town, if possible, with real breakfast food. Pancakes, bacon, eggs and omelets, hash, butter, etc.

We were on our way home from the rally Sunday morning. Soleman and Norm had mentioned the night before (we had tentatively planned to ride back with Ken and Norm) that they would be leaving after breakfast at 6AM at the Greek diner across the street from our Ritz like accommodations at Motel 6. We (me n’ Bill) don’t usually eat breakfast until we travel at least a hundred miles or so, so their plan wasn’t going to work for us.

We jumped on RT89S at 5:35AM. There was nobody on the freeway. As we traveled on 89 the air temperature went from about 68° at the hotel down into the lower 50’s (maybe even some upper 40’s) as we descended into the valleys, at speed. It would have been great if I had prepared myself for this eventuality. After about two hours on 89 Bill slowed down a bit and gave me the “time to eat in about 5 miles” sign. We both swung off at the exit and soon arrived at the dirt parking lot of a very quaint little country diner called “The Hungry Beaver”, or something like that. It was closed. We jumped back on 89 and continued south toward White River Junction and RT91S.

About ten or fifteen minutes later Bill put his directional on and we were now on our way to Hartland, VT. Small town diner here we come.

So how does all this happen so seamlessly?  Do you have a Garmin GPS on your bike? Bill and I both do. There’s this great feature that allows you to use the touchscreen while riding and touch “FOOD”. Bill somehow found a great place to eat called The Hartland Diner, 107 miles away from the Motel 6 in Essex Junction. We were both hungry.

The first thing you see when you pull in the diner driveway in quaint Hartland, VT is the huge, black BLM flag hanging outside the baby blue painted diner. We weren’t in Kansas anymore. I honestly thought the BLM thing, as a political or cultural movement, was over. I was wrong. It is alive and kicking at the Hartland Diner.

Things continued along these lines as we walked inside where we were met by life-sized cardboard cutouts of US Senator (VT) Bernie Sanders, President Barak Obama, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, all amid a panoply of other signage loudly, and with aplomb, letting anyone who entered know exactly where they stood politically, socially, culturally, and, aesthetically, they being the restauranteurs. Subtle isn’t a part of The Hartland Diner. But that’s okay. This is America right? Freedom of speech. Freedom of religion. Freedom to carry.

There was also a large collection of plastic dinosaurs on the u-shaped counter at the center of the diner. I am not sure if there was a statement being made with the dinos or not, but with everything else in the room my bet would be yes. I should have asked but I was more interested in eating at the time.

The fact is we weren’t here for the political vibe and the general visual overload, we were here to eat breakfast. The server quickly attended to us with the offer of coffee and handing us each our edition of the menu. Imagine a tall, baby blue, custom made (and very well at that) binder, about two inches thick, with page after page of all things food. It was a manifesto with “World Diner Domination” boldly printed on the cover. (See the gallery for a nice picture) The breakfast section was immense, and it is served all day. Everything is made to order, even the Corned Beef Hash @ $25.00.

Bill and I looked at each other across our beautiful, vintage, Formica® “boomerang” table and acknowledged our smiling approval. As expected, the coffee was great, and we both noticed a bottle of Tabasco brand sauce neither of us had ever seen before, Scorpion Sauce. They also had regular Tabasco, along with several other well known hot sauces and the classic Heinz Ketchup. Each booth was also outfitted with its own BLM and FREE Palestine sticker, and a laminated table tent with the headline “How things work around here” with lots of hearts and childlike drawings of pancakes being doused with real maple syrup. Hey, it’s Vermont, right?

We ordered our food next. I ordered a basic pancake slider, which is a hand-crafted breakfast sandwich with a freshly fried egg, house-made hash browns and bacon between two four-inch pancakes, served with Cabot butter and real Vermont maple syrup. It was perfect in every way. Bill ordered a blueberry pancake, that went over the edge of the plate (all Fiesta ware), and the hash, which was unbelievable. Bill got up after breakfast and asked the proprietor/chef to come out, and she got a huge bear hug, and also a “this was the best hash I have ever had,” complement from Bill.

Another interesting piece of the puzzle included many framed Broadway musical posters, all signed by the cast members. I wondered out loud about the posters and another patron said that the chef/owner’s father was a Broadway musical producer. That’s when it dawned on me that we were in a Broadway musical set of sorts, all designed to look like and actually be a small local diner with great food where the patrons got to see a great show and have their breakfast all at the same time. BTW while we enjoyed our tasty food a long list of early Beatles tunes was playing in the background. “She loves you and you know that can’t be bad, yeah, yeah, yeah!”

We were happy and full as we headed out to the bikes and the ride home. The conversation was about the entertaining show, the decor and the just experienced phenomenon of the juxtaposition of politics, culture, food, and motorcycles, and how in our great country it all seems to fit together, even though it can look like one of those surrealistic paintings by Salvador Dali at times. In fact, I would say the whole experience was a spectacle of surrealistic showmanship, kinda like Pete Townsend smashing everything on stage at the end of a WHO concert, all while we ate our breakfast.

God bless America.