Category Archives: Blah

GenX Rant: You’re not lonely, you’re just an idiot…

Posted on by
6

So, the Washington Post ran an article this week where the former Surgeon General states that the U.S. has a “loneliness epidemic” it’s currently facing. A what?!

From the article:

“Vivek H. Murthy, who became the U.S. surgeon general in late 2014 after a lengthy confirmation battle over his remarks about guns being a health-care issue, added emotional well-being and loneliness to his list of big public health worries.

Now he’s writing about the impact the workplace has on those issues, taking his concerns to employers and speaking out about how the “loneliness epidemic” plays out on the job. In a new cover story in the Harvard Business Review, Murthy treats loneliness like a public health crisis, and the workplace as one of the primary places where it can get better — or worse. “Our social connections are in fact largely influenced by the institutions and settings where we spend the majority of our time,” Murthy said in an interview with The Washington Post. “That includes the workplace.”

Have we lost our f#*king minds!?

So, Timmy doesn’t make friends at work, goes home and spends eight straight hours on social media, or binge watches 8 episodes of Breaking Bad and feels like no one is his friend. That not an epidemic. Tim is an idiot!

I wasn’t a lonely kid, and I didn’t grow up being a lonely adult. Why? My parents would physically lock me out of the house from like after school to whenever the street lights came on. I was no ‘allowed’ in the house. They forced me to got out and make friends. It’s a learned skill, making friends. They said only one thing, “Go make friends.”

No instructions. No scheduled playgroups. Get your lazy ass outside and make friends. It’s not hard, just don’t be an idiot to the other kids who are were also forced outside. A ‘friend’ is not a social connection. It’s someone you physically talk to, touch, you know what each other’s likes and hates. You know their dreams and fears.

So, here we are in 2017, we can’t find enough talent, we’re struggling to help our leaders manage the performance of our workforce, and now we have to teach adults how to make friends? You have to be freaking kidding me!

A decade ago Gallup found out the ‘trick’ too happy employees is they have a ‘best friend’ at work. Little did we know, then, but apparently we do today, HR would become best friend matchmaker for friendship illiterate millennials who couldn’t look up from their phones for fifteen seconds to say an actual “hello” to Timmy as he walked by.

I give up. We’re all morons. Society is lost. China, please come takeover already…

Everyone has their own rules. These are mine. The Sackett Rules!

Posted on by
1

I’m heading back from South Africa today, so I’m re-posting a blog post I wrote six years ago. The day I wrote it I was at SHRM with Matt Stollak and Matt Charney, who gave me the motivation for this! It’s fun looking back on some old posts and reminding myself of some of these.

I think we all have rules, our own set of rules, but rarely do we let others know, which is why it’s so hard dealing with people. If we just knew everyone’s rules, we would probably all get along just fine!

Here are my rules:

The Sackett Rules

1. Don’t call in sick on Mondays or Fridays – no one believes you. (My staff knows this one well)

2. Everyone has a price, it’s a recruiters job to figure that out.  Never take “I’m not interested” as a reason. You just haven’t found out the price where they would be interested. (I don’t want to shovel cow manure, but if you pay me enough, well, heck, where’s the shovel?)

3. It only costs a little more to go, first class.  (My Grandpa use to say this, then my Mom, now me. It’s about doing things right.)

4. People won’t remember what you said, but they’ll remember how you made them feel. (That’s why I bring great snacks to meetings, and try and have a funny story!)

5. Always be nice to Moms with young kids. (Their day is always much harder than mine.)

6. There’s always a reason to kick an old man down the steps, just don’t do it. (via Chris Rock – this just makes me laugh)

7. Don’t cross the streams. (from Ghostbusters: I use this one with my youngest son, it makes him laugh, and he’s never seen the original movie)

8. No touching of the hair or face. (Ron Burgundy in Anchorman: my wife will laugh at this. I don’t like people touching my almost gone hair and I had Lasik surgery years ago and don’t like anyone touching my face, and I don’t like bees!)

9. Don’t be a victim. (Yeah, you pretty much control what happens to you, I have very little patience for people who play the victim.)

10. If you are scrubbing the kitchen floor in your boxer shorts, don’t do it with the shades to the sliding glass door open, while your neighbors behind you are having your other neighbors over for drinks on the back deck. (enough said I believe)

What are your rules, that you wish everyone would know? Hit me in the comments!

If you want Genius, You Can’t manage to Ordinary

Posted on by
Reply

Most leaders I know want brilliant, creative, genius outcomes from their employees. Awesome! I love high expectations.

Genius, though, is a fickle thing. 99.99% of us will never reach the genius stage in anything we do in life. If you’re lucky enough to work with, be friends with, or manage a genius personality, you know these cats aren’t normal.

Some folks can reach a genius level in one aspect of their life. This lady is a genius at selling software, no one is better. This dude is a genius at creating and improving processes like no one else.

Leaders usually try to manage the genius like every other ordinary employee.

Therein lies the problem. The genius isn’t ordinary, they’re extraordinary. We have a hard time wrapping our small leadership brains around this idea of treating one person differently than the rest is the right thing to do. We were ‘trained’ to treat everyone equally.

Some times the right leadership decision to set precedent. To treat someone differently than the rest because that’s what needs to be done to reap what the genius has to give you. It’s not that the genius necessarily wants or asks to be treated differently. It’s the fact that if you want genius you can’t manage them like their ordinary, otherwise, you’ll probably just get ordinary.

 

The day Political Correctness Jumped the Shark

Posted on by
7

You know what “Jump the Shark” means, right? It’s basically saying that something has lost its relevance and is past its time. In today’s always on social media train, things can jump the shark very quickly. Something that is hot today, is totally forgotten about within hours.

Obviously, there are certain things that will never jump the shark. Racism can not jump the shark. There will never be a day when racism is irrelevant. Political correctness and companies trying to be politically correct, though, can jump the shark!

Robert E. Lee.

That infamous Confederate General with all the statues and car named after him on Dukes of Hazard has been really popular in the news lately. After the tragedy at Charlottesville, VA recently, folks around the U.S. have come to the conclusion maybe it’s time we stop celebrating people who fought for slavery and take down those monuments that are awful reminders of things we should not be honoring or celebrating.

ESPN, the worldwide leader in sports, has a really great announcer that happens to be named Robert Lee. Not Robert E. Lee. Just Robert Lee. In fact, ESPN’s Robert Lee is an Asian-American, not even a white dude, like the original Robert E. Lee.

ESPN’s Robert Lee was supposed to call a football game on ESPN being hosted by the University of Virgina. The same place where white supremacists marched and killed a person recently. When all the brilliant folks at ESPN put their heads together, they thought it best not to put “Robert Lee” on the telecast of the University of Virginia game.

Why?

Well, that’s a great question! ESPN believes folks will be offended by a person named Robert Lee calling a football game on TV in which the University of Virgina is playing in Charlottesville. The Asian guy, Robert Lee. Not the dead Confederate General Robert E. Lee, which appears ESPN leaders don’t believe those watching the game could tell the difference, between an alive Asian-American and a dead Confederate White General.

Political Correctness has jumped the shark. ESPN is everything that is wrong with Corporate America.  We’ve gotten to the point where we’ve tried to dumb down everything to a level that it no longer makes sense to anyone.

Of course, Robert E. Lee is not something we need to celebrate in our country. But, does that mean that a guy named Robert Lee can’t call a football game?! ESPN, how dumb do you think America is? Wait, don’t answer that, I think we get the picture.

The 3 Conclusive Steps to Getting Sh*t Done

Posted on by
1

There are times when I struggle to get things done.  I’m a really good starter of things. In fact, I love starting things.  I can always see how I want it finished (a little shout out to Covey – Begin with the end in mind).  But like most things you start, eventually things get bogged down, and getting them over the finish line can be hard.

It’s probably why most projects fail, it gets tough, so we stop and move onto the beginning of something else because that’s fun and exciting.  I’ve learned this about myself over the years and I do two things to help myself. First, I surround myself with people who have great resolve to getting things done, the type of folks who don’t sleep well at night because they know there was that one glass left in the sink, and they should really get up and put in away.  I love those folks, they aren’t me, I hire them every time I get the chance.  I even married one of those types she makes me better!

Second, I force myself to not start something new, until I finish what I’ve already started.  This can be annoying, I’m sure, for those around me because sometimes projects have to go on hold while you wait for feedback, or other resources, etc.  This makes me antsy, I like to get things finished!

I was re-introduced recently to a quote from the novel Alice in Wonderland that I think really puts in perspective what it takes to get something done.  The quote is from the King of Hearts and it is quite simply:

“Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop.”

Your 3 Steps:

1. Begin

2. Go till the end

3. Stop

We make it much harder than that, but it really isn’t.  I like simple stuff, it fits into my mind quite well.  It might be the best advice I’ve gotten in a really long time.  I don’t need pre-planning, or post project assessments, or update meetings, or budget reviews, etc.

Naive?  Probably.  But, sometimes you just need to begin, go to you come to the end, then stop.

10 Ways Old White Dudes Can Stay Relevant in the Workplace

Posted on by
8

I don’t consider myself an old white dude, but I’m sure most of the twentysomethings working for me probably think I’m the old white dude! Old white dudes are at a crossroads of the American workplace. They used to be on top. There was no better role to have in the American workplace than to be an old white dude!

But times they are a-changin (only old white dudes and hipsters will get that reference!).

In today’s workplace old white guys are as desired as foot fungus. Somewhere between WWII and last Tuesday old white dudes became irrelevant, well, I mean unless you’re a Fortune CEO or President, besides that stuff.

But, I’m here to help. I mean, eventually, I’m going to fall into the old white guy category on the diversity and inclusion surveys so I better find a way to pull us out of this funk and make us super cool again! Here what you need to be doing old white dudes:

1. Denounce all other old white dudes. That way you’re not ‘that’ old white dude, you’re the cool new old white dude who got ‘woke’ (look it up on Urban Dictionary old white dudes).

2. Stop wearing cargo shorts. Apparently, the kids decided cargo shorts are lame and only old white guys where them. Remember those shorty-shorts we wore in the 1970s and 80s? Yeah, those are super cool now. Wear shorty-shorts and show a ton of leg!

3. Hide the fact you like money, small government, and hate taxes. If you want to be cool you have to be willing to give up most of your money to a government who has continually shown to have no idea how to spend our tax dollars for people who claim they can’t find a job.

4. Buy comfortable marching shoes – but not those lame white Nikes or New Balance sneakers all the old white dudes have – go for Nike Air Max’s. Cool old white dudes march with our brothers and sisters who have been wronged. If you don’t march, or at least show up at their parties in downtown areas, you can’t join their click. Also, get ready to wear a ton of rainbow stuff. Calm down, no one looks good in rainbow, but the after parties are super fun!

5. Sell your $60, 000 pickup or sports car and buy a Prius or some kind of Subaru. Only old white dudes drive expensive pickups and sports cars. Cool old white dudes drive Prius’s and Subarus. A good second option is a bike and ride it to work.

6. Talk about Tacos like they’re your new religion. Cool folks in the workplace ‘love’ tacos. Not only are they great food but you’re also supporting a diversity group by eating them, I think. You can’t just ‘like’ tacos. You have to want to have sex with tacos. Tacos should be your primary conversation point each day until you die.

7. Get into a workout routine and then push what you do onto anyone within ten feet of you at all times. It’s cool to workout, but it’s more cool to workout and then make everyone else feel stupid who doesn’t do your workout. Old white guys golf and go boating. Stop all of that. If you want to get into the water buy a paddle board and a rack for the top of your Subaru.

8. Complain about your super long eight hour work day and how you could do all of this working at home in two hours. The goal of becoming a cool old white guy is to fit in. Sure work-life balance has never been better in the history of America, but that shouldn’t stop you from railing against the machine.

9. Be super chill about all dumb decisions people make. To be a super cool old white guy, you have to be super chill about how everyone else decides to live their life no matter how stupid it might seem. “Hey, Mikey, love the new face tattoo! I’m sure that will really help your career path! Super cool!”

10. Never say anything about diversity and inclusion. Old white dudes can’t have an opinion about diversity and inclusion because you don’t know the struggle. Even gay old white dudes should probably keep quiet. I mean Tim Cook is an old gay white dude and he runs Apple! Does he really know the struggle!?

There will come a time when old white dudes will become a minority in the world, but you pointing this out just makes you sound like a racist old white dude, so cut that stuff out. Just suck it up, buy some slim fitting jeans and throw away all y0ur Docker Khakis, no one wants your theories on changing demographics.

You might grow a crazy long beard. Many old white dudes have found that really awful long beards help them blend in a bit better. Like ‘hey, I’ve got a way too long beard, so maybe I’m not an old white dude, but a Viking!” People love Game of Thrones in the workplace, so it might help.

Hey, hit me in the comments about how ageist this is or what other great ideas you might have to keep old white dudes relevant in the workplace!

 

Email Heroes – Are you one?

Posted on by
Reply

For most of their careers, my parents could never check their work email at home.  It did mean that they probably stopped working when they got home, unlike most professional employees today.  My parents also rarely made it home at 5 pm and worked in the office many Saturdays and Sundays when the work needed to get done. The world changed, we can now get work done almost anywhere.

When did we start defining work as sitting in the bathroom at home and replying to emails in five minutes as work?

Let’s face it, most people aren’t really working when they are home if they don’t normally work at home.  They like to believe that what they’re doing is real work, but if can also wait to be done the next morning when you arrive at the office, you’re not doing real work, you’re just narcissistic.  Oh, I better immediately get back to John and tell him I can definitely do that interview at 8 am, next week Friday…

We act like checking work email at home is the same as donating a kidney or something.

Studies show that 59% of males and 42% of females respond to emails when out of the office.  Those numbers actually sound low to me. The survey also shows that younger workers are more likely to think about work when going to bed and when waking. Just wait! Pretty soon thinking about work will be the same as work!

Are we losing our f’ing minds!?

Seriously! I want to know.  Having the ability to check and respond to emails outside of the office increase your work-life flexibility, but we talk about it like it’s an anchor.  That iPhone is only an anchor if you make it an anchor!  I have a son who plays baseball and I watch as many of his games as I can.  In between innings I always check my email and respond to work if necessary. I do not consider that work. I consider that watching my son play baseball!

Making the decision to take a half a day to watch my son play baseball is easy, because I know I can balance both jobs I have, running a company and being a Dad.  Does my son care that I’m checking email while he’s warming up in between innings?  No. He doesn’t even notice.  It’s not like I’m behind the backstop giving a performance review over the phone while he’s up to bat! I’m just checking and following up on some emails.

If you decide you want to stay connected to your job and organization while you are out of the office, that is a personal decision. Don’t act like you’re a hero going above and beyond by keeping up on your emails. You’re not, everyone does that.

If keeping up with your emails is the real work you’re doing, you’re highly overpaid and easily replaceable. If telling your coworkers you checked emails while out of the office on some personal time to show how dedicated and better you are than them, you need to get a life, email hero.

5 New Rules of Work

Posted on by
6

I’m usually a big fan of Fast Company articles (in fact my friend Lars Schmidt is now a regular contributor to FC and his stuff is awesome!)but this one seemed like the biggest contrived piece of new-aged garbage, I just had to share!

The article has a great premise: These Are The New Rules of Work.  You know, one of those articles that will show us all how we use to do work and how we now do work. Well, maybe, but also how we hope we could do work like they talk about in magazines like Fast Company, but we really don’t because we live in the real world.

Here’s a taste:

Old Rule: You commute into an office every day.

NEW RULE: WORK CAN HAPPEN WHEREVER YOU ARE, ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD.

Cute, but I actually work at a job where we go to the office each day, like most people in the world. So, while it would great to work in the Cayman Islands, my job is in Flint, and if I don’t come in, I don’t get paid. Which makes trips to the Cayman more difficult.

You get the idea.  It was written by a professional writer, not by someone who actually works a real job. Writing isn’t a real, normal job. When you write freelance, you can actually work from anywhere, because you basically work for yourself!

Here are the others:

Old Rule: Work is “9-to-5”

NEW RULE: YOU’RE ON CALL 24-7.

Well, you’re not really on call 24-7, you choose to be ‘connected’ 24-7, there’s a difference.  I do believe that ‘leaving’ your job at the office was a concept that was overblown for the most part in our parent’s generation. They claimed to do this, but only because they didn’t have email and smartphones and laptops. Let’s face it, our parents would have been just as connected given the same technology.

Old Rule: You have a full-time job with benefits.

NEW RULE: YOU GO FROM GIG TO GIG, PROJECT TO PROJECT.

There’s no doubt there is a rise in the use of the contingent workforce, but this doesn’t mean it’s necessarily chosen by the worker.  True, thoughts have shifted that many people no longer want to work at one company for forty years, but much of that has been shaped by companies and economics. When you live through an entire decade of layoffs and downsizing, you begin to think of the work environment as more transient. The crazy part about this mindset is organizations still feel like candidates should want to stay at a company for forty years, even though they can’t, and won’t, guarantee that for you.

Old Rule: Work-life balance is about two distinct, separate spheres.

NEW RULE: FOR BETTER OR WORSE THE LINE BETWEEN WORK AND LIFE IS ALMOST ENTIRELY DISAPPEARING.

This is the one rule I actually agree with.  Again, from a day when you could actually separate yourself from your work and personal life. In today’s ultra-connected world, it becomes very difficult to do this. I think most people get tired of living two separate lives, and just want to live one. This is who I am, professionally and personally, take me a whole person, or not.

Old Rule: You work for money, to support yourself and your family.

NEW RULE: YOU WORK BECAUSE YOU’RE “PASSIONATE” ABOUT A “MOVEMENT” OR A “CAUSE”—YOU HAVE TO “LOVE WHAT YOU DO.”

This is actually the single worst piece of advice ever given to mankind! Bar none.  If this was actually the case, how do you think anything would actually get done on this planet? How would store shelves get stocked? Gas stations get to run. Your dinner gets cooked and the dishes washed at your favorite restaurant? Do you really feel there are folks “passionate” about washing dishes for you? That they want to wash dishes for your cause of having a chicken fried steak and gravy for dinner?

Get some freaking perspective.

I think it’s great if you can work at somewhere you’re passionate about, good for you. But it’s definitely not necessary for you to have a great life. Have a cause that is special in your life? Perfect, go for it. You know what really helps most causes? Money! If you have a job that makes great money, just imagine how you can truly help that cause.

So, what do you think about these ‘new’ rules of work?

Hi, My Name is Tim, and I’m a Lonely Middle-aged Guy.

Posted on by
10

Middle-aged men face this weird life-path. You start a career. Get married. Move to the suburbs. Start a family. Become a little league coach. Watch your kids graduate. Then you get ready to die.

I feel like I’ve got more friends than ever in my life, but if I stop and really put down on paper people who I would consider a ‘close’ friend, that number is very small. Part of this is the social world we’ve created. Staying in touch with hundreds or thousands of people at a very surface level, but never really going that deep. “Sorry to hear your cat died. So, awful…Hey, this video is hilarious, I better share…”

The reality is I grew up in a generation that was much different than my parents. I don’t think my parents really cared if I lived or died, as long as I wasn’t too loud in the house, and I didn’t do anything to embarrass their station in life. My generation then went to the extreme opposite and became helicopter parents!

The Boston Globe recently had an article titled: The biggest threat facing middle-aged men isn’t smoking or obesity. It’s loneliness. And while I don’t really want to admit this is me, it’s probably more me than I realize! From the article:

Beginning in the 1980s, Schwartz says, study after study started showing that those who were more socially isolated were much more likely to die during a given period than their socially connected neighbors, even after you corrected for age, gender, and lifestyle choices like exercising and eating right. Loneliness has been linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and stroke and the progression of Alzheimer’s. One study found that it can be as much of a long-term risk factor as smoking.

The research doesn’t get any rosier from there. In 2015, a huge study out of Brigham Young University, using data from 3.5 million people collected over 35 years, found that those who fall into the categories of loneliness, isolation, or even simply living on their own see their risk of premature death rise 26 to 32 percent.

I like to tell my wife she’s my best friend, and the reality is, that’s true in every form of the phrase. I’m sure she likes knowing that, but boy does that add a lot of pressure to a marriage relationship! I’m thankful for having such a great relationship, but she doesn’t like Tosh or Deadpool, so I probably need a guy friend for that stuff!

I have a dog. He’s pretty great. Wish I had a pickup truck for him to ride with me in it. That would be even better. I call him my best friend every day, and I think he actually believes it. I know I do.

I have others I call my ‘best’ guy friends, but some of those on that list I rarely see and sometimes go weeks or months without actually communicating live. That doesn’t seem best friend-ish!

Because I write in the HR space, I have a bunch of women who I communicate with often, and I would definitely call them my ‘best’ friends who are ladies. Most guys don’t have this luxury because their wives wouldn’t take to kindly to other women talking to their husbands. I’m lucky that way, but still, most of these ‘friends’ I rarely see live or talk to live, it’s mostly a social relationship.

The moral to this story? Stop reading blogs and go touch someone. Not inappropriately, but physically see them and talk to them. The human body needs real life relationships to thrive.

Sackett’s Top 10 Fast Food foods of All Time

Posted on by
6

So, I’m a big fan of sportswriter Bill Simmons. I love his writing and his podcast. About a year ago he started a website called The Ringer that basically develops sports and pop culture content, and last week they released a list of the Top 50 Fast Foods of all time.

On his pod, Simmon’s admits that the millennials who work for him screwed up the entire list (they had Chick-fil-a waffle fries as the number one choice! Those aren’t even the number one choice on the Chick-fil-a menu!), but it’s a fun list to look at any way to see where your favorites fall. To me, the list was flawed as it just measured all fast food foods in one category, which is really hard to do. S

So, I’m giving you my Top 10 Fast Foods based on the following categories: Main dish, Side dish, Breakfast, and Desert.

Sackett’s Top 10 Fast Food Main Dishes: 

1. Chick-fil-a Original Sandwich – I first ate a Chick-fil-a sandwich on spring break in Florida when I was nine years old and I thought it was the best thing I’ve tasted. Since I was in Michigan, I only got Chick-fil-a once a year when we would go to Florida for Spring Break. So, when I got older and traveled all over the country, I would go to great lengths to get Chick-fil-a and bring Chick-fil-a home to my family! These sandwiches are so good I actually look past their awful social stances! Until I’m done with the sandwich, then I go back to thinking how bad of a company they are.

2. Shack Burger from Shake Shack – The single best burger on the planet. Some could argue it’s not completely fast food, but when you order at a counter and wait to pick it up in minutes, it’s fast food. More expensive than most fast food, but another item I go out of my way to get! And stop on In-and-Out burger. You lose all credibility with me if you actually think In-and-Out is better than Shake Shack. Cheaper? Yes. Better? Not even close.

3. Spicy Chicken Sandwich from Wendy’s – The original spicy chicken sandwich and for my money the best. Chick-fil-a is close, but when the original is so good, you can’t bring yourself to order the spicy. Wendy’s sandwich has the right amount of heat and a juicy piece of chicken!

4. Joey Bag of Donuts burrito from Moe’s Southwest Grill. Qdoba’s burrito runs a close second to Moe’s. Chipotle isn’t even close. Look, when I get a burrito that’s as big as my head, I don’t need to hear your organic, free range bull shit. I know I’m eating something that will likely kill me, just let me enjoy it! Moe’s makes a great burrito and you always feel welcome!

5. Double Cheese Burger from McDonald’s. The double cheese from McDonald’s is the grease-soaked burger type item that just tastes good, even though it shouldn’t.  Also, you can’t just eat one, it’s a two order minimum, they should just come that way. I’m not proud, but I’ve been known to order more than two. It’s a great 2 am meal.

6. Arby’s Roast Turkey Ranch & Bacon Sandwich. First, you actually feel healthy ordering this as compared to most fast food items, But throw on a ton of turkey, bacon, and ranch and it’s no longer a healthy choice, but it sure tastes good! This replaces all subs on my list. Sure there are great subs shops, but they’re all local. National sub shops are usually awful.

7. Shredded Chicken Burrito from Taco Bell. This is my go-to road food. If I’m in the car and in a hurry, this Taco Bell burrito is a winner in my book. Look, I don’t trust Taco Bell beef, but for some reason, I trust their chicken, and I can eat a few of these.

8. Little Ceasars Hot & Ready $5 Pepperoni Pizza. Not fast food? It might be the fastest food on the planet! I walk in. Ask for a hot and ready and I’m out in a minute! Not only is it not an awful pizza, it might be the best value of all fast food, ever! Sure you can find way better pizza, but for $5 bucks you can’t beat this pizza.

9. Philly Cheesesteak from Penn Station. Regional chain alert. I don’t consider a Cheesesteak a sub, and Penn Station has a great Cheesesteak. Sure, you can find way better local joints, but not fast food cheesesteak places in the midwest like this!

10. Chicken Club Toaster Sandwich from Sonic. Okay, I’m a chicken sandwich fan and I like Texas Toast, Sonic gives me both on this sandwich. It’s my go-to sandwich at Sonic.

 

Sackett’s Top 10 Fast Food Side Dishes: 

1. Potato Ole’s from Taco John’s – I’m a sucker for tater tots and these are the small ones, deep fried with a blend of spices that you can dip in nacho cheese. Stop it! I want some right now!

2. McDonald’s Fries – I think 99% of American’s grew up on these and they’re still a favorite. Consistently great for about ten minutes. Once they get cold they taste like something awful and they can never be warmed up. This leads to eating the fries first, usually before you even get the bag home.

3. Sonic Tater Tots – Like I said, I like tater tots. It’s my list, not yours. Dip them in ranch and welcome to the Midwest of awesome!

4. Kentucky Fried Chicken Mashed Potatoes – I don’t even think these are real potatoes but you put that brown gravy on them and I can eat way too many.

5. Qdoba Queso and Chips. Great spicy white queso and fresh chips, if they only had a margarita in a to-go cup this would be perfect.

6. Long John Silver’s Hush Puppies. What the hell is even in a hush puppy? I don’t know and I don’t care because they’re so good!

7. Crab Rangoon’s at any Chinese takeout place. Usually, this is another no-wait item in the Chinese takeout world, especially those takeout places that run the hot buffet counter all day long.

8. Waffle fries from Chick fil a. You don’t find waffle fries in many places and they do these pretty good. The one thing that holds this back is when you get that one waffle fry that isn’t really a waffle fry but more of a half of potato that didn’t get fully waffled!

9. Onion Rings at Burger King. These aren’t great onion rings overall on the onion ring scale, but these are fast and good. The problem is you never get enough of these in an order, but you do get usually get a bonus fry or two.

10. Crinkle Fries at Culvers – close second place are the Shake Shack crinkle fries. The key to a great crinkle fry is making sure you get the done enough. The worst tasting fry is a half done crinkle fry. Culver’s does these really well!

 

Sackett’s Top 10 Fast Food Breakfast items: 

1. Steak Breakfast Crunchwrap from Taco Bell – So, let me get this straight you put a big hash brown, eggs, steak, and cheese inside a flour tortilla shell and grill it? Yes, please!

2. Krispy Kreme Donuts – Okay Krispy Kreme’s aren’t even my favorite donuts, but donuts had to be high on the list and we all have our favorite local places! To be fair, a hot box of Krispy Kreme’s is like eating Lay’s Potato Chips, you can’t just eat one! My favorites in order: Quality Dairy (Michigan), Glazed and Infused (Chicago), and LaMar’s (Midwest, KC).

3. Chick-fil-a Chicken Biscuit – It’s the Chick-fil-a sandwich on a biscuit instead of a bun. What’s not to love?!

4. Sausage, Egg, and Cheese McGriddle’s from McDonald’s – Okay, sausage, egg, and cheese between two warm griddle cakes that taste like maple syrup. My diabetes gets excited just thinking about it!

5. French Toast Sticks from Burger King – Perfect fast food breakfast. You don’t have time for a fork and knife. Just let me dip these deep fried pieces of bread into some syrup.

6. Bacon, Egg, and Cheese Croissan’wich from Burger King – Back to back BK items on the countdown. This is a solid breakfast sandwich and the flaky croissant pushes it over the top.

7. Cinnabon Original Classic Role – My teeth hurt just writing this, but OMG these are too good to be real! I actually feel guilty ordering one of these and eating it in front of people.

8. Steak, egg and cheese Subway Flatbread – Under-rated as a breakfast stop. Their sandwiches are awful, but the breakfast is actually pretty good and you can make it semi-healthy is you decide that’s for you.

9. Grilled Breakfast Burrito at Taco Bell – Taco Bell is killing it at breakfast as compared to most fast food places, I could probably list most of their items on this list and feel good about it.

10. McDonald’s Hash Browns – It doesn’t seem like a breakfast item by itself, but many folks I know just order these. What’s not better for breakfast than fried potato cakes!?

 

Sackett’s Top 10 Fast Food Dessert Items:

1. The Chocolate Chunk Cookie from Chick-fil-a – I have this number one on my list and I think it’s underrated! Every time I give someone one of these cookies they can’t believe how great it is and they can’t believe I got it from a fast food place. I could buy these in bulk, put them on a plate in my house and pass them off as homemade.

2. Blizzard from Dairy Queen – The most copied fast food desert on the planet, almost everyone now has their version of the original, but it started at Dairy Queen. Vanilla ice cream and your choice of mix-ins, it’s one of the perfect summer treats.

3. The Chocolate Frosty from Wendy’s – Another original which is basically an extra thick chocolate shake or just a cup of soft serve chocolate ice cream, it doesn’t really matter because this is the perfect fry dipper!

4. Strawberry Slush from Sonic – Okay, you could call it a drink, but it’s a dessert. Most people will say this isn’t event the best dessert at Sonic as their shakes and malts are good as well. Plus, if you don’t like Strawberry, go ahead and pick your flavor, there are like twenty-five to choose from.

5. Apple Pie from McDonald’s – It might have been the first fast food dessert ever created, so it has to make the list. I mean, warm apple pie you can eat with one hand while driving! That can’t be beat.

6. Cookies from Subway – You can’t miss with Subway cookies. My oldest son likes these so much we had them at his graduation open house. What makes them good? Usually, they’re half-baked, making them super soft and you can’t just eat one.

7. Cinnabon Delights from Taco Bell – These double as a breakfast food and a treat. Basically, they’re a traditional Cinnabon ball filled with Cinnabon icing, plus they come warm! So sweet your teeth will hurt.

8. Cheesecake from Fazoli’s – Plain or with strawberry topping, the Fazoli cheesecake is a great compliment to your Italian fast food meal.

9. Frozen Custard from Culver’s – Super creamy, thick frozen custard tastes so much better than your normal soft serve ice cream. Plus, they always have multiple flavors and toppings, plus the flavor of the month. It’s hard going to Culver’s and not getting custard!

10. Rootbeer float from A&W or In and Out – It’s a throwback to when America was great. I remember my grandparents making root beer floats for us as kids on a Saturday night and everyone, including the adults wanted one.

Hit me in the comments if I missed one of your favorites on the lists above!