I vowed to go out on a Tuesday night in Salem and not come home until 2:00 a.m. and we did it, last night.
We closed the night — or opened the morning — at Daynight Donuts on S. Commercial Ave., a place we have driven by often and whose sign “Biscuits and Gravy: $1.75, has frequently given us reason to pause.
“I don’t see why you take pictures of donuts,” the dear donut maker said at Daynight.
“I just like how they look,” I told him.
“My family — that’s what I take pictures of,” he said, looking a bit annoyed. “I wouldn’t waste film on donuts.”
“It’s a digital camera, I can throw away anything I don’t want.” A wise American concept if there ever was one. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that when the going gets rough, donuts can be as good as family.
“But still, there’s something in there, and it’s a shame to waste it on donuts,” he said.
I disagree. There are few odder places in Salem than Daynight Donuts, which looks alarmingly like a Dunkin Donuts — and even has signs for Dunkin’s Coffee Coolatta to boot.
“It used to be a Dunkin Donuts,” our laconic donut baker said.
“When was that?” I asked him.
“A long time ago. Like one year.”
Here’s your food tip of the day: Daynight starts baking chocolate frosted donuts about 2:00 a.m.
And if you think about it, the name of this little local place masquerading as a franchise is kind of a challenge to you all: I dare you to come in at the exact moment when the world turns from night to day — and I’ll reward you with a warm, gooey donut.
Perhaps the donut baker subscribed to that whole “to take a picture is to steal part of the soul” mindset. It’s clear that he cares deeply for his donuts, haha.
Sorry, I actually don’t really know what I’m talking about.
I love that he only takes pictures of his family, though. If I had family over here, they’d take up 85% of my flash card too…
aWWWWW!
Glad to see you championthe cause of local donuts! A pox on Krispy Kremes and Dunkin Donuts. (Must donut emporia have allierative names?)
Yes. Berlin even has a famous place called Delicious Donuts Research, a play on DDR (acronym for former east germany). http://www.delicious-doughnuts.de/
My mother is the same way. Anytime we are spending time together and happen to be in a somewhat exotic place, she scratches her head wondering why the hell I’m taking dozens of pictures without any people in them. To her, the camera is a family sort of thing and a family thing only.
This makes me want to grab my camera to take pictures of donuts, just for the response you got. Can you imagine if he got 2 donut picture takers in one day?
Well, he works the late shift, so wait a few hours! Also, the guy was really nice. I don’t blame him for thinking I’m strange.
There used to be a local donut shop called Sesame Donuts out on Lancaster. What made Sesame great was that they would book bands to play there…rock and roll in a donut shop. It was beautiful. I miss them. – Ryan
http://www.myspace.com/sesamedonuts
Last West Coast Dunkin’ Donuts Changes Name
That was the headline in the Statesman Journal on March 14, 2008. Too bad you have to pay for S-J articles from their online archive now. Do you suppose anyone does that? Anyway, I seem to recall that the long-time franchisees objected to having to add a lot of new menu items that were being forced on them by the DD corporate geniuses. Good for them. I hope they are doing a good business sticking to the basics.
Mystery: Solved! Thank you Amecameca. And no, I will not pay for S-J articles. They tried to make me pay for old news and I said: No no no!
I seem to recall that when that Dunkin’ changed it’s name, it was first called “Daylight Donuts.” Then only a few days (maybe a single day?) after the new sign went up, they discovered “Daylight Donuts” was already taken, so they changed one letter.
Here, I knew I wasn’t going crazy–the eatsalem blog talked about it: http://eatsalem.com/2008/03/dunkin-daylight.html
Actually, you don’t have to pay for old news. If you have a library card you can access S-J articles going back to 1999 via Salem Public Library’s website.
Jenny, you are right! I live down the street from dunkin’, I mean daylight, ahem, I mean daynight donuts. It was so strange to see the signs change three times in a matter of a week.
I am continously amazed at how this comments section is telling the story of the daynight donuts myth… how fiction becomes fact! Thanks, folks.
[...] enough, or interesting enough, or funny enough, to read out loud to 75 people. I finally picked “Closing Time at Daynight Donuts,” which is a really favorite according to the number of hits it has received, and “Waiting for [...]
I found this article ( http://consumerist.com/5007419/dunkin-donuts-suing-its-own-small-franchisees-out-of-existence ) and figured thats what happened. (if you look at the article date it was about a year before this post)
The donut guy told me that the company was forcing the smaller chains to carry menu items that were being promoted by the corporation but which the smaller venues couldn’t sell in their communities. But I hadn’t said I was blogging about him, so I didn’t think it appropriate to put in the post a few months ago. Donuts schmonuts. They are still using all of the Dunkin’ donuts ingredients, just different name.