"Thank you. Come again!"

D'oh!

This is one of the times I wished we lived in a bigger city like Chicago or Dallas or Las Vegas.

Those are a few of the cities where the folks at 7-Eleven have converted their stores to Kwik-E-Marts, the fictional convenient stores made famous in "The Simpsons." Here's what one looks like:

They're even selling some of the game products only available at Kwik-E-Marts on the show!

In case you missed it, "The Simpsons" movie comes out July 27th, and the 7-Eleven tie-in is just one of the marketing promotions intended to boost publicity. (Hey, it must've worked ... I'm writing about it!)

Having converted to Fox's "Family Guy" since Peter Griffin, Stewie and the gang first aired in 1999, I can still say I was a big "Simpsons" fan back in the day, ever since Homer and Bart brought home Santa's Little Helper from the racetrack on the series debut back in '89. (Yeah, I wasn't really into the "Tracy Ullman Show," so I only vaguely remember the old-school "Simpsons" shorts.)

But even not having followed the happenings in Springfield for several years, I'm still looking forward to seeing the movie, let alone one of my fav Springfield-ites: Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, the attendant who works at the Kwik-E-Mart 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Before working at the Journal, I lived in Vermont for 15 months and the whole time, I longed for three things: the mall (any mall!), Denny's and Slurpees. When I came back to town, one of the first places I stopped by was the 7-Eleven on Hooker Ave., and got myself a large Slurpee. (I then got a large brain freeze, but it was so worth it!)

How cool would it be to walk into 7-Eleven ... uh ... make that a Kwik-E-Mart and buy a giant Squishee?! Ah, to dream!

Anyway ... here's one of the trailers for the movie:


This post is dedicated to my buddy Jeff, who married Steph on June 16, 2007. Congratulations!