Tuesday, September 13, 2005

More about Mickey D's

It occurs to me to explain what has led me to my current position of Drive-up Nazi. When I was a kid, my family used to order food at the drive-thru window occasionally. We didn’t follow the guidelines I helpfully laid out in the last post. We didn’t try to figure out what we wanted BEFORE we pulled up to the speaker. To the rest of my family, the fact that they were going to have to choose a food item from the menu often appeared to come as a complete surprise.
This is how it went:
Okay… Hi. Um, we’d like… Honey, what do you want? Okay, a hamburger, with… no, a cheeseburger, with extra ketchup… and fries. What comes on the hamburger? Okay, make it no onions. And make the fries large. And a medium Coke. Teddie, what do *you* want? Well, they have hamburgers and hot dogs and French fries… Okay, a hamburger. You want it plain? Yeah, make that hamburger plain. Yeah, plain, just the meat and the bun. So, a cheeseburger, and a plain hamburger. No, just one cheeseburger, and one plain hamburger. What did you want to drink, Ted? And an orange drink, small. Wait, no, medium. And a medium order of French fries. Can we change that first cheeseburger to a double burger? Yeah, and onion rings instead of fries. Okay, Bryan, what do you want?

It's too painful to go through the rest. By the time we'd gotten thru the above, we’d only ordered for two people out of six, and the poor sucker taking the order already had no idea which hamburger is changed to a double, what’s ON the hamburger(s), how many orders of fries there are in what size, or his own name, probably. Our orders would’ve defeated the president of MENSA, and most of the people working at the drive-up window did not seem to be the president of MENSA. They never got it right, and I didn't blame them a bit. After we got our order, we would pull ahead and go through a hamburger-sorting extravaganza, with tears from the smaller ones when they discovered they had gotten extra mustard instead of no mustard, or perhaps their hamburger wasn’t even included in the order. Then Mom or Dad would go back in and get everything straightened out, and the whole thing would take about the same amount of time as raising and butchering our own beef at home. And I would sit in the back seat and cringe and squirm with embarrassment and frustration, and vow never to go through this with my own family.
So now I make my own kids figure out their order before we get into line, and mock and berate them unmercifully if they stutter or hesitate while giving it to me. And believe me, they way I make the drive-up experience – and their lives in general – miserable, they tend to stutter a lot...

6 Comments:

At Wed Sep 14, 12:04:00 AM PDT, Blogger Erik said...

quite amusing. and i think you're doing the right thing with your kids. sometimes, kids only respond to emotional and verbal abuse.

eventually, i believe we'll see society gradually return to more abusive methods of child-rearing which leave deep psychological scars. (i hope!)

 
At Wed Sep 14, 09:19:00 AM PDT, Blogger jay are said...

Gut-splitting funny. I can just picture it.

 
At Wed Sep 14, 01:56:00 PM PDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

ok, i don't have to leave my original comment re blogball having the funniest post on your blog recently (cell phone comment). thanks for the laugh.

si

 
At Wed Sep 14, 02:13:00 PM PDT, Blogger Blogball said...

Bryan, thanks for the post. You always think of great subject matter that will get me going. I have thought of a few more requests when waiting in line at a drive through. .

·Please follow directions! When they say the 2nd window don’t stop at the 1st window and act puzzled why there is no one to take your money

·If you drop a few coins on the ground when receiving your change please don’t try and squeeze through your door that will only open up 1/16 of the way and squeeze your body out as if you are going through the birth canal. Only to find out that your nickel and two pennies have rolled under the car behind you. Keep moving! It’s not worth it.

·When finally receiving your food please don’t stay around and take sips of your root beer to make sure it isn’t coke and then check to make sure you have extra pickles on your double double. Pull forward and park your car! You can dissect your food there.

.Please do not be nasty or berate the restaurant employees for taking so long or messing up the order. Put yourself in their position. How would you like taking a food order from a jerk like you?

 
At Wed Sep 14, 10:17:00 PM PDT, Blogger jay are said...

I guess I'm in the mood for this subject because I'm cracking up about it all over again. Blogball, your comments are too hilarious.

 
At Fri Sep 23, 10:07:00 AM PDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

The other night Erik and I went through the Wendy's drive-thru and it's this experience that reminded me of your blog. We pull up to the black box and Erik orders: Yea, I'd like a #6 plain. So like no lettuce, tomato or onion. Oh and can you leave off the mayonnaise too. Yea, sojust plain. Wendy: What would you like to drink? Erik: A med pepsi....no lemonade. Wendy: No response. Erik: Hello?, just tell me when your ready. Are you there? Did you get that? Wendy: No response. Erik: Tell me when you're ready?

Meanwhile I am laughing almost to the point of tears. I encourage Erik to pull up to the window. Erik gets his food and the order is right! But the whole thing revived my hatred of drive thru's.

 

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