"Stranded At The Drive-Through"

There are things in this life that are universal, that we all have experienced, that are w oven into us and have become part of us like a Rubik's Cube wrapped in the Zapruder film, and put on display in the Hall of People Picking Their Nose While They Drive Because They Forgot That Everyone Else Can See Them.

One of those things is...fast food. Now stay with me. No matter your age, no matter your economic background, whether you liked Sam Malone better with Diane or as a bachelor, you know what I'm talking about.

We've all at one time or another been a part of that late-night bantha caravan through the drive-through lane at our local burger place (slash) holding cell for acne-ridden teenagers with the attention span of Jim Carey on crystal meth.

You sit there in the lane, jonesing for some kind of sustenance, mulling over our value-mealed options, trying to figure out if it's better to buy the combo even though you're taking it home and you don't need the drink, and becoming concerned because you've suddenly lost the ability to do the math, when you hear the time-honored greeting...

"Uh..welcome to Burger Barn...uh...I'll take your order in a minute."

And you think to yourself, "hey, Beevis, it's one o'clock in the morning, you're here, you're wearing the little Britney Spears headset, what the fuck else could you possibly be doing in there to preclude you from taking my order? Have I interrupted some kind of gang initiation again? Are you jumping in the guy from Dominos into your big burger gang? Is it your turn with the magic marker back there for a big game of Pictionary? What's coming between us, here? Did I pull up during "The O.C? Hey, Adam Sandbag...Let's go here!"

To yourself, I mean. You would never risk the wrath of the average midnight fast food employee. You've seen these guys. No birth records, no distinguishing features, old enough to kill you if they want, young enough to think nothing about putting your buns next to theirs while they pull the pickles off your damned important "special order." Nah...take what they give you and move on. Don't make eye contact. Don't count your change. Nobody's really happy, but nobody gets hurt, either.

So you're left stuck at the drive-through, where you continue to stare at the menu in search of the one item that really sounds good. In truth, what you're going to order is the answer to your question... "Hey, what won't absolutely kill me this late at night. What can I eat without having to take a Tom Clancy novel into the toilet with me as soon as I get home? What's the best way to minimize my damage and walk the tightrope between starvation and constipation?"

In the end, you just pick something, because you know you're lucky to be getting anything from these people at all. You pull up and they toss your food to you at the window, and you pull forward, knowing full well that your odds of getting exactly what you ordered are worse than Pamela Anderson cashing in a Jeopardy Daily Double in any category other than scummy Rock Musicians. You pull up...

"What'd you get?"

"Uh...looks like a fish sandwich...How bout you?"

"Bag of sporks."

You look back, and you notice that your place in line has been filled with the next hopeful hungry heifer, and you can't pull back in with your bag full of crap. It's late, and the seating portions of the restaurant are closed, leaving you holding the bag...literally. So you go home, eat the damn food, all the time saying to yourself, "I'll never go there again."

Guess what? If we were able to boycott restaurants for bad service, our stomachs would stay emptier than Steven Seagal's Oscar Case. We're weaker than the chili many of these places serve. We don't forgive, but we certainly do forget. Of course, it helps that nobody works at one of these places for more than fifteen minutes, and just like MTV, you get a fresh set of youthful drifters everytime you return. At two weeks, you become management, and they send you off to burger school. You become an assistant manager, with hopes of one day working your way up to Mayor McCheese. And your place is taken with somebody else who only wants to work there long enough to steal free burgers, and so on. It's inevitable.