I walked into the “restaurant“ and nobody was near the main counter, on the civilian side or the worker side. So, I stood and waited. And just as an employee approached the cash register, a holler-dwelling couple shuffled in and started to tell her what they wanted.
“Excuse me?! I was here first!” I should’ve shouted, but didn’t. You’ve got to pick your battles, and this one didn’t seem to rise to an actionable level. But that didn’t stop me from silently steaming about it…
The man appeared to have been digging ditches since November of 1983, and had a head the size of a softball. All his features were bunched together into one small area of his face, despite the shocking smallness of his overall head. And his wife (or whatever) looked like the Liberty Bell with a faded Garth Brooks t-shirt stretched over the top. I noticed she had no chin whatsoever; it was just neck, then mouth.
They had an unruly little girl, with one eye that seemed to roll around in its socket: an absolute free-agent, attached to nothing. She wandered through the place, bothering people and making strange noises with impunity.
The man began ordering, and acted like he’d never been in public before. He asked an endless string of stupid questions, and seemed to believe this was his own personal fast food restaurant.
“And can I get one of those, what are they called, Cokes? Are those any good? Have you ever tried one? Cokes? I knew this old boy, one of my ditch brothers in Tallahassee… or was it Houston? No, it was Tallahassee! He tried a Coke once, and couldn’t stop talking about it…”
I thought my brain might fly apart.
Finally, another employee opened a second cash register, and a seasoned citizen made a move for it. “Not a second time!” I either yelled or thought loudly, and nearly body-checked gramps into the McCafe.
For a brief second I felt kind of bad about my aggressiveness, but noticed the old goat had a white ponytail down his back. So, screw him. His hairstyle caused me to instantly reassess my feelings on the subject.
I was buying lunch for me and our oldest son, who is home sick today. And I started…
“Yes, I’d like a ten piece Chicken McNugget, and-”
“The meal or just the nuggets?”
“Just the nuggets. And I’d-”
“Dipping sauce?”
“What? Oh yeah, barbecue I guess. And I’d like-”
“Two or three?”
Goddamn! I couldn’t finish a freakin’ sentence. The woman kept peppering me with questions. And I was just trying to order lunch, not apply for a mortgage.
Finally, I was allowed to get it all out, and moved aside. And ol’ Noam Chomsky Mother Jones Rules for Radicals filled the void I’d created in front of the order-taker.
“Senior coffee!” he demanded, hatefully. “And a couple of those cookies. Chocolate chip! I get a discount on those too, right?”
The woman said yes, he begrudgingly paid, and snatched the receipt from her hand. Then he stood there studying the thing, on high-alert for evidence of the right-wing plot to cheat him out of his twelve cent discount.
After ponytail was finished being a complete asshole, I realized the ditch digger and Belle were STILL placing their order. Man, if they hadn’t opened a second register I would’ve either been long-gone by now, or paralyzed by a stroke.
I stood and waited while somebody stacked-up my pillar of fat, and a guy stinking of management eventually handed me a bag with the top rolled down. “Here ya go,” he said, and walked away. Wow! How friendly.
Then a man with his tie tucked inside his dress shirt, and hollering into a cell phone, almost knocked me down as I attempted to exit the joint. He had one of those “going places” purposeful walks, and a pair of douchey shades.
“This is like some sort of asshole jamboree!” I shouted in exasperation, once I was finally free of the place. And two middle-aged women overheard, and laughed.
But the food turned out to be pretty good — the pillar was masterfully constructed — and I’m giving the overall experience a C+, up from my original grade of C-.
This is Jeff Kay reporting.
1st!
two two two!!
McDonalds really brings out the best in people. Great review, I’ll have to try one of those Cokes someday.
The quality of people is generally much higher, also the drive through was probably busy, where I work generally the drive through gets a LOT more business than the lobby. That or they were short staffed, if someone doesn’t show up it can get a bit hectic.
You can’t fix stoopid!
woo hoo number 4
Top Five!
Belle- HI- freaking-larious.
I too would have immediately changed my opinion about Ponytail. Yes I am a male ponytail biggot. What of it? If you are old enough to get a senior discount then you should have learned by now you look like a douche with a stupid freaking ponytail. Whats worse these guys always have a ponytail roughly the diameter of I’m guessing their penis. What all 6 hairs got that long?? Jackass!
And after all that you gave them a C+?? We need more teachers in my daughters district who grade like that.
See, now had you joined the FBI you could have shot them. Or better yet, made them “disappear” into Guantanamo bay with nary a McDonald’s in site.
just checking in…
Our Walmart has a Subway sandwich shop located to the left of the lobby. A glass wall in the lobby separates the jetsam and flotsam from those entering the store. As you walk in, you can look to the left, and stare at the specimens ordering and eating their five dollar footlongs. It’s like when you go to the zoo and see some strange animal you’ve never seen before. You just stare. (“Dad, they all have six fingers on each hand!”) I’ve never been in there, and never will. And what’s with people “dining” at Sams? Sams is NOT a destination! Are you so hungry from shopping at Sams that you require nourishment RIGHT IN THE STORE? Oh well, they’re fun to look at, too.
Tallahassee made the Surf Report! And we know what Coke is. Boy do we know!
I thought the same thing! Yay he mentioned Tallahassee….. Then i thought why the hell did i just get excited about that? Hahahaha
P.S. No one in Tallahassee eats mcdonalds when there is what-a-burger to be had.
I have become increasingly irate over the fact that literally 80% of the time we order fast food, something about the order is wrong. This all came to head when my wife and I went through the Burger King drive thru because she wanted a Diet Coke. That’s all we ordered. One medium Diet Coke please…we pulled away from the window and they had given her a Coke.
You know that shit’s gonna kill you one day.
I will be making a concerted effort to use “asshole jamboree!” in my dinner conversation tonight. Thank you once again Jeff for adding such colorful phrases to my everyday life.
(Also, I would like to say “looked at me like I was wearing a jacket made of turds” is really a hit down here in rainy ol’ Florida)
A McDonald’s imponderable: How the fuck do you run out of french fries? Did it come as a shock when people were ordering them with their- waddayacallem- hamburgers?!?!?!?
Rant complete.
Where was the cell-phone camera, Mr. Kay? You’re very adept at pretending to be dialing numbers when actually snapping a picture of odd looking specimens of the human race. So why no picture of the ditch digger and his lass?
So……..You went inside the McD’s to obtain a take-out order. You should try out this new thing that they have at most of these places now. They call them “drive-throughs”, and you don’t even need to leave your Camry. But then you wouldn’t get to meet such interesting people.
BTW, I am the guy from Tallahasse who informed the ditch-digger of the many charms contained in one of those coca-colas. Seriously, I spent the first 22 years or so of my life there. It’s a god-forsaken shit-hole, but that’s where I’m from. If you’re from Tallahassee, your probably thinking right now: “Why did they fire Bobby Bowden?”; or perhaps: “How does that Gov Crist stay so dadgum tanned?” Maybe also: “When is that Aerosmisth gonna write another one of them songs about Tallahassee?”
In Houston right now, someone is asking: “What in the hell exactly is an Aerosmith?”
The last time I ate McDonald’s was 1997 so I go nuthin.
Happy Thursday, Surfers!
No questions! Just a full on, Hard Core, Laugh your Ass off Report! Welcome Back Mr.Kay!
The McDonald’s drive-thru is my new weekend late-night drunk-food destination. It used to be Waffle House, but the wait there can be up to 20 minutes for a table. Yes, at a Waffle House… what is this now, some sort of fancy establishment like an Applebee’s??? I just can’t justify waiting to be seated at a Waffle House.
Anyways, my drunk food of choice is usually three McDoubles and a medium Diet Coke. All on the Dollar Menu, for a combined total of $4. Combined with 8 or so beers, I’m probably putting down 3000 calories. It’s okay though, because I only do that like once a week.
Good Evening Surf Reporters…
My first thought was: Why didn’t Mr. Kay go to Wendy’s for a #1 no pickle?
Second thought was: If Jeff hadn’t told the Subway “sandwich artist” to go fuck himself…..
If it had been me pre-Xanax I would have knocked ditch-digger and senior citizens heads together and given them both a hernia. Seriously, McDonalds is the culinary Wal-Mart. At times I crave the food but I can’t stand going in there. Thank God for drive-thrus.
And as far as the pony-tail goes…it usually is on a guy that has no hair on top and/or it looks like he hasn’t washed it since the Nixon administration.
I went inside because I needed to use my bank card (no cash as usual), and don’t like getting into all that at the drive-thru.
I went to McDonald’s because my kid is sick, and I let him choose. He likes their nuggets, over Wendy’s nuggets. Go figure.
And you guys are right, I should’ve snapped a few pictures. It never crossed my mind, and I need to get back to it. Kay-O-Vision, as it’s called….
“a man with his tie tucked inside his dress shirt, and hollering into a cell phone, almost knocked me down” – wow, that spoke to me (as we used to say). Around here, you can’t walk down the street without tripping over several self-important shitbags of that type. You know, the ones who think they need to “touch base” and create “action items”, but actually need an enthusiastic kick to the groin.
Those Coke-thingies are OK, I guess, but that whisky is much, much better.
Oh, almost forgot the three extra rules of fast-food conduct: 1) wait your turn; 2) wait your DAMNED turn; 3) wait your GODdamned turn.
Imagine being a full-grown man having reached the pinnacle of his career as a McD’s manager. it’s a wonder more of those places are shot up more regularly, when you ponder it.
@jimbo – THREE Mcdoubles? You kidding? That’s an amazing amount of grease, right there. i hope you’re still young and have stretchy arteries.
I ate at McDonald’s just 4 hours ago! I agree, it is the culinary WalMart. At our Mall we have a nice food court with a variety of choices. Places that serve good food that can’t get just anywhere, but which place always has the longest line? Yep, McDonald’s! I always say to myself, “Come on people! Try something a little more fancy…and healthier than the same old crap. Try something new. Get out of you rut!”
Thats my comment and I’m sticking to it.
I forgot to say…Wendy’s nuggets are the BEST !!
tiff – I was thinking the same thought today. As I was watching the McD’s manager work the lunch crowd, I was thinking, “I’ll bet as a kid in school, you never pitcured yourself here as a McDonald’s manager, buddy.”
However, I’ve also heard, a few times, that some fast food managers get paid pretty good..like in the neighborhood of $50,000 a year!
I use to work at a Jack in the Box, doing their maintenance work; cleaning the fryers and changing the grease in them, sweeping and cleaning, putting away the new inventory of food as it would come in early in the morning. Quite an education in “Behind the scenes” of what goes on at a fast food place. If only the public knew the real story.
In& out managers make 80 K
I think I’m done commenting, but I’m not sure yet. Could I get sauce with that?
you & r. There, those were missing from my earlier comment, so feel free to put them in where you think they should go. I failed to proof-read before sending. Too much grease and calories, I guess.
AREN’T shot up.
there. that makes more sense.
Now that I’ve gone back and read the whole surf report, I was reminded about something that really bugs me about McD’s. Why do they roll down the top of the bag before handing it to you? Just give me the bag! I’ll roll it down myself, if I want it rolled! I usually order at the counter and after waiting for too long to get my order, they finally bring it to me and spend an extra few seconds rolling down the top of my bag, like they are sealing it and getting it ready for transport out the door. Don’t they know I’m just going to be un-rolling it in a few seconds?
Most of the time, I order my stuff to go, then I go sit down and eat it at the table. I hate dealing with the tray, for some reason. I’d rather just wad up the wrappers and paper bag and throw it all away, at the end of the “meal”. Hopefully, in just a small way, it costs the corporation more money by doing it that way. Yes, it gripes me too, when I see that someone else has been too lazy to pick up their mess from the table they were sitting at and throw it away. PIGS!
OK, since it seems that tiff and I have the comment floor all to ourselves, we’re going to open it back up to the rest of you. especially if you’d like to correct any mistakes or mis-spellings in your previous comments. Nows your chance…..
Jeff Kay – You already know this, but you sure have a way with words! You are a great comedy writer. This latest “McDonalds” update is a perfect example, as it had me laughing all the way thru. Too bad you didn’t go with the FBI. You could’ve really lightened up that place.
BTW, I enjoy seeing the pictures you use to start off each update with. Do you get them all from online somewhere? You must have to search everywhere to find good pictures and graphics that are suitable to use. Love your stuff and thanks, as always, for putting in all the effort you do, for us.
9th comment! Woo-Hoo ! Must be a record! I really should give someone else a chance, I suppose.
OK, I’m done.
30 miles south – While I am enjoying your comments, it is the volume that is really cracking me up!
Folks from the holler are fairly rich compared to the hill-billys. Ever seen Sgt. York? We had a Druther’s long before we had any McDonalds’s. Ever been to a Druther’s?
(And I”ve read a bunch of Noam Chomsky; the language theory, not the half-assed politics.)
For those of you who love the drive thru I need to say fuck that. Unless the dining room is closed or I’ve recently shit my pants I don’t do the window box.
My fave restaurant experience lately was at arby’s where I ordered a large #6 (Beef and Cheddar) with bacon (for $0.50 more). So dumb shit takes the order and I ask where’s my cup and she asks “you wanted the combo?”. Yes, that is why I ordered the #6. If I just wanted a BnCwB I would’ve said as much. She told me that the #6 is also the sandwich. OK, here we go…
Are we (the overall we, not necessarily the present company we) so fucking stupid that we have to order individual sandwiches by number.
I’ll have the 27? The 27 combo? No, 3 #6’s a #3, and 3 #2’s you fucking drop out.
I hope she Shayne Graham’s on her free shift meal.
I worked at a McDonald’s in high school, but the managers tended to be elderly folks in their early 20s or so.
30MS, they roll up the bag for the same reason they do everything else: because they’re told to. It’s part of “Basic Crew Course”, along with how to make fries, operate the register, etc. And how many things go in what size bag, and rolling the top of the bag (fold it twice, actually).
And hey – thanks for opening the floor back up :^)
ND – Weyerbacher Simcoe IPA
Excellent work today. Jeff is on his game.
My hometown of Wellsburg, West Virginia had three outlying areas where all of those type people lived, Rabbit Hill, Forty Nine Hill, or McKinleyville.
I lived in that town for the first 26 years of my life. I could go 51 weeks and never lay eyes on any of those freaky people, not at the Kroger’s, the gas station, the bar, church, bank, no place.
Then one week in July, the carnival would come to town and every retard, every gimp, every waterhead, and dirty neck pony tail hick with his 500 pound pregnant girlfriend would show up for Bingo and funnel cakes all week long. The hollers and hills and trailer parks would empty out in to little Wellsburg to flick cigarette butts and throw empty popcorn boxes all over town.
If all you fast-food burger eaters knew what those burgers were made of, I wonder if you’d continue to eat ’em. You probably think McDonald’s and Burger King et al. take a slab of beef, grind it, and make hamburgers out of that. You’d be mistaken. In order to maintain a consistent amount of fat content in their burgers, as well as to save money, the fast food joints take an amalgam of beef from various sources, fat gathered from sweepings from the butchering process, and beef byproducts that used to be reserved for pet food, but is processed with ammonia to kill the e-coli; and they then mix all this stuff together and press it into patties. Here’s an article from the New York Times that discusses one such beef processor:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/us/31meat.html
And here are some excerpts from that NY Times article: “Beef Products Inc., had been looking to expand into the hamburger business with a product made from beef that included fatty trimmings the industry once relegated to pet food and cooking oil. The trimmings were particularly susceptible to contamination, but a study commissioned by the company showed that the ammonia process would kill E. coli as well as salmonella. … McDonald’s, Burger King and other fast-food giants use it as a component in ground beef, as do grocery chains. … The company says its processed beef, a mashlike substance frozen into blocks or chips, is used in a majority of the hamburger sold nationwide. But it has remained little known outside industry and government circles. … Mr. Roth spent the 1990s looking to give Beef Products a competitive edge by turning fatty slaughterhouse trimmings into usable lean beef. Mr. Roth and others in the industry had discovered that liquefying the fat and extracting the protein from the trimmings in a centrifuge resulted in a lean product that was desirable to hamburger-makers. … Another department microbiologist, Gerald Zirnstein, called the processed beef “pink slime” in a 2002 e-mail message to colleagues and said, “I do not consider the stuff to be ground beef, and I consider allowing it in ground beef to be a form of fraudulent labeling.” … School lunch officials said they ultimately agreed to use the treated meat because it shaved about 3 cents off the cost of making a pound of ground beef. … McDonald’s, whose hamburgers have contained Beef Products meat since 2004, declined to say if it monitored it for pH.”
Damn Swami, if I hadn’t just eaten a 5-way and 3 hot pockets today I’d run right out to mcdonalds and order a double cheeseburger (w/o pickles). Hell I might even fuck it before I eat it.
McD’s is just plain bad for you, and you know it already.
@tiff – I’ll be 30 soon… does that still count as “young”? Either way, I’m not too worried about it… I do a bunch of running and biking and ellipticalling at the gym, plus my doctor recently gave me a clean bill of health.
@Swami – Yeah, I figured that it’s not all sirloin cuts, or even flank cuts, in those McDoubles. Still, McDoubles are freakin’ delicious. And although I haven’t looked up the numbers, I’m guessing that your chance of getting a disease or bacterial illness from “bad beef” at McDonald’s is exceptionally low. They cook the beef patties hot enough to kill any bad stuff.
However, you’d probably have a solid argument for getting ill from bad sanitary conditions… unwashed hands, mayo left out a little too long, hairs in the burgers… yum. Hopefully all of the alcohol I consume before a McDonald’s run sanitizes against these issues.
One of the best updates ever!!!!!
Good Morning Surf Reporters….
I thought about this… I pondered( I did ). The reason one can’t go through the Drive-Thru, aside from the fact that one has no cash, is that inevitably they will screw up the order.
You don’t check the bags because you’re in line. The pressure of the build up behind you makes you move on. Everybody’s hungry and everybody’s in a hurry.
And sure as shit you were shorted an extra double cheeseburger, or the fries aren’t Super Sized.
Add to the fact that the person readying your order was voted in high school “Most likely to work at McDonalds”.
I don’t normally eat at fast food places…hell, the last time I had a burger was several months ago on one of those rare “eating” occasions, and it was a Rally’s cheeseburger. Drive thru, no hassle…but I was in the back with the beer cooler so I was not too wound up. I probably eat fast food once or twice a year. Surviving on rice now, and it’ll stay that way for a while.
Amigos,
For the life of me, I don’t understand eating at a corporate food establishment that uses stretchers in its beef and regularly keeps food under warming lights for long periods of time.
Within a 10 minute drive from my house there are two locally owned drive-ins which don’t stretch their beef, make their own french fries from real potatoes, serve milk shakes made with fresh fruit ingredients, don’t charge a great deal more than McDonalds, and keep both their paid salaries and profits in my community.
Neither has a drive-through, so I need to exit my car and walk 20 or 30 feet to the order window, but I can use the exercise.
Also within 10 minutes of my house, there is a Tatanka joint (buffalo meat) that serves “hamburgers” that have about half the fat content of beef burgers, and the food is tasty.
So perhaps I’m missing something, but why would I go to McDonalds or any of the other national drive-in chains?
I’m just wonderin’…
jtb