McGriddle: The Remix

The munchies are a bitch, and today’s ritualistic contraband consumption left me hungering for a McGriddle. Normally I don’t even like the artificially sweet, congenially greasy sandwiches, but my carnal urgings would hear none of my withholdings and commanded my immediate response. The only problem, I come to realize, is that I live 45 minutes away from the nearest McDonalds, but not to be persuaded otherwise I Bo Duke over to my driver’s side door and fumble to fit my key into the ignition, intent on throwing caution to the wind and breaking every speed limit thrown at me. Time: 9:34 am.
Despite my expeditious intentions, I find my overall velocity hampered by random distractions emanating from my surroundings. My speedometer has trouble exceeding 35 mph as I try to understand the lyrics to an old Billy Idol song in an all-new way, and the bushes on either side of the road take on the shapes of endangered animals, mostly rhinoceroses but occasionally something different. After narrowly avoiding the remnents of somebodys blown tire that for a split second i mistook for a baby seal, I surmise that I’m approximately 5 blocks away from my destination. Time 10:23 am.
My hopes couldn’t be higher until I sight a Cal-Trans sign ahead. “Expect Delays on: TODAY.” Damnit! One lane and every goddamned traffic light try to slow me down, but nothing can delay me now, “Welcome to the Jungle” begins blasting from my speakers and I am suddenly in the mood to race. I smoke a mid-eighties Honda Accord, and absolutely rape a 57’ Chevy pick-up. No one is safe; nothing can stand in the way of my Number 7 combo meal and I. The left hand turn lane is nearing, and throwing a backwards glance to the world, I don’t even signal. My pedal is at capacity, my clock, still ticking. Time: 10:30 am.
Cruising slowly into the parking lot, I make for the golden arches but find the way blocked. Ripples spread across the surface of a nearby puddle as horrific sequences of blue hair, polyester track suits and overpowering perfume pass before my eyes. In droves the elders consume the pavement, making for their cars now that their stores of carefully clipped coupons have been depleted. My resentment flares are I glance at the clock on the dash. Women over the age of 85 are making me late, therefore I hate them, I hate old ladies with carts, who, ever since petitioning for women’s suffrage in 1920 have run out of meaningful things to demand. Today was apparently pedestrians right’s day and the geriatrics were taking turns walking their carts in front of my car one after the other in a sort of nonviolent resistance. I sit in the same spot idling, just staring at the edifice that houses my tabernacle only a few yards away. I think maybe I, like Moses, will never get to see the Promised Land. Time: 10:35 am.
Finally my persistent honking parts the seas of the decrepit and I pull up to the drive-though and begin speaking with a box. The voice is menacingly cheery, like somehow it knew that it would be the cause of the dejection I was about to feel, and was taking joy in depriving me of my holy grail. It ironically belonged to a woman.
She asked me too hold on and then acted like she had left. She wanted me to know that she was in control of the conversation and was asserting it though a sort of forced silence, I could think of nothing clever to say, not knowing at that time that I was dealing with Satan. I was on the offensive and I hated that.
She drew first blood: “Welcome to McDonalds, what can I get for you today?”
“Um…a, ah…number 7 please.” I waited, my breath held…
“OK, and what kind of drink?”
“Oh shit! I mean, uh…Dr. Pepper.” I got away with it! I felt like I needed 12 other cohorts with whom to celebrate successfully pulling off the biggest heist ever! I envisioned myself eating my McGriddle with a sloppy George Clooney-esque grin on my face, driving into the sunset with Julia Roberts to my right and Brad Pitt in the back seat.
“Alright, so a 5 piece McNuggets with a Dr. Pepper, is that going to be all?” Wait, what? No! No, no, no. I could almost see her suppressing laughter; all her fellow workers stopping what they were doing to join in the secret hilarity.
“Um, no, I want the sausage, egg, and cheese McGriddle… the breakfast meal, but the Dr. Pepper part is right.” I added the last part so as to try and seem compromising. Sure, you got my order wrong, but not all of it, your only half of a fuck up.
“I’m sorry ma’am, but were not serving breakfast at this time.” I could envision her holding the mic away from her face and chortling with laughter, saying to herself, “I purposefully confused his gender” She probably had buckteeth and a cleft palette.
“I’m only a few minutes late, come on, help a brotha out!” Considering the part of Fresno I was in, I figured that throwing in a few Ebonics might help my cause.
“I’m sorry ma’am—er, sir, but its company policy.” She was curt, as if to say the joke is over and she was ready with Pepper Spray at window one if I got too feisty.
“Let me talk to your manager then, maybe he has the ability to use his mind for more than just respiration.” I wasn’t going to take this shit; I call in the artillery and start thinking of bigger words to use in the argument that was sure to ensue.
“Your speaking to the manager, and she has the same mind as before.” Her tone dripped of spite.
“Oh good, same dumb bitch then?” Vocabulary fail.
“Excuse me sir?”
“Let me talk to the clown! He’s in charge, he’ll give me my goddamned sandwich, you whore!.” I didn’t know I was this high; things were getting too out of hand. I did what anybody with the reflexes of Jeff Gordon would do and slammed on my accelerator.
I didn’t hear what she replied back because I was already rounding turn one with my middle finger poised. I was ready to finally look into the eyes of the person who owned the voice I hated, and then tell her to go fuck herself using my hand.
I realized that this wasn’t going to be as dramatic as I had first envisioned because of the mini van at the next window still waiting for it’s food. Shit. I smash my breaks and avoid hitting the assumed Asian in front of me, only to take away all menace from my emotional use of symbolism. I felt the burn of unheard laughter as I waited for access to the rest of the shopping center, and I look longingly towards the expanse of the parking lot, where democracy and liberty still exist in the form of Jack in the Box’s 24-hour breakfast deal.

False Alarm

It is evening, and I am to be found perched on a lounge that adorns my veranda, busy inhaling one of Fidel’s finest and watching the smoke twist and turn on the summer breeze that occasionally decides to delight me with refreshing torrents of respite. In the countryside that surrounds my dwelling it is perfectly calm and overwhelmingly still. I have not heard a noise nor seen any movement all day, possibly longer. I sit and I drown in the boredom of reality while inwardly yearning for excitement and aching for adventure, even if it would mean jousting windmills. After what seems like an eternity, faintly, a noise reaches my ear. It is hoofs, of this I am sure, but who rides horses in 2010? Realistically speaking, nostalgic rednecks and Poland’s military, but I just can’t stand the thought of this rare disturbance merely being as simple as that, in fact, I would rather assume a much more kick ass scenario. Straining my ears with every fiber of my curiosity I listen as my presumed antagonist approaches from afar. Sitting back and inhaling once more I bide my time, and in the growing darkness I eagerly anticipate the approach of this assumedly mysterious caller.

My mind reels as I contemplate whom this visitor could be and my commendable imagination quickly kicks any notion of a normal encounter far from my rationale’s reach. Of course it could be JUST a horse, but I’d rather it be something more fantastical, like a unicorn. Now, admittedly, unicorns don’t exist, and neither does a Pegasus, but there is an equal probability of either being the culprit impedingly sauntering closer. I suppose its even possible that a unicorn and Pegasus met a few years back at a mixer for work and had a baby that was both winged AND horny, and so it may be probable that this proposed bastard is what’s looming somewhere in the distance, who am I to say?

I suppose it might be stretching things to infer that it could be a centaur, but on the other hand, it totally could be a centaur. Why shouldn’t I expect a visit from a half man, half horse who obviously has some information pertaining to my Destiny and how the time has come for me to save the world? Just saying it out loud makes it more of a viable possibility, kind of like peter pan and shit.

Slowing down to summarize my thoughts, I’ve thus far deduced that the sounds I am hearing are emanating from some type of hybrid species with the ability of flight and/or a defensive outcropping of keratin, fingers crossed it speaks English. I’m sure you’re asking yourself what you would do if a creature of this sort were to clip-clop into your yard, but I’m afraid that you just can’t possibly imagine how it really feels, but I’ll do my best to summarize the terrorizing events that follow.

The moment for action is nigh. The seven times I watched MacGyver flash before my eyes, and my subconscious mind checks the box marked “fight”. First order of business: don’t wait around for the opponent to find you vulnerable and defenseless. Thinking quickly, I spring from my seat and hit the dirt on all fours, crawling into position for a flanking attack. Second order of business would have been to construct a pipe bomb out of stuff I had in my pocket, which consisted of string, fish bones, and the One Ring of power*, but I lacked the ever essential paperclip and chewed wad of gum so I abandon my Dean Anderson antics and get back to business. Like a freaky crazy bat I triangulate the exact position of my adversary with my heightened sense of hearing, then I lie in wait behind some foliage as the bushes directly in front of me rustle and shake. The tall reeds part like an up-side-down curtain presenting the crescendo of my fantasy, and in the next few seconds I realize that my suspicions and concerns are about to be either confirmed or shattered, and as my cryptid stepped out, appearing before me for the first time in all of its glory…it turned out to just be a goat. Go figure.





*Hobbit Reference, duh.