3-Day Work Week, 3-Day Weekend

Hey cuties!

Hi fellas,

Hey, who enjoyed their Valentine's Day?!  That stupid, hyped-up Hallmark holiday that half you suckers out there probably stress yourselves out over?

You know wanna who didn't enjoy Valentine's Day?  Do ya?  I'll tell you who.

Me.  I can't stand Valentine's Day.

Here's why.

More or less.

Valentine's Day has always sucked for me, if only to remind me, on an annual basis, that I'm arguably the world's least romantic person in human existence.  Its surely contestable.  This didn't mind me so much back in my care-free single days - I wasn't trying to impress myself with thoughtful romantic gestures, now was I. . .

Why, that'd be just weird.

Now that I'm married - *dramatic sigh* - things have changed.  Sure, the Mrs. seems to share my sentiment that Valentine's Day is, after all, just some stupid holiday that Hallmark thought up in order to drive up mid-winter sales.  But deep down, I'm pretty sure she feels a tiny, tinge of rage whenever she has to endure yet another chocolate-less, rose-less, diamond-less, Lexus-less day.

Anyway, what makes it even worse - besides having to deal with my own romantic issues - is having to deal with all the teenage drama that comes with working at a MIDDLE SCHOOL on Valentine's Day.

Holy.  Shit.

Middle Schoolers LOVE the Punic Wars. . .

Now, you'd think that kids would be crapping their pants in excitement over learning about the Punic Wars.  Sitting on the edge of their seats, wide-eyed and fixated on each, nail-biting PowerPoint slide in my lecture.  Hannibal's crossing of the Alps, the slaughter at Trebbia and Cannae, the Roman surprise maneuver at Zama...

...but NOOOO.

Turns out kids these days are more interested in what one another's boyfriends, girlfriends, and - gasp! - secret crushes received for Valentine's Day.  Was Alejandra's stuffed animal bigger and, dare I say, cuter, than J'monique's?  Did Jamar get more chocolates than Carlos?  This, dear readers, was the talk of the day in Mr. Hough's class.

Screw Hannibal.  Screw the Punic Wars.

Give the masses stuffed animals and sugar.  Long live Valentine's Day.

pfft. . .

My outdoor office. . .

Anyway, that was the first day in a grueling three-day work week for yours truly.  I suppose I can't complain about that crap too much.  I did get to spend a lot of time this week writing, which has been awesome lately - I wish I had more time on hand to do so.

This weekend I also had a considerably fruitful run at the Salvation Army in Kissimmee.  I generally try and find random oddities, antiques, and obscure collectibles on such runs to the ghetto thrift store, and today proved to be a successful - and inexpensive venture.

For $3.26, I picked up a necktie and a paperback.  The book was J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion - kind of like the Old Testament to the Lord of the Rings.  It reads like Deuteronomy or Numbers, too... but for avid fans of Tolkien, its a must-have, and my old copy is probably growing dust - or worse - back where I left it... in the bowels of West Africa.  On some random tro-tro.

I doubt a Ghanaian got into that one...

While this book was well work the dollar I paid for, it was the tie that made my day.  For a mere $2, I picked up a brand-new tie depicting scenes from the Bayeaux Tapestry - the medieval piece of art (and arguably the most famous tapestry in history) that described William the Conqueror's Norman invasion and subsequent victory over the Saxons at the Battle of Hastings in 1066 AD.  If that's not gangster, than I don't know what is.

I'm totally wearing this to Dave's wedding next month, by the way - stay tuned for pictures and tales from that adventure.

In closing, I'd like to mention that Kris and I decided to take the kids out for dinner tonight.  We hit up an Applebees in Hunter's Creek, based solely on the fact that we didn't feel like anything specific and its always loud as holy hell in there - our kids probably wouldn't stand out so much.

We're generally optimistic people, but the Houghs don't necessarily have the grandest track record when it comes to eating out with the kids in tow.  We were expecting to drop the usual $30 or so for our meal, receive shoddy service at best, suffer through the eye-rolling and teeth-sucking of those sitting around us as our kids hop about screaming, and be forced to rush through the meal due to toddler freak-outs and temper tantrums.

Surprisingly enough, this outing featured nothing of the sort.  For starters, beer was two for one, and the server - for whatever reason - decided to charge my Shock Tops as two Bud Lights.  Hell, I'm not going to complain - that's about a $2 or $3 difference between the two.  Much appreciated server.

If that wasn't enough good news for us to walk away from dinner feeling satisfied - and it very well could've been - we were granted another stroke over extraordinary luck.  Throughout the meal, our kids were loud.  That's how 2 - 4 years olds roll - they're loud, they're obnoxious, and half the crap that comes out of their mouth makes you cringe and look about public areas nervously.

Sitting next to us throughout the meal was a large group of twenty-somethings - maybe seven or eight of them, sharing drinks and having a good time.  Whenever I have my kids out with me in a situation like this, and I find myself surrounded with people who don't have kids, it worries me.  I was convinced that these young adults would loathe sitting next to our kids, and complain about the subsequent noise and chaos erupting from our table.

But they were all DEAF!!

. . . all the time. . .

Yes, readers, every last one of them.  I cast a nervous glance in their direction at one point during our meal and saw them signing away with great animation.

...Either that, or they were throwing up some serious gang signs at one another.  I can't seem to fathom the likelikhood of two, rival suburban, all-white gangs sitting down for a meal together at an Applebees, though.  Call me crazy.

So that was a stroke of brilliance on the hostess' part I definitely wasn't expecting - sitting the couple with the loud-ass kids next to the table full of deaf people.  Nicely done, Applebees, nicely done.

But we're not done yet.  There's more.

Godzilla inhales her fudge sundae. . .

I wasn't hungry, and had decided to drink my dinner instead, but Kris' meal came and she enjoyed it without issue.  The girls didn't eat either - we had filled them up before we left so they wouldn't waste a plate of food that we paid for (that usually happens, regardless of whatever fried, kid-friendly food we put in front of them). But we did decide to treat them to dessert - what the hell - and ordered them some ice cream the minute we sat down at the table.

. . .and with her, as always, is Flynn Rider.

As it turns out, we did not get charged for this.  At all.  Our server straight-up decided not to charge us for the kiddie desserts.  I'm assuming this is because they're both pretty small, and we just ordered 'ice cream.'

Instead he came back with a fudge sundae for Abby and strawberry shortcake and ice cream for Alayna - free upgrades on what we had ordered.  This leads me to believe that he either a.) just gave us better desserts that someone else had changed their mind on, free of charge, or else b.) accidentally gave us someone else's desserts and did not want to get dinged on the tip.

Either way, the kids were happy for getting sugar, and we were happy about getting our $14 bill.  Less than half of what we were estimating to be seated next to a table full of deaf people during happy hour.

We tipped him $10.  Thanks, homeboy.

- Brian

Planet Crap

Dearest Foodery Patrons,

Lately, Kris and I have been going out every Saturday with the kids and eating out like we used to before we had kids. It's a 'hit or miss' sorta thing. Usually the kids do really well, too - which is surprising seeing how the Cannonball's two and everything.

So tonight we once again went out to eat, and this time decided to hit up Downtown Disney since we hadn't been there in awhile and figured one of those restaurants down there would be cool with the girls. We hadn't eaten at Planet Hollywood in probably three years or so, and so we settled on that one.

I'm going to stress 'settled' here.

The first red flag we should've picked up on was the fact there was an hour-long wait. That's the sort of thing you're supposed to acknowledge prior to eating out at a sit-down restaurant. I get that. Why we didn't pick up on this, I don't know. Perhaps it had something to do with the two screaming kids we had with us at the time. Who knows.

Anyway, the place was packed full, and our clan was sat next to a large table of tourists, tucked away on the second floor balcony. This was the second red flag. For starters, being significantly off the waiter beaten path almost guarantees that you're going to be getting your food luke-warm at best. Secondofly, being sat next to a large table of tourists both a.) creates an atmosphere that makes you want to kill yourself, and b.) distracts your waiter, who is trying to get the most of his tables as humanly possible.

...and if you're a waiter, who are you going to try and get a bigger tip out of? The two parents ordering entrees and beers, with their kids picking at the side-dishes, or the twenty-person, multiple-course, touristy-souvenier glass-purchasing, booze-flowing, feasting table? Its a no-brainer, and we're not getting on the waiter's case about showing more love to the tourists than us.

What did piss us off about this particular dining experience was that we ordered our food, and spoke not a word to our waiter until he picked up our credit card when we paid. He never once asked us how things were, what we needed, if we were finished, etc. I didn't even get the opportunity to order a beer with my meal - me! The waiting itself was almost even worse - it took twenty minutes to get our waters and the kid's chocolate milk, and then an additional hour to get our food.


Well, long story short, it ended up running us something like $25 total... which was pretty cheap, seeing how we didn't get the opportunity to order half the crap we wanted to. And real quick, I'd just like to say that there are very few instances where I tip less than 30%, as I like to think of myself and someone who can truly understand and appreciate just how crappy it can be working for serving the collective stupidity of the United States. Those in service have it rough, and if I see effort I reward it graciously. But when I don't see effort, I'm like Sherman the frickin' Sea.


Having said that... what did I leave this particular waiter for his (lack of) services? I gave him $1.


He got a buck from me and he was lucky to get it. After all, he did bring our food to us (eventually). The bottom line is this, though: if you know you're going to be busy, set up a routine beforehand so that you're making sure you're covering your bases... that's your job. Otherwise, be ready to be screwed tip-wise.

- Brian