THE FOLLOWING IS A TRUE STORY.

I bet they were busy trying to figure out if they should put meat on a burger or not.

– Beene, comment in last entry

OK, there’s an explanation for this, really. Went to a dinner the other night with a group of net.acquaintances (“Does EVERYONE at this table have a blog? Oh god, we do. Kill us.”) at a diner. Everyone orders their food, and I order what looks to be the “lightest” thing on the menu, a “burger basket” of appetizer tiny-burgers or whatever. Everyone else of course is on Atkins and ordering huge slabs of raw meat or something. But anyway. I get my basket, and notice that something is missing. Namely, the burgers. Buns? Sure. But no actual meat was involved. The faux-burgers were meticulously laid out, pickles placed in each tiny bun, a tap of mayonnaise on the top bun, but, um, no meat.

So I look at it quizzically and point it out to my dinner companions. “Um, is it under the fries?” “No.”

The waitress comes by. I say, “Excuse me, there seems to be something missing.” and show her my meatless basket.

“AY YIE YIE!” she says. (Direct quote.) She runs off. Brings another, older waitress. They stare at my basket, giggle, then take it into the back.

Other people start peeking out from the back at our table. Clearly, this is not something that happens on a regular basis here. Finally the manager comes out with a coupon for a free dinner (which I promptly give away) and, some time later, the cook, chastened, comes out with approximately 30 burgers in a basket. “I, um, made extra.”

(Bear in mind, I ordered this specifically because it was the least amount of food on the menu.)

So I’m starting at this basket of now meated burgers. People are STILL poking their head out from the kitchen looking at, I guess, the site of the Basket Incident. I try to finish the basket. Really, I do. But I just wasn’t that hungry.

So finally the waitress comes and takes our plates. She looks at mine so sadly. “You not finish? It not good?” she says forlornly. I honestly don’t know what to say. I feel like I’ve made such a scene in this poor place by insisting on burgers with, well, burgers. And then, like a heel, I didn’t eat them.

There’s a lesson here. Namely, pickles are good.