Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Since I just had lunch at a buffet, this might be my last entry. I'm not sure which will kill me first...eating cold food that's been sitting in an exposed environment since the place opened this morning, or eating with hands that were forced to use the same serving tongs the unsanitary masses have been using all day. Next to the salad bar, they should have a little serving station stocked with Pepto-Bismol, Beano, Rolaids, Maalox, Mylanta, and Phazyme. And maybe a pharmacist for consultation.
Have you ever taken a close look at those buffet serving tongs? They come in two styles: the shiny black plastic ones covered with greasy fingerprints, and the shiny metal ones covered with greasy fingerprints. Either way, you lose. Unless you plan on going to the bathroom to wash your hands after every trip through the line, you might as well just walk around to every table in the place and politely ask to lick everyone's fingers. And what makes the whole scenario even worse is that buffets are usually patroned by...how do I say this nicely...the trash of the world. Remember the lawsuit the obese couple from West Jordan filed against Chuck-a-rama a few years ago when they were asked to leave after eating too much roast beef? People like that. So you're paying a fairly high price to go eat cold food and catch diseases from lower class citizens, and all you get out of it is gastrointestinal pain and a few hours on the toilet. Sounds like a bargain to me.
In my defense, I didn't plan on going to the buffet today. Two coworkers and I decided to go to The Olive Garden in Riverdale for the $5.99 soup and salad lunch. We arrived and were told there was a 10-15 minute wait, way too much time to waste for a quick work lunch. The Souper Salad restaurant shares the same parking lot, so we decided to tempt fate and go there, which, if you're not aware, is a buffet. Off the subject for a moment, the Olive Garden was packed full of hot chicks waiting for tables, but they weren't attractive to me because you could tell they were the kind of women who think the Olive Garden is a classy place, and women that naive just aren't sexy. Even further off the subject, I took a girl I'd just met on a date a while ago. I suggested we go eat at a nice Greek place called The Athenian in downtown Ogden which features a unique menu, a cozy atmosphere, and attentive service. She dismissed my suggestion, and said, "Let's go someplace nice, like Chili's or the Olive Garden." Nice? We did go to Chili's, but I was so turned off that I never saw her again. Someone that clueless isn't worth my time. Spacious suburban chain restaurants with "Never Ending Pasta Bowls" and "Big Mouth Burgers" on the menu aren't classy. Sorry ladies, but the simple fact that I realize The Olive Garden isn't fine dining makes me better than all of you. I'm hardly a food snob, but I do have a functioning brain in my head.
Anyway, back to Souper Salad. The place didn't seem dirty, but since most lethal bacterias are odorless, tasteless, and microscopic, I decided not to let appearances deceive me. I noticed a faggy-looking guy in a pink shirt cover a hacking cough with his hand and then dish up some potato salad with the same hand. Feel free to call me paranoid, but I kept an eye on him, and everything he touched after that, I avoided. The only thing I actually enjoyed was the softserve ice cream, which I had two bowls of and which I'm sure was clean, since bacteria need to heat to replicate. The place was full of the expected stereotypical trash: grimy auto mechanics on their lunch breaks, slutty girls in halter-tops with visible tattoos, and ordinary middle-aged obese folks looking to get their money's worth.
Charles Darwin, the storied Victorian-era English biologist, theorized that only the fittest, most intelligent creatures will survive long enough to procreate, thus passing on their intelligence to proceeding generations. Darwin was obviously wrong. The abundance of impoverished buffet patrons is proof.
Have you ever taken a close look at those buffet serving tongs? They come in two styles: the shiny black plastic ones covered with greasy fingerprints, and the shiny metal ones covered with greasy fingerprints. Either way, you lose. Unless you plan on going to the bathroom to wash your hands after every trip through the line, you might as well just walk around to every table in the place and politely ask to lick everyone's fingers. And what makes the whole scenario even worse is that buffets are usually patroned by...how do I say this nicely...the trash of the world. Remember the lawsuit the obese couple from West Jordan filed against Chuck-a-rama a few years ago when they were asked to leave after eating too much roast beef? People like that. So you're paying a fairly high price to go eat cold food and catch diseases from lower class citizens, and all you get out of it is gastrointestinal pain and a few hours on the toilet. Sounds like a bargain to me.
In my defense, I didn't plan on going to the buffet today. Two coworkers and I decided to go to The Olive Garden in Riverdale for the $5.99 soup and salad lunch. We arrived and were told there was a 10-15 minute wait, way too much time to waste for a quick work lunch. The Souper Salad restaurant shares the same parking lot, so we decided to tempt fate and go there, which, if you're not aware, is a buffet. Off the subject for a moment, the Olive Garden was packed full of hot chicks waiting for tables, but they weren't attractive to me because you could tell they were the kind of women who think the Olive Garden is a classy place, and women that naive just aren't sexy. Even further off the subject, I took a girl I'd just met on a date a while ago. I suggested we go eat at a nice Greek place called The Athenian in downtown Ogden which features a unique menu, a cozy atmosphere, and attentive service. She dismissed my suggestion, and said, "Let's go someplace nice, like Chili's or the Olive Garden." Nice? We did go to Chili's, but I was so turned off that I never saw her again. Someone that clueless isn't worth my time. Spacious suburban chain restaurants with "Never Ending Pasta Bowls" and "Big Mouth Burgers" on the menu aren't classy. Sorry ladies, but the simple fact that I realize The Olive Garden isn't fine dining makes me better than all of you. I'm hardly a food snob, but I do have a functioning brain in my head.
Anyway, back to Souper Salad. The place didn't seem dirty, but since most lethal bacterias are odorless, tasteless, and microscopic, I decided not to let appearances deceive me. I noticed a faggy-looking guy in a pink shirt cover a hacking cough with his hand and then dish up some potato salad with the same hand. Feel free to call me paranoid, but I kept an eye on him, and everything he touched after that, I avoided. The only thing I actually enjoyed was the softserve ice cream, which I had two bowls of and which I'm sure was clean, since bacteria need to heat to replicate. The place was full of the expected stereotypical trash: grimy auto mechanics on their lunch breaks, slutty girls in halter-tops with visible tattoos, and ordinary middle-aged obese folks looking to get their money's worth.
Charles Darwin, the storied Victorian-era English biologist, theorized that only the fittest, most intelligent creatures will survive long enough to procreate, thus passing on their intelligence to proceeding generations. Darwin was obviously wrong. The abundance of impoverished buffet patrons is proof.
# posted by RBW @ 12:27 PM 
