So, I went to a restaurant, which is kind of a big deal, because we stopped dining out on account of the plague.

Doordash, though. Damn. I wish I had invested all the money I spent on Doordash over the past 2 years in bitcoin or something. I’d probably be telling a different story, or writing this from a private island. 

Since I’m vaxxed and boosted and got COVID, I figured I was safe to foray out into public eating. I made plans to meet a friend for lunch.

She had something come up and had to back out. But was I deterred? No, no I was not.

I felt ready to face the world and have never minded eating alone in a restaurant. In fact, I kind of dig it.

My normal work routine is to pack a lunch and, around noon, I grab my lunch and scurry back to my desk to eat.

I don’t avail myself of the breakroom. There’s fucking people in there.

Since I had no lunch, the world of restaurant lunches spread out before me. Where would I go?

I considered Italian, but I planned on making spaghetti and meatballs for dinner that night. Italian was out. No matter. I would drive a few exits down. There were all types of restaurants there. I would decide when I arrived.

At the top of the street, sat a restaurant I had never heard of before.

It had the same name as a TV show I was obsessed with in the nineties. The building had a lodge-y feel to it and the sign on the roof said “Great food and great scenery.” Cool! A lodge with pictures of mountains and crystal clear streams. This would be great. Just what I needed.

I walked in and was immediately struck by the hostess’s attire. She was dressed like a lumberjack whose clothes had shrunken down to Barbie doll size.

After asking to sit at a high top in the back corner of the bar, I felt happy to be out and about. I still wanted to avoid the other humans as much as possible.

I followed the hostess to my table and tried processing her outfit, but was in no way judging her. Humans have a right to adorn themselves as they see fit. I am sick to death of reading stories about young women in school getting sent home because their bare shoulders are apparently a threat to the young men in school. We have bodies and being taught to feel shame over the vessels that take us through our lives is damaging.

It wasn’t the skimpiness of her clothing.

I was worried for her because it is February in the Midwest. She needed a nice cardigan or something.

I noticed two things when I sat down. The waitstaff were all women dressed in the same lumberjack outfit that only a lumberjack with no concern for the elements would wear. Except for the boots. They wore nice sturdy boots. The second thing I noticed was every other occupied table was occupied by men.

It took me just a few more seconds to figure it out.

Ohhhhh. Twin Peaks. The restaurant is called Twin Peaks. 

It was basically a Hooter’s for the outdoorsy type.

I was the sole woman diner in a breastaurant. Sitting in a back corner. Alone.

This was not the experience I was dreaming of.

Did it go just a little downhill from there? Of course, as I am me.

As I said, we don’t go out for dinner anymore. I’m unaware that some restaurants don’t have traditional menus anymore. They have a barcode on the table that you scan with your phone to get the menu.

Did I have my readers with me? Nope. No way I was reading a menu on my phone. I mean, I could have expanded the picture, but I’d have to expand it so much that it would take a damn bit of time to scroll through a menu. I only had an hour.

So, I asked my waitress if she had a regular menu.

She did! The menu type was miniscule. So, you know, not much better than my phone.

I could make out what looked like fish and chips. I like fish and chips okay.

Honestly, at that point, I just wanted to eat my lunch and scurry back to my desk.

The food wasn’t very good, which isn’t surprising. I don’t think food is the main focus at any boobie restaurant.

But I did it. I ate lunch out in a restaurant. I called my mother on my drive back to work because I knew my story would make her laugh, so it wasn’t a total loss.

Later that night, I made pasta with a plan to pack the leftovers for my lunch last Friday.

Honestly, the pasta wasn’t very good. I wasn’t super excited about eating it again and decided to lunch out again. This time I would go to a restaurant that I knew, because I sincerely wanted no surprises.

I ended up on the same street I had been on the previous Wednesday. I passed Twin Peaks and parked near Bravo. They weren’t busy and had menus with large type.

Friday’s lunch was more satisfying, although the food wasn’t as good as I remembered.

I don’t know if my taste is still off from COVID or if I just don’t remember what chain restaurant food tastes like.

There was a TV playing the Olympics in my line of sight. I spent 30 minutes eating chicken parm and watching Curling.

My takeaway from that experience is that Curling is like a bizarre dream that is also sort of boring. Also, there don’t seem to be many instant replays in Curling.

I think next week, I will go back to my normal routine of eating lunch at my desk.

Photo by Joshua Woroniecki on Unsplash

On New Year’s Day this year, I woke up, looked at Randy and said “I will be 60 next year.”

I’ll be 59 in less than two weeks and have to tell you, I am behind in the successful transition to old ladydom.

Last Monday, Randy and I went to the grocery.

On most days, that is not noteworthy, even for this blog where I talk about the most mundane of things.

But it was my first foray out after being sick for a month. I was over the flu, COVID, and a nasty stomach bug. By over, I mean the symptoms had passed, but I was still wrung out.

Randy thought it would be a good idea for me to get out of the house and move around a bit. I was agreeable. I was so sick of my couch and my bed that I would have agreed to just about any outing.

We went to Jungle Jim’s which is our favorite grocery. It’s fabulous and huge and familiar.

I made it from the car to the front door before being completely winded. No way I was making it through the whole grocery.

They had mobility carts! Yes! I would just grab one of those carts and I’d be fine.

Old people do it all the time. I am really butting up to being an old person, so it would be okay. I mean, how hard could it be?

First lesson learned? Don’t fucking back up. My god, the noise.

So, backing up was right out. I didn’t need that kind of attention.

I followed Randy and he’d start to go down an aisle. So I would turn to go down the aisle, then he’d say “Oh, it’s not this aisle, it’s the next one.”

But I was already committed to that aisle, so I’d go buzzing down the aisle muttering to myself the whole way. “You said THIS aisle. Not the next one.”

I realized that I spent many years being a little judgmental of people riding on mobility carts.

And here I was, muttering to myself and trying to get all the way down the aisle so I could go all the way down the next aisle and catch up with Randy.

I was one of them.

I understood my sisters and brothers on mobility carts. They weren’t crazy people talking to themselves. They just got juked on which aisle to go down.

I stand with you, my sisters and brothers. Or really, I sit with you.

We made it through the general grocery area. We traversed the lanes and lanes of beer. We got through the bakery, the meat section and the enormous produce section.

Way on the other side of the store, in the international section, the mobility cart decided it had had enough for one day and ceased to work.

I believe we were in the Hispanc aisle.

You can’t push these things. If they aren’t moving? Then, they aren’t moving.

Stopped sideways in the aisle, I blocked the chorizo on one side and salsa on the other.

Randy: Well. I will go back and get a regular cart.

Me: I’ll just be here I guess. Blocking everything.

So, he took off.

About 20 seconds later, I got the cart to work.

I took off after Randy and blazed down the aisle at a casual strolling speed.

I tried yelling after him, but my voice had been off for weeks. I had no yelling voice, only a raspy voice accompanied by the occasional squeak.

I called him, but he didn’t hear his phone.

As I set my sites on him I had the Wicked Witch theme from Wizard Of Oz in my head. I would catch him. Oh yes, I would catch him.

I did. Way back in the general grocery area. The other side of a 200,000+ square foot grocery store. He finally heard me squeaking his name.

I stopped the cart when we met up. Which was a mistake. Because the cart died again.

He took off again and once again, I got the cart to start back up after a few tries.

You guys, I could see the entrance. I could see where all the other carts were, manual and electric.

Then, three little old ladies walked in front of me. I was forced to stop.

One of them looked at me and said “You should have beeped your horn.!”

I didn’t even know there was a horn.

I said “Oh, gosh. I don’t ever use these. I just don’t want to run over anyone.”

The cart started again. I was going to make it to the cart corral.

Randy: You are such a liar.

Me: Am not! I don’t drive these things.

Randy: But you totally want to run someone over.

Me: Fair. That’s fair.

I let the person working the front door know that their mobility cart needed service or a charge or something.

We transferred our groceries to a regular cart, went back through the dairy section, and then checked out.

I mean, I guess if I have to use one of those carts again, I’ll be better prepared, but damn. I wasn’t very good at it. But to be fair, it was mostly the cart’s fault. Mostly.

I might have been fiddling around with the buttons while Randy looked at hot sauce, but that doesn’t mean I broke it.

I might have broken the cart. But it probably was a defective cart. Which of course is the one I would pick.

I went back to work last Wednesday and made it about 4 hours before bowing out. I worked from home the rest of the week.

I’m going back tomorrow. Wish me luck. There aren’t carts or anything there.