Saturnalia

Day 3
It was Age Day. Elaina and I woke up around the same time that my mum started having her first contractions 30 years prior. We decided there couldn't be a better way to celebrate an anniversary of birth than with low-class food and sub-standard cleanliness, so we burrowed into various articles of clothing that didn't match and headed to The Waffle House. I was nearly hopping with excitement, I mean it's not every day you get to go to a place that 2 of your favorite comedians have made frequent references to, on your 30th birthday. In fact that could only happen one day ever. We arrived and shoved our way inside, both being in mild surprise that the whole expanse of the "restaurant" was slightly shorter and more narrow than my closet. And even better, there was a waiting line. For the 6 tables. The fact that I didn't have a personal space meltdown was indicative of my exhaustion and very sudden maturity, since I don't even like it when people are sitting at the next table, much less standing on you.

While we were squished into the sticky chairs being trampled by people who were crawling over our knees, shoulders and heads to be seated, I idly watched the workers behind the counter. Their spatial situation wasn't that dissimilar to ours, all with the jostling and crashing into each other, however Elaina and I weren't attempting to prepare other peoples' food while strangers stomped in it. I noticed one of the guys behind the counter in particular, and murmured to Elaina "You know, that guy's not completely ugly." She agreed, and we both stared. In our heads we both imagined the life and times of this random guy, probably a gamer, living in his parents' basement, spending his weekends drinking beer at the WaWa, working at The Waffle House strictly on edict from his family. It seemed probable.

When we were finally seated, yet again I had to remember I was in another state because every person within 3 inches of us was smoking, which is legal there, and gives the waffles that excellent charred flavor. After about 3 seconds, who should push and shove his way over to us to be our server than the Not Ugly Gamer Guy...he handed us menus and said some assortment of welcoming words, which completely went over my head because I was rooted to the spot by his obscure eastern-European accent. What? But...but you're a VA-based gamer in your parents' basement! His whole story changed in an instant, instead with focuses on fishing boats and belongings tied in scarves. As Elaina put it, he went from a lazy loser to a hard-working man just by having an accent. I particularly noticed his eyes, as he took my order for 25 waffles and a piglet, because they were a beautiful assortment of golden brown mixed with turquoise blue. I turned to Elaina and remarked that she should see his eyes because they were beautiful, not realizing that when he'd turned away from our table he'd basically only spun in a circle in the closet/restaurant and was still within hearing, smelling and tasting range. I said "Oh, hahahahahahahahaha" as I usually do when I dance on my own tongue. He just grinned down at me and looked at me with his eyes so I only laughed harder.

Our food arrived which to my great shock wasn't spectacular, we gnawed through as many pounds of it as we could manage given our delicate natures, and decided it was time to leave. The arrangement was one of those "pay at a register as you leave" affairs, the trouble is the register is directly behind a booth. As in, people were sitting there. And with the dozen children that had come in with one woman who were plowing past us up and down the 4-foot space, I practically had to lay flat against the very not averse teenage boys who were sitting in that booth as Elaina paid for our food. As she handed back the signed receipt to Not Ugly guy, he remarked "Cool signature," along with smiling and looking at her with his eyes. She burbled a thank you and we kicked and punched our way out of the restaurant. That night was the big opening party at her new Dave and Buster's so we decided to go to the mall and look at big opening party outfits. We were in one of Elaina's favorite stores and I was developing a deep crush on a pair of purple shoes, when she swept up to me in a panic realizing she didn't have her debit card on her. Given that it had been in her pocket all morning this was a troublesome thing.

We headed back to the car which was approximately 6 square acres from the store we were in, I wanted to have a logos-based discussion with the individuals who sketched out the parking/shopping arrangement of the mall, and we scoured the ground and trees and skies for the errant debit card all along the way. No love. We got back to her car and started flinging napkins and floor mats and french fries around, but still nothing. It was no use trekking all the way back across the plains to that store, so we started driving dejectedly back in the direction of home. Elaina figured when she pulled her phone out of her pocket her card may have accidentally gotten flicked out too, and landed in some nether region of inner space. We wondered if that region could have been somewhere in the vicinity of The Waffle House, since Elaina knew she had it when we were there. In fact she knew she'd paid for our potty-fodder with it, and was feeling a growing suspicion that it might be in the nether region of Still Being Held By Not Ugly Guy. This suspicion made her lurk in a very red way about the face, so when we got there I was commissioned to go in and inquire. As soon as I kicked an elderly lady out of my way and toppled into the restaurant, I noticed there was no sign of Not Ugly Guy. And there's not many places to hide there. But one of the girls behind the counter immediately shrieked "Did you leave a debit card??" I shrieked "Yes!" She suddenly turned into a security guard at Fort Knox and said "Now, for security purposes I'll need you to verify the name that would be encoded on the card-" and I said "ELAINA DAVIS RAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!" She said "Whoa...ok ok, here." I skipped back out to the car but hid the card in my hoodie, and managed to play a forlorn bad news face for just over 4 seconds before I said "They only had this raaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!!" It was a yay. I think Elaina should tell her Wal-Mart story in the comments now.

This is getting egregious. I'll finish Day 3 later.

Chant Down Babylon