Falling Pants and Friendly's
There's something uniquely odd about Friendly's. Maybe it's the strangeness that is their ice cream watermelon roll. Maybe it's the fact that never have I gotten in and out of one in less time than it takes to go to the DMV, even if all I'm ordering is a Diet Coke. Maybe it's the looming pictures of sundaes everywhere - a Friendly's is the only place I've ever seen ice cream look ominous.
This, in part, is why on those rare occasions when one's an option, I avoid Friendly's.
Driving back from Boston with my folks, we sort of ran out of other options. We'd gotten on the road early with an eye toward making good time back toward Carolina, and had opted to skip the hotel breakfast as a way of supporting this goal. Instead, the plan was to find something along 95 as we headed south, presumably within the greater Boston area.
This plan, for various and sundry reasons, failed. Before I knew it, we were well past the limits of the 128 loop and picking up speed, and the prospect of trying to navigate the streets of Pawtucket loomed ominously. So, when the Foxboro exit loomed and there was a sign noting that a Friendly's could be found there, I decided on the better part of valor, or at least keeping everyone's blood sugar up, and stopped.
It was indeed a Friendly's. It was indeed positively plastered with ominous pictures of hot fudge sundaes. Breakfast did in fact take a good long while. And then, just as we're wrapping up, a couple of folks sit down at the table next to us and pick up a conversation they'd clearly started long before.
And the first thing we hear is, "If they'd just looked in his bag, they would have seen that he had other shorts after he took his off."
This, as you might expect, got my attention. The conversation continued with, "His shorts were too big. He couldn't run in them. We tied a rope around them, but he took them off because he couldn't run. They could have looked in his bag."
I wish I could say I turned around and asked "If they fit, why didn't you just put the shorts in the bag on him in the first place?" But to do so was to risk: risk being accused of eavesdropping (though the decibel level the story of the Falling Shorts was related at meant it could have been heard in Newport), risk getting embroiled in a lengthy conversation, risk knowing any more about the situation than I already did, and to be blunt, that notion frightened me deeply.
So we waited for the check. And we waited for the check to come back. And we got out of there as fast as we could.
And before we got in the car, Dad and I both hitched up our pants. Just in case.
This, in part, is why on those rare occasions when one's an option, I avoid Friendly's.
Driving back from Boston with my folks, we sort of ran out of other options. We'd gotten on the road early with an eye toward making good time back toward Carolina, and had opted to skip the hotel breakfast as a way of supporting this goal. Instead, the plan was to find something along 95 as we headed south, presumably within the greater Boston area.
This plan, for various and sundry reasons, failed. Before I knew it, we were well past the limits of the 128 loop and picking up speed, and the prospect of trying to navigate the streets of Pawtucket loomed ominously. So, when the Foxboro exit loomed and there was a sign noting that a Friendly's could be found there, I decided on the better part of valor, or at least keeping everyone's blood sugar up, and stopped.
It was indeed a Friendly's. It was indeed positively plastered with ominous pictures of hot fudge sundaes. Breakfast did in fact take a good long while. And then, just as we're wrapping up, a couple of folks sit down at the table next to us and pick up a conversation they'd clearly started long before.
And the first thing we hear is, "If they'd just looked in his bag, they would have seen that he had other shorts after he took his off."
This, as you might expect, got my attention. The conversation continued with, "His shorts were too big. He couldn't run in them. We tied a rope around them, but he took them off because he couldn't run. They could have looked in his bag."
I wish I could say I turned around and asked "If they fit, why didn't you just put the shorts in the bag on him in the first place?" But to do so was to risk: risk being accused of eavesdropping (though the decibel level the story of the Falling Shorts was related at meant it could have been heard in Newport), risk getting embroiled in a lengthy conversation, risk knowing any more about the situation than I already did, and to be blunt, that notion frightened me deeply.
So we waited for the check. And we waited for the check to come back. And we got out of there as fast as we could.
And before we got in the car, Dad and I both hitched up our pants. Just in case.
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