So this post is a re-blog from my best friends blog... it was just TOO good not to share. I was actually in tears reading it, I'm none too sure if others will find this quite as amusing, and maybe I'm partial as I was a major player in this blog- but whatever, I think its epic.
So, now I present you a re-blog of Victoria Frank, called 'Flapjack Blonde' ...enjoy!!
Breakfast is the best meal of the day. It just is. Most of the time, however, I skip it because I'm running late and the stuff I want is just plain fattening. But tonight was free pancakes night at iHop, in celebration of National Pancake Day. Yes, my best friend and I celebrate this ridiculous, but totally awesome holiday. You mean you don't?
In my anticipation, I couldn't stop thinking about pancakes all day. I would randomly bust out in song, singing about pancakes in my best opera voice to the displeasure of my coworkers. Whenever I would mention pancakes, I would yell and fist pump in excitement. I invited everyone I knew, even though the gas it would take for them to get to Canton and back would ultimately cost people more than the meal. But it's the idea behind National Pancake Day that's so awesome.
And when the time finally arrived for free pancakes, I almost keeled over in my enthusiasm.
My best friend Amanda and I arrived at iHop to find no parking spots, obviously. I did eventually spy one next to a large snow pile, and after unsuccessfully trying to wedge my car in between an expensive SUV and the glacier that somehow found itself onto the Canton Strip, I decided I just shouldn't park there. Although, at the time, I figured free pancakes would definitely be worth any damage to my little, beat up Honda by the shiny silver Jeep. Run me over if you must, I'm getting my pancakes.
Once inside, we gave the hostess our name, squeezed ourselves onto a bench next to a girl who was way interested in her boyfriend (who was obviously and awkwardly not as interested in her) and waited… and waited… and waited. The boredom must have been killing us, because simultaneously, we pulled out our iPods and attempted to connect to the wireless network.
Locked.
And as anyone who ever watched The Social Network would think they could do, I decided to try my best at becoming a hacker… right there in the iHop entrance area.
"What could the password be?" Amanda asked.
"Well, it's not PANCAKES," I said, completely serious, only to realize a few seconds later how incredibly unintelligent I sounded to the 500 waiting patrons around me.
After trying several other breakfast food-related passwords, as well as words associated with Sam's Club (the neighboring business), we both decided to put away the idea of connecting to the Internet while waiting for free pancakes. So we tweeted from our cell phones, played some video games, laughed entirely too loud at our own lame jokes, and generally annoyed everyone around us.
And finally, our name was called.
In my rush, I literally ran into the manager who was seating us. I actually bowled him over (OK, he didn't fall down, but his foot could not have felt good after I stomped on it). He sat us at a table in the center of the dining room. Perfect.
Amanda and I play a game – and perhaps you play it too – where we make up conversations that we believe seated restaurant patrons would be having among themselves. Naturally, the guy and girl from the waiting area were still a topic of conversation and conveniently seated on the other side of the room, so we continued to analyze the fact that something was amiss in their relationship.
That's when we saw it.
Something intercepted our conversation about the off-balance couple. It was a girl… eating jelly.
You may be thinking, "It's iHop. There's toast. And people eating jelly all the time," but this was different.
There she sat, about 15 years old, at a table with her parents, opening each jelly container individually, spooning out the contents and licking her utensil completely clean, before moving onto the next packet. And the next. And the next.
It captivated us. How could someone eat that much jelly? And how could her parents just sit there and act like it was normal to spoon mass amounts of jelly into your mouth as your appetizer?
And as we watched this horror unfold, we never would have realized that the best was yet to come. Apparently, this girl was not only addicted to jelly, but abhorred pickles.
When her waitress sat her burger down onto the table, the girl promptly picked up the pickle spear, laid it in the palm of her hand, and held it out to the waitress. She palmed the pickle… and expected the waitress to just take it out of her hand and back into the kitchen, as if someone else might want it later.
Amanda and I just sat there. Staring at each other. Finally, the only words I could muster were, "Well, that wasn't weird at all."
Thankfully, the waitress saved us and delivered our beautifully buttered buttermilk pancakes. We (somewhat) reluctantly peeled our eyes away from the spectacle that was next to us, and quickly began devouring our stacks, enjoying every bite, and not stopping to breathe in between.
But then, the unspeakable happened. (Be honest, who saw this coming?)
I started to feel that feeling, where, if one more bite is consumed, you may not actually keep your food down. I cut a bit, put it into my mouth, chewed. It wouldn't budge. I was so full after only half my pancakes were finished, that I sat there, pancakes stuffed in my cheeks, and just went into a pancake coma.
"What if I just sat here, with pancakes in my cheeks like this?" I slurred to Amanda.
"It just hit me too. Oh no. I feel sick. But I have to finish this entire plate," she responded.
"I can't swallow them!" I frantically yelled, as tears welled up in my eyes.
"Must. Eat…. No, I'm done." Amanda finally said.
And we both threw our white flags (napkins) onto the table, surrendering to the pancake overload, disappointment hanging in the air like the heavy (and unmistakable) smell of breakfast diner.
You could see it in our eyes and on our faces. We had oversold the idea of National Pancake Day to ourselves. We were so amped to consume the pancakes, we failed to realize that we weren't actually hungry for pancakes. Or that they weren't as amazing as we thought they would be. Free pancake day was anticlimactic. There was a rise… and where the peak of the evening should have been, just a void, and ultimately, just a big fall.
And this is when our new friend, the jelly-eater, looked at us like WE were the crazy ones.
I hung my head in shame. And as I did so, I realized I had formed a sort of potbelly, rounded perfectly and ever-expanding as time went on.
"iHop," I said. "More like… iFat."
As we drove away a mere hour and a half later (most of which was spent waiting in anticipation), Amanda uttered the only words that could sum up our National Pancake Day non-extravaganza.
"Bye-Hop. See you next year."
and THAT is why we are best friends hahahaha!
x
