Tag Drive Through

Now You See It

Michael Leave a comment

The older you get the fewer chances you have to say, “I never thought I’d see that.” It only makes sense that eventually you indeed will have seen everything. Fortunately mankind’s ability to invent, innovate, and improve is boundless. And thus recently, I again had the opportunity to say to myself, “Self, now you’ve seen everything.”

I was out taking a leisurely ride through the local environs when I happened down a road I had never been. This wasn’t a country road or a residential drive. It was a rather short yet well-traveled avenue but for some reason I never had a reason to use it neither to get from here to there nor to patronize any of the less than handful of businesses thereon occupied. There is a mechanic’s shop, an insurance agent, a paint store, and a florist. It was the flower shop that held me awestruck and although it wasn’t as significant say as when man walked on the moon, what I saw was up there. Well, not up there by the moon, actually not anyway at all in space. It was figuratively “up there.” Sort of. Especially if you are having a mentally slow day and can’t come up with a good phrase to end the sentence. Anyway, that flower shop (or ‘Shoppe’ as the marquee proclaimed), was breaking new retail floral ground. It has — are you ready for this? — it has — you really should be sitting down — it has — drum roll please — a drive through window!

Yes, florists are reaching the level of banks, pharmacies, beer distributors, automatic car washes, quickie oil change places, and fast food restaurants showing that thoughtfulness and gentility can also be speedy and convenient. Now you can arrive home with a bouquet of flowers, the perfect apology for whatever you did last night, without having to bear the embarrassment of actually getting out of your car and going into the supermarket floral department and/or counter. No longer do you have an excuse for not bringing your boss’s weird wife a hostess gift just because you were running late to get there for the dinner you’d rather be anywhere other than because the two of you couldn’t decide on a believable excuse for not going. (Ditto for your wife’s weird boss.) And now when you are hit with the question of what to bring for a fourth date while sitting at the red light three blocks from her house you realize your answer is just a short U-turn away.

Style, culture, elegance at the speed of pull around to the first window please. Now I’ve seen everything.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

The Case of the Missing Drive Thru (sic)

Michael Leave a comment

Last night I wanted Chinese for dinner. When it comes to Chinese I’m flexible. It can be General Tso Chicken, Orange Chicken, Kung Pao Chicken, Lemon Chicken, Hunan Crispy Chicken. I’ll even make it myself. I can make a chili-based sweet hot sauce, I always have some spicy orange glaze in the fridge (don’t ask, I’ll write about that some other time), I can do a lemon sauce. I even have rice and lo mein noodles on hand so the side is just a flip of the coin. I even have a couple of fortune cookies somewhere in a cupboard. If I only had chicken.

That scuttled the whole Chinese thing. See, in addition to me not having chicken, it was raining. If it wasn’t raining I’d have been happy to drive to the nearest Chinese restaurant and pick up dinner. But since there are no drive through Chinese restaurants I was forced to eat leftover pork chops, assemble and bake a pizza, or get a Quarter Pounder. Why are there no drive through Chinese restaurants?

If you look at what we have driven through, drive thru General Tso shouldn’t be that hard to pull off. Just in the food category we have burgers, tacos, gyros, donuts, deli sandwiches, and hot dogs. We can get chicken sandwiches, chicken nuggets, chicken wings, and chicken eggs scrambled or poached. What’s so different between a chicken nugget with your choice of sauce and fried chicken pieces tossed in a spicy glaze to commemorate some long forgotten military leader from the nineteenth century.

We have drive through pharmacies, drive through banking, drive through coffee houses. There are drive in movies, drive in oil change places and drive in car washes. We live in a time that we can eat, drink, bank, be cured, and get our cars serviced and washed without ever getting wet. (You know what I mean.) It wasn’t that long ago before photography went the way of digital that we had drive through photo processing. But when it’s raining and we’re hungry for what we don’t have on hand we better not have Chinese on hand. Where’s the outrage here!? (or here?!) Am I the only one who feels it!? (it ?!)

So that’s my rant for today. Sorry it’s not as conscience raising as transgender restrooms, American presidential candidates’ lies and mis-speakings, or international internet censoring but I still haven’t gotten my General Tso.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

McYouWon’tBelieveThisOne

Michael Leave a comment

It was there for a while.  A little while to be sure, but to be sure, it was there.  Or they were there.  Those two words.  Those two words that are almost never heard at a fast food drive through window.  Thank you.  So rare are they that we were certain they had just been substituted by some unfamiliar phrase and thus we posted a page of translations one might find useful when pulling around to Window Number One (“The 21st Century Drive-Through Translator,”  May 8, 2014). Now, however, after a more recent visit to Drive Through Land, he is certain that those words, or lack of them, are iceberg tip zone.

It was a couple weeks ago that he was starved and needed something to eat and needed it fast.  Ahead of him he saw arches and pigtails and crowns.  Didn’t matter where he stopped, they were basically interchangeable.  He pulled into the first one and saw only one mini-van at the speaker.  This should be quick he thought.  Mini-van equals kids, equals kid meals, equals one-two-three ordering.  Wrong!

As he pulled behind the van and lowered his window he caught the sound of the lady ordering loud enough that she could have done so without the speaker set-up.  “…and a bacon ranch salad without the bacon.”  A pause presumably while she read the read-out on the speaker’s screen.  “Not a side salad.  A bacon ranch salad, hold the bacon.”  The response came through just as loud. “That is a side salad with ranch dressing.”  “No it’s not.”  Here is where he should have turned around and moved on to contestant restaurant Number Two.

Eventually the mini-van lady and the disembodied speaker voice came to an agreement of what kind of salad she was going to get (even though nobody really understands why these places serve salads anyway).  She pulled around to Window Number One and he gave his order which the headless speaker person totaled to $4.28.  He reached into his change cup, pulled out a quarter and three pennies, felt for a bill in his pocket hoping to snag either a five or a ten and was relieved to find a ten between his fingers, and made his own way to Window Number One, the very window where the mini-van was still stationed!

“…don’t ever change my order again like that.  If I ask for a salad I want that salad not a little side salad.  I know what you people make on those things.  Is that the phone number to call complaints to.  I’m dialing it now.”  And off to Window Number Two she went, probably misdialing all the way.

He took the now vacated place, the no longer headless voice repeated his total, and he passed over the bill and four coins.  The young lady in the window asked if he wanted his receipt, he said no thank you and waited for his change.  Instead of money she handed him his receipt (yes, the very one he said he didn’t need) and uttered those immortal words, “There you go.”  He continued to wait and when she didn’t get it he tried a verbal cue.  “Hmm, my change?”  “You gave me 28 cents,” she said.  “Yes,” he said, “but not with a four dollar bill.”

He looked up and saw that the mini-van was still at Window Number Two.  He wondered if the mini-van lady was ever a drive through worker.

Now that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you.

The 21st Century Drive-Through Translator

Michael 1 Comment

Some time ago we opined that “There you go” was not synonymous with “Thank you.”  We’re guessing others thought similarly and likewise made their concern known because we have noticed that every once in a while, we actually hear those two magic words when passing dollars through a window to conclude a drive by burger purchase. Unfortunately there are some rather unmagical words and phrases still floating about.

Let’s float.

 
There you go:  We think it means “Thank you” but that’s only because it’s the phrase we most often here after handing over money while receiving change, or it’s the phrase most often heard when most people would use “Thank you.”

 
I’ll get it later:  “Drive on. I’ll have someone go out and pick it up later.  No, you don’t get more,” said right after the coin portion of your change which has been precariously placed on top of the bills and receipt then thrust out the window in the general direction of your car spilling the change into the no man’s land between Window One and your car.  Usually followed by “There you go.”

 
Here you go:  Not to be confused with “There you go” this means “Whoa there fella, back up there” when you pull around to Window One, overshooting it by at most 3/4 of an inch causing the Windown One attendant to lean forward.

 
Did you have the large coffee?:  “I have no idea what order these orders are in.”

 
Read the menu, I’ll be with you in a minute:  This can have multiple meanings, the most common are “I’m in the bathroom,” and “What order are these orders in?”

 
Have a good day*:  We think it means “Thank you” when uttered by the Window Two attendant after passing your order through his or her window.  Or it could mean “Go on now but come back soon.”  *Pronunciation guide: Good pronounced “goot” as in “foot” making the phrase sound like “Have a goot day.”  We don’t know why.

 
You can express concern (aka complain) to management that you are being treated with less than what you’d expect considering you’re giving them money.  However, there are some unfortunate responses from management regarding the less than stellar presentation seen in Drive-Through Land.  Recently when She of We was met with rudeness by the employees and uncleanliness of the establishment.  She complained to management saying she would not stop and eat there again.  For her troubles she was presented with coupons for her next visit.

 

Apparently there is a need for a translator in that direction also.

 

That’s what we think. Really.  How ’bout you?