Crispy, Cheesy, Bean Burrito Supremo, #26, Your Order is Ready!

I got up this morning at 4AM and drove 3 hours through the dark and fog on winding country roads that were unfamiliar to me to conduct a series of seminars for a company that I don't care about anymore. 

If I ever write a novel I think I'll use that sentence to kick the thing off.  I wanted to add something about the boss that I can't stand but he quit or got fired or something.  I'm disappointed that I couldn't manage to work him in somehow.

Actually, I don't mind running these seminars.  It's not stressful or anything.  I've done a of them and I'm pretty good at it.  I'm relaxed and casual and not at all serious.  It's not the end of the world.  The people are pretty nice and they seem grateful for my efforts.  I'm not sure what I'm complaining about unless it was the 4AM wake-up call. 

Anyway, I end up at a marginal hotel in a tiny city located in an economically depressed area of the country.  It was spitting rain under a lowering sky, almost cold enough to snow.  I left the hotel to stretch my legs and sauntered down a long strip mall kind of shopping area that bordered one side of the frontage road, the other side lined with fast food restaurants.  The strip mall was depressing: cut rate grocery stores and discount marts and vacant store fronts.  I bought a jar of off-brand crunchy peanut butter at a moldering grocery mostly because I was embarrassed about walking around a grocery store for 15 minutes without buying anything.

I walked by the food places on the way back.  There was a Mexican place but that looked like a whole procedure, sitting there by myself eating dinner.  Then I passed a place called Huddle's that I feinted at once or twice I couldn't make myself go in.  The name was too weird.  I was worried there would be groups of people in a huddle.

Finally, I enter a Taco Bell.  I haven't been in a Taco Bell in 25 years.  I was clearly out of my element.  I keep waving people ahead of me as I tried to decipher the menu items.  I couldn't tell what most of them were.  There were a lot of adjectives like crunchy and crispy and supremo and stuffed, all with different prices.  Finally, I selected two cheesy bean burritos.

They called my number, I grabbed my sack, and got the hell out of there.  I checked the bag as I cut in between the incredibly long line of people waiting in their cars at the drive thru lane, eschewing the empty restaurant for the safety of their own car.  There was one item in the bag.  I kept walking.  I didn't pause.  I'm not sure what I ordered and I'm not sure I took the bag that was meant for me.  I could have grabbed someone else's bag.  I'm not too good with numbers and I've mentioned this problem I have with paying attention.

I threw the peanut butter away when I got back to my room.  It was terrible.