A group of white, uptight, pony tail soccer moms and their well-trained vegan children descended upon my section recently for lunch.
I almost set a side of salsa on the table, but Bridget, clad in Lululemon, swatted my hand.
"Wait," she said, pausing for a few seconds to sort out the chaos my gesture carried. "Is that salsa spicy?"
"Nope," I replied as I set it down.
"Wait WAIT," she said before I could set down the accompanying chips. "Are those chips spicy?"
"Not unless you find corn, vegetable oil, salt and water to be spicy" I replied as I set down the chips.
After establishing that, no, my shitty Mexican restaurant doesn't carry rice, almond, or soy milk, the children were then instructed to order their own drinks. The moms - Bridget, Carlee, McKenna and Sasha - gave me patronizing smiles as if the children were about to perform for me.
"I would like a lemonade, please," Anissa said while coloring on her menu.
"No no, honey, I want you to say that to our server in sign language," Carlee said.
"But I don't understand sign language," I countered.
"You...don't speak sign language?" she asked.
"Speak it? Yes. Sign it? No."
Eventually the children ordered lemonades and waters via various forms of communication, none of them simple. After ordering a bland feast of rice, beans, and CORN tortillas ("Can you confirm they're gluten free?"), McKenna suggested I take the children on a "tour" of the restaurant.
"Kids wouldn't it be FUN to watch the workers make the tortillas???" she said.
Sure, "the workers." And I'll bet your ancestors said things like "Kids, wanna poke the slaves with sticks, doesn't that sound fun?"
"Sorry, we don't have any place for customers to watch our workers warm up the pre-packaged tortillas," I said.
"Bummer, they do at Don Pablo's," she told me.
"Oh neat gotcha," I replied while walking away.
Eventually they asked for the bill after the children were denied the kid's meal ice cream sundae. "We can have rice cakes and almond butter at home!" Carlee sang.
They exited shortly thereafter. Because they don't appear on the bill, I ordered all four of the kid's sundaes and savored them. Someone was going to have ice cream that day, dammit, and it might as well have been me.