Me and the boys were at an outdoor ice cream shop last night for a treat. They were both over at a table with a couple of new books, and I was standing in line to order. Calfgrit4 comes up to me and says, “Daddy, do you have any money?”

“Um, yeah,” I said. Was he thinking of how I was going to pay for the ice cream?

“Can I have it?” he asked.

“Why?”

“I want to make a wish,” he said.

There was a small fountain in front of the shop, with lots of coins in it. “Oh, OK,” I said. I dug into my pocket and pulled out some change. I had three pennies, and I gave CG4 one of them. He ran off to make his wish.

A minute later, he came back to me. “Calfgrit7 wants to make a wish, too,” he said. I gave him a penny to take to CG7.

When I got our ice cream orders, I took them over to their table. Before I sat down, CG4 asked for “more money” to make another wish. I only had one more penny, and I knew that if CG4 made another wish, CG7 would want to make another wish, too.

“No,” I said, “just one wish per person tonight.”

While they were busy eating their ice cream, I pulled out my last penny. I stepped up to the fountain and tossed it in. I wish that their wishes come true. Maybe that’s cheating the system, but it’s the only way I could think right then to give them both a wish with one penny.

Bullgrit

For lunch, I went to a K&S Cafeteria. I haven’t been to a cafeteria restaurant in years.

When I walked in the door of this restaurant, I was shocked at the poor upkeep. The first thing I noticed when I entered was the peeling wallpaper — everywhere, the dark blue wallpaper was curling up. Oh geez, I thought, what’s the sanitation grade of this place? I found the grade: A. OK, so they don’t grade on decor.

The second thing I noticed, as I walked through the maze for herding folks through the serving line, was the age of all the other customers. Of the more than 20 people in the line, I was definitely the youngest patron. I had forgotten that aspect/demographic of cafeteria dining.

Once up at the serving line, the food looked really good –- it was all very well presented. I checked out the menu board to see what the prices were like, and I saw something I’d never heard of before: telia, teleria, or something like that (“t” something “ia”). I had no clue what that was, but it was listed in the same section as beef and chicken.

As I ordered my beef tips over rice, I heard a woman a couple of people behind me order the t—ia thing. I watched over my shoulder to see what the server went for, but just my luck, the server had to retrieve some plates. So I had to move on forward without seeing the t—ia thing.

I had my beef tips, rice, corn, a slice of Texas toast, a glass of sweet tea, and then I came to the dessert. Holy sweet baby! More slices of different kinds of pie than I could count. It took me a minute to choose — much to the annoyance of the older man in line right behind me.

I settled on a huge slice of cheese cake. The thing was about three inches thick! It was all I could do to make myself eat all my lunch before taking a fork-full of this pie. . . cake? (It’s obviously a pie, but why do they call it cake? Nevermind. This is going into a really dumb comedy routine that I’m sure Gallagher or someone covered 20 years ago.)

I couldn’t finish the pie/cake, but I put in a good try.

Hmm. You know, this story . . . really is boring. Did I mention everyone in the restaurant was at least 20 years older than me? Yeah, I did. Did I mention the . . . yeah, I did. Damn.

OK, look. I’ll write something better tomorrow. This sucks. Damn. I thought this story would be interesting, but, crap, it’s not even mildly entertaining.

It’s pie! But it’s called a cake! Meh. I just can’t save this. There’s nothing interesting or funny about eating lunch at a K&S Cafeteria. It’s just kind of sad for a 41-year-old geeky professional.

Bullgrit

I planned to get to the polling place first thing in the morning, but when I drove by at 7:15, there were parked cars lined up for a couple hundred yards down the street. I didn’t want to wait in that line. I drove on to work and planned to go in the evening.

Every couple of hours through the work day, I checked the news sites to see how things were going. All reports talked about very long waits, problems with machines, and, in our area, rain.

Well, I figured I’d need to go get in the line as soon as I left work. I told Cowgrit my intentions, and that I might be a little late getting home.

It was dark and raining all the drive from my office, but when I reached the polling place, there were very few cars even in the parking lot — none were parked out on the street like in the morning.

I parked, walked up the walk way — had half a dozen people shove campaign papers at me, and had one guy introduce himself as a candidate for something — and into the building. I followed the signs, gave my name, got my ballot, filled it out, and put it through the machine. I was back in my car less than five minutes after getting out of it.

Thank you to everyone who got out and voted early. You made it easy for me to get in and out in a breeze.

Bullgrit

Calfgrit7 and I went, with his scout pack, to a carnivore preserve. The site has a couple or three dozen wild cats — ocelots, servals, tigers, and such. (Seven tigers!)

Although all the animals were interesting in their own ways, the tigers were the most amazing to see. To start with, tigers are much bigger in person than they seem on TV. The smallest tiger on the preserve is over almost 500 pounds. The others are 700-800 pounds, and when standing upright (to get food offered up high), they’re about 8 feet tall.

At one point, while looking at the white tiger (shown here), it started stalking the kids lined up in front, at the rope cordon. It’s a bit disturbing to see a tiger’s eyes up close like that, and know that it’s judging which cub scout to eat first.

When the stalking started, the tour guide/animal keeper said it was time for us all to turn our backs on the animal and walk away. So we did so. As we exited the area, Calfgrit7 joked about it.

“Shake our booty,” he said, and wiggled his butt in the direction of the tiger.

“Please, son,” I said, “let’s not taunt the eight hundred pound tiger.”

Bullgrit