Lancaster: Stream of Consciousness

The last thing I did in Lancaster was buy this “7 on the Creep-o-Meter” papier mâché clown at Dutch Haven, while Pretty Poison’s “Catch Me I’m Falling” played on the store’s soundsystem.

Henry bought soft pretzels and homemade root beer. Pretty much everything Henry bought that weekend could be consumed. He’s not one for souvenirs.

After Dutch Haven, we parted ways with Tommy & Jessy and stopped for a little while in Hershey, because no way was I passing up a jaunt through Chocolate World.

The ride-through tour of the simulated chocolate factory doesn’t cost a dime, but it spits you out right into a chocolate-covered palace of consumerism; $20 later we were walking back to the car, Chooch with two plush Hershey characters stowed under his arms.

Fucking Chocolate World. I did think it was nice though that Hersheys employed a retarded kid to hand out miniature bars of defected candy after the tour, even if he was a bit slow at it.

Then we saw hot air balloons while on our way to eat at the Capitol Diner, where we eavesdropped on a booth of family members lecturing an 18-year-old girl about statutory rape (her boyfriend is 15; she haughtily wailed, “I don’t want to go into the world being afraid of everything!”); meanwhile, the middle-aged retarded man at their table ordered something he didn’t like, causing his mom to scold, “That’s what you get for not asking me first!”

He probably just got done with his shift at Chocolate World; lay off, Ma!

The manager of Capitol Grill thought my fingerless gloves were casts and openly pitied me while I paid at the register. When he realized they were Pacman gloves, he announced this wildly to everyone sitting in that section of the restaurant and I left there with strangers staring at me.

We got home around 8:30 that night to a gnarly spider luxuriating on a giant web on our front porch, but you already know about Sir.