On his own accord, Chooch is eating apples (while taking in an early Sunday viewing of Halloween II) as a prelude to the pillow-sack he’s about to fill with snazzily-wrapped partially hydrogenated thunder-thigh oil, high fructose double-chin syrup, and all the sweet seductive promises of childhood obesity.

I’m hoping he doesn’t get any Whoppers; talk about the party foul of trick-or-treating. Well, that and getting hit by a car.

I think I’ve effectively convinced him to eschew his HORRIBLE Ben 10 costume (can’t take all the credit – I’m pretty sure the fact that 3/4 quarters of his school turned into undulating question marks when they saw his lame costume might have had something to do with it). We are going to attempt to turn him into a zombie clown, since we already have the wig, nose and bow-tie from one of my pathetic photo shoots with ex-Christina. I am trying very hard not to be an over-bearing Halloween pageant mom like my mom was to me. At least I haven’t tried to put him in a box yet.

Henry and I have about 4 hours to learn how not to suck at applying costume makeup. Wish us luck.

P.S. I will be posting pictures from his school Halloween party (which turned out fantastically once I successfully trumped the Gosselin mom – good call on that one, guys!), probably tomorrow. I haven’t been feeling well . Ask Henry – he was in the basement trying to fix the furnace when he overheard the dulcet notes of my vomiting as it traveled two floors through the vents. I’ve sort of been phoning it in the last few days.

P.P.S. Oh yeah, Happy Halloween!

When I picked Chooch up from school yesterday, all the kids were wearing these lame-ass spider headdresses.

Chooch was not pleased – not even a little.

I made him keep it on for the entire BLOCK we have to walk to get home and he bitched the whole time, like he was afraid some hot preschool broad was going to roll past on a squeaky tricycle and catch him looking decidedly non-bad ass for once.

So tomorrow is this fucking Halloween party at the school. Henry is my chaperone. Please pray for me, you guys.

Remember over a week ago when I bribed you people to leave a comment by dangling some imaginary prize over your heads? Well, I didn’t forget about it. (OK, I did forget about it. But today, I’m all about remembering.)

I used that lovely Random.org thing that I always have to stare at for a few minutes before it dawns on me what to do. I forgot about ‘print screen,’ so here is the winner as captured by my crappy iPhone camera:

That means the winner is Jersey Diva Mom! I have no idea what your prize will be! But I can guarantee it will be something having nothing to do with Miley Cyrus. Probably no weaponry, either; I’m on this unusual anti-violence kick.

A $2.49 cup of coffee nearly ruined it all.

One sip was all I needed to know that whatever was inside that cup was less a pumpkin spice latte, more something that could be used in lieu of Ipecac. Shame on me for getting a specialty drink at a gas station in the first place.

“I paid for that!” Henry bitched as I tossed it into the garbage can outside of Sheetz. Thus began a heated argument over the only thing we ever fight about – money. Yay, money! The finale found me contemptuously exiting the car and stalking off down the highway on foot until Chooch convinced Henry to turn around and fetch me from the side of the road (I was stubbornly attempting to walk to my mom’s house), well-rehearsed apology at the ready.

If he hadn’t apologized, we would likely have missed out on a really great day with Jessy and Tommy, who we were en route to meet at the Perryopolis flea market when the pitched latte presented a road block. (And Chooch would likely be without a father right now.)

I’m so glad we made it to the flea market, else I might have missed out on the most riveting conversation of all time: Tommy and Henry discussing the merits of some motorized tool-thing called a Roto-Hoe, and pontificating the origin of its name. “Why wouldn’t they just call it a Roto-Shredder?” Tommy asked Henry, clearly not yet figuring out that Henry doesn’t really know anything.

“Maybe something else already had that name,” I heard Henry muse.

My sole purpose of going to the flea market was to sniff around for the woman who sold me the ring of all flea market rings last August, but she was nowhere to be found. And no other table provided finger-candy nearly as gaudy or with half the brass-knuckle power as her rings. I was saddened by this, but Chooch sure made out. Jessy tried to teach him how to barter, but he was like, “Why? Mommy’s going to buy this for me no matter what.”

I was watching Chooch as he stood near a table while some gnarly shit-schiller bark prices to him like he was a 35-year-old man and not a wallet-less 4-year-old. He looked so amused by it all and had this sort of laughing ‘WTF’ expression on his face. I saw that same look a few minutes later as he was petting a dog at a booth set up to give a carpet cleaning demonstration and it made me realize that as ridiculous as flea markets are to me, they must be really fantastical from Chooch’s point-of-view.

Sundays with Jessy and Tommy have quickly become something I look forward to (even though Chooch groans and says, “Great. Tommy’s gonna beat me up!”). Something about them makes Henry be super nice to me. Sometimes he’ll even hold my hand. Probably because Tommy asks him questions about THE SERVICE and re-masculates him a bit with testosterone-y discourse (for instance, on Sunday they discussed the cost of fishing licenses). That must put Henry in a good mood or something, even though he peed in the flea market bathroom while all the stalls were occupied with pooping bargain hunters;  Henry wouldn’t stop speaking of the horror for a good hour.

Wouldn’t be my preferred nap-location, but hey – I’m sure selling rusty tools and yellow-paged romance novels is really grueling.

Some haggard tart had a boxful of white studded wristbands (supposedly) from Hot Topic. It was the only thing I saw, besides a gigantically horrific $40 painting of some asshole who founded Washington County, that made me inch toward my iCarly pocketbook.

“How much?” Jessy asked the leather-faced broad, who was busy organizing another bin of stolen goods a few feet away.

“$4,” she hollered back in a not-so-nice tone. “They’re $8 at Hot Topic.”

“How much for two?” Jessy bartered.

“THEY’RE $4 A PIECE!” this fucking landfill souvenir barked. “THEY’RE $8 AT HOT TOPIC, THAT IS HALF OFF.” Oh no she didn’t. This shit-stained remnant of Kool’s packaging from 1974 did not just patronize us.

“Gee, thanks for assuming I can’t do math,” I sneered, exploding with self-righteousness. (This is what I do best in life. Explode with self-righteousness. Ask Henry about the furious letter I wrote in an attempt to get out of a parking ticket.) “Dumb bitch,” I added, as I dropped the bracelet down with exaggerated flourish.

Henry, who was standing a bit away, looked at me expectantly when I approached him with a wrist decidedly not dressed for next year’s Warped Tour. “I didn’t like her attitude,” I explained. “So no sale for that whore.”

Over lunch, we made plans to take a group trip to Lancaster next month. We ended the day with an arousing game of Depends keep-away at Target, which had me (ironically) nearly pissing myself in the toy aisle. I’ve never laughed so hard in Target.

And to think, a $2.49 cup of coffee almost prevented all of that from happening.

I’m on another Pierce the Veil kick. This happens often and now you must suffer along with me. It’s ridiculous that I haven’t overplayed their new album by now (though I’m sure every time Henry gets in the car, he thinks, “Goddamn haven’t we listened to this album enough already?”). I just don’t think these guys get enough credit. Especially not from a lyrical standpoint. A lot of people can’t get behind Vic’s voice, but that’s one of the things I love so much about this band – they sound like no other.  (Plus, I like boys who sing like girls yet can still fucking scream.)

This is my favorite song off Selfish Machines and I really hope they make a video for it. In Alternative Press’s track-by-track breakdown of the album, Vic said a fan approached him and said that her boyfriend had died in a car accident, and that it had been at one of their shows where he held her hand for the first time. This song was meant to be from the boyfriend’s point of view and it kills me every time I hear it.

Listening to them today has provided a nice bit of catharsis after last night’s volatile post. I haven’t even re-read it so I can only imagine it’s obscenity- and typo-laden. Thank you for making me feel calmer today, Pierce the Veil.  I might die if I don’t get to see you again soon.

I knew it was a dumb fucking idea as soon as I penciled in my name as a volunteer for the upcoming preschool Halloween party. I don’t know if I was using this as a catalyst for getting over my fear of other moms or other kids, but how fucking naive of me to think that this could bring upon me anything but misery, stress and one heaping hassle reaking of eau de soccer mom.

A slip of paper was returned to me at the start of last week. On it was the four moms volunteering for the party and our respective phone numbers. I figured at some point we would all meet up, maybe before or after school, and discuss the boring minutia involved in planning a successful preschool Halloween party that wouldn’t implode upon itself.

But apparently I don’t know shit about planning school functions, because when I walked into Chooch’s classroom last Friday morning, I was quickly cornered by some tall, nerdy mommy who assertively introduced herself as the mother of one of the girls in the class.

“I’m also one of the moms volunteering for the party next week,” she continued, and I tried with all of my might to stop feeling like she was looking down her nose at me. I really don’t deal well with condescention.

I figured she was going to ask me what my ideas were, maybe suggest that I hang back and wait for the other mom-broads to show up with their respective children, so we can sit down like grown-ups and work this shit out so it won’t wind up being a complete clusterfuck.

Again with the naivete.

“So I just happened to run into the other two moms on Wednesday. They’re cousins, so they already have been deciding what they’re going to do. One of them is taking care of the treat and the other is doing a craft. Now, I’m going to go to Eat n Park and get smiley cookies for the snack,” she prattled on, looking entirely too smug. “So, that leaves the game up to you. Will that be a problem?” There was something in her voice. Gilded haughtiness. Smarmy high-horseness. Whatever it was, it didn’t sit well with me.

I was stunned, almost to the point of silence; completely shocked. In my periphery, I could see bright flashing lights, probably from the blood vessels that were bursting.

In my perfect world, I’d have called her a cunt a hundred different ways and threatened her vagina with a wide assortment of spiny farm tools. But over the ringing in my ears, I could hear the laughter of Chooch’s schoolmates as they played before class. And then I looked down and saw Chooch at my side, waiting to ask me a question.

So I sucked in a deep breath and said, with the slightest sarcastic lilt, “Clearly it’s not going to be a problem.” I then informed her that I already had treat bags, and I intended to still use them.

“Oh, that’s fine,” she said, and I can’t help but feel she didn’t really think that was fine at all, that some new mommy might have a chance to out-do all the veterans. “I’m bringing in tattoos for them, on  top of the smiley cookies,” she went on, reminding me again of how pathetic her snack was going to be.

Smiley cookies? Seriously? Mother of the motherfucking year. I bet your daughter will be so proud that her mommy went to a restaurant to buy Halloween cookies when a REAL MOM (or in my case – A REAL MOM WITH A HENRY) was planning on baking Halloween CUPCAKES.

I left the school that morning in tears. It’s what repressed anger does to me. (And when it gets really bad, that’s when the uncontrollable laughter kicks in, but Henry is typically the only one who angers me enough to see that.) As soon as I walked into the house, I grabbed my phone and called Henry, wherein the tears turned into waterfalls.

“I’m going to go and talk to the teacher,” Henry barked. “That’s bullshit.”

“NO!” I wailed. “You’ll just make it worse!” Like I’m suddenly the kid who’s being bullied. But it’s true, and I thought a lot about it – it will make it worse for Chooch.

“Then just don’t help them at all,” Henry suggested. “Fuck them, let them do it all!”

“That’ll ruin it for Chooch,” I reasoned. “And he’s the only reason I wanted to help in the first place.”

So you know what? Fuck those broads. Not only am I still going to bring in the treat bags, but I’m still baking those fucking cupcakes. (And of course, you’ll translate to mean “Henry is still baking those fucking cupcakes.”)

Oh, they’ll get their fucking game. I’ll bring in a Ouija board, I don’t give a fuck.

Kevin Kreiss (the guy who organized the zombie car wash last month) orchestrated Zom-B-Rama, a zombie carnival on Saturday. It was located in an empty store front in Monroeville Mall and went on the entire day. Chooch had known about it for weeks and kept asking, “How many more sleeps until the zombie carnival? Is today the zombie carnival? When the hell are we going to the zombie carnival?”

He let us attempt to zombify him before we left the house on Saturday, which was no small wonder. Unfortunately, Henry and I are no masters at costume makeup and by the time we arrived at the mall, most of it had seemed to come off. We should have just used dirt – that seems to stick to his face like tongues to my frozen heart.

But before we left the house, he decided he was going to hang outside and wait for victims to walk by. As soon as he would see someone in the distance, he would run across the all the front yards until he was parallel to where they were on the sidewalk, stick out his arms, and commence zombie-stalking. Some people played along and pretended to be scared, but then there were some assholes who were too cool to be concerned with anything other than their awesome iPods, which were probably playing really lame shit. Fuckers.

The turn-out was pretty good when we arrived. There were zombie patrons milling around the mall near the Monroeville Zombies homebase, and several people stopped to comment on Chooch’s Jason shirt and his hat. He gets aggravated when this happens, so of course I laughed. He even had a slight brush with paparazzi as a few people (including a professional photographer) stopped to take his picture. Oh, to walk a day in Chooch’s shoes.

We were only at the carnival for about an hour. Chooch started out fine, things like this don’t scare him. But he doesn’t like loud noise, and God forbid there was some atmospheric music playing to enhance the mood of a post-apocalyptic carnival. It’s not like it was fucking Dimmu Borgir or something, but Chooch was still clamping his hands over his ears and being Mr. Miserable about it. He half-assedly played three of the games (they had a whole little midway set up with zombified fair games) before whining about wanting to leave. So Henry had to use up the rest of the game tickets while I kept Chooch in the (quieter) back room where the tickets could be traded in for prizes.

I’m starting to think Chooch will never go to Warped Tour with me.

Anyway, the carnival was hosted by Dawn of the Dead’s Ken Foree and I’d have liked to have been able to take a picture with him and Chooch, or maybe stick around for some of the other entertainment that was on slate, like the costume contests and RNR Freak Show, but Chooch was becoming increasingly overwhelmed as more people were stuffed inside the small space. This is often the downside of bringing a four-year-old companion to events.

By the end of it, so much of Chooch’s makeup had worn off that he just looked less like a zombie and more like the victim of a grandma’s overzealous affection. Not very ghoulish.

I’ll be so pissed if “Subtle Zombie” is big next year.

I hope Kevin Kreiss continues to offer such fun and zombiriffic options throughout the year. Maybe Chooch will be less surly next time.

“I wish Vic [from Pierce the Veil] was my boyfriend,” I muttered to Henry just now on the way to the flea market, after a huge fight erupted over iced coffee. “I bet HE would understand me.”

Henry snorted. “Not unless he’s raised kids.”

Everyone knows I love haunted houses, but what I love even more is going to a haunted house with someone who hates haunted houses, and by that I of course mean someone who has a weak heart and pees herself at the mere sight of an animatronic corpse rotting on a blood-squirting commode and then has to schedule an extra session with her therapist because she can’t stop the sensation of walking through a hallway cramped with dangling body bags.

And that is exactly the kind of person my friend Gina is. It took a little bit of needling, but I finally got her to agree to go to Hundred Acres Manor last night.

It was a bit of a gamble, considering she’s a new friend and I try to wait at least half a year before lead-footing the abuse pedal.

Since it was a Thursday, and a few minutes before the ticket booth closed, there was no one in line.

This made Gina whimper and begin back-peddling, but I reminded her of the scandelous photos I have of her from 1998 and that made her quit tugging me back to the direction of the car.

Today, when I went to her house to retrieve the clump of my hair and flesh from my hand which she tore off in one of her scared rabbit fits inside the Manor, I found her diary splayed open to this page:

…and calls Henry to tell him all about it.

I stole Henry’s phone while he was sleeping so I could make this recording for all of you special people to hear.

As if I don’t splooge about this enough on here, I really love my friends over on the Etsy’s Dark Team. There was a Halloween Stalker Swap that I signed up for and was dying to know who my stalker was. My package arrived the other day and as soon as I saw the return address, I shouted, “FUCK YEAH, AGONY’S DECAY!” Remember my Jason Voorhees hair fascinator? JENNY MADE THAT.

You better believe I tore the shit out of that box, until the contents came spilling out onto my lap like an entire bushel of Eve’s apples.

I almost died.

The first thing I saw was a frightening plaque featuring Jason and Mrs. Voorhees.

I love it so much, though Chooch has already expressed intense interest in it so I have a feeling it will end up decorating his bedroom wall, right next to his framed eyeball print.

But right now, it’s hanging next to the front door, so back off my Halloween swag, son.

(I feel like that could be a future photo of me and Chooch.)

I would have been satisfied with that alone, but my Darkside girls always spoil the shit out of me. So there was more.

Before I knew who my stalker was, the organizer of the swap kept sending me convos via Etsy, pumping me for information on behalf of my stalker, regarding my collection of Cure music and videos. Jenny used that info to put together a CD of rarities and a DVD of live performances!

Chooch came downstairs this morning while I was watching the DVD. He sat down on the couch and, after watching for a few seconds, angrily asked, “Where’s Lol?

”

“Lol?” I repeated with surprise, wondering how he even remembered that, because it was probably over a year ago when I first told him about Lol Tolhurst, ex-Cure member. And then it turned into 20 Questions About Lol Tolhurst, hosted by Chooch.

“Why does Robert hate Lol? Is he sick? Is he dead?” And on and on Chooch went, obsessing over a man who hasn’t had any part of the Cure since 1989. Finally, Chooch made me Google Image him on my phone, which he took from me and proceeded to (quite haughtily)  flip through all the photos of Lol Tolhurst, past and present. Then he went back to watching the TV, disgusted that Lol was nowhere to be found.

Mr. Tolhurst, looks like you have a #1 fan.

Jenny also included this hot Robert Smith pendant! I wore it to work the day I got it and it wound up being a conversation piece. One of the analysts paused by my desk and asked, “Is that Robert Smith?” Turns out she likes The Cure, too, so we bonded over that and I was happy to have something in common with a co-worker. I told her about how I went to Australia to see them and she thought it was cool, not crazy, which is the reaction I generally get from telling that story.

And Jenny knows of my hardcore Michael Myers passion, so she tossed this bottle cap bracelet into the mix. LOOK AT HOW FUCKING HOT HE IS! Oh my God. I’m happy to have a bracelet to go with my Michael ring.

Seriously, go check out her shop! Thank you, Jenny, for the creepy-awesome gifts!

Mrs. Evils always hooks my kid up!

Recently someone was like, “You know, Erin, your blog is like, all about you.” That must get annoying. So today, let’s make it all about YOU.

  Tell me something about yourself!

It could be anything – your favorite band, food that gives you hives, where you hid that body in ’99. It’s fun to learn about who reads this, and I’ve met some really awesome people this way (one who even lives in the same ‘hood as me!

). So don’t be shy. Even if you see me everyday, even if we’ve been playing in the Internet sandbox together since 2004, and especially if you’ve never commented here before, you should totally play along. I want to know you! There might even be a random prize*. You never know.

So tell me something about yourself, or get the fuck out! (Kidding! God.)

* Seriously, I might be giving  something away to a random commenter so leave an email address!

Chooch got a fedora yesterday. He put it on and we took pictures. The end. (Wouldn’t it be nice if all my posts were this succinct?)

I was like, “Where the hell did you learn this pose?”

“Freddy,” he answered. And then when my face looked blank, he added, “From ‘iCarly’!

”

God, I am so out of touch. (Not really, because as soon as he said that, I immediately knew what episode he was talking about. I’m such a hussy for TeenNick.)

This one was from Friday, after the Harland picture-takin’ extravaganza. The downside is that since I asked him to sit on one stoop, he deemed it necessary to try out EVERY SINGLE STOOP we passed on our way back to Kara’s.

He had to get his school picture taken a few weeks ago.

He probably wondered why the photographer did it in one shot. “He didn’t even ask me to wear a pig mask!”

Aw, fuck. Here I go ruining a perfectly good blog post with WORDS again.

People are always telling us, “Erin and Henry, you guys need to go out alone once in awhile, good Goddamn.” Because we don’t usually do that. Warped Tour might have been the last time it was just the two of us, out and about, without a demanding, possessive four-year-old in tow.  Although we did have a double date a few weeks ago, I still thought it was time for just the two of us to grab some dinner and struggle for things to converse over. Politics would definitely not be one of those things.

I have a Groupon for the Gypsy Cafe on the South Side that needs to be used by November 1st, so I thought that would be a good date place for us. We both really enjoy quirky ethnic places and I’m part gypsy so it all made sense. There was a vegetarian moussaka on the menu that I had been eying.

My mom even said she would babysit, but that we would have to bring Chooch to her house. I was looking forward to it all week.

So, there it was: last minute, Saturday at 4:30, when I went to print out the Groupon. That’s when I noticed the not-at-all-fine print about reservations. I made Henry call and of course it was too late to get in for that evening, unless we waited until after 10pm. I can’t eat dinner that late. I could risk dying.

Plan B was to still drop Chooch off at my mom’s house, eat dinner at Blue Flame and then go to a haunted house, as there are several out in my old ‘hood. Blue Flame isn’t exactly a romantic restaurant, but it’s cozy and quaint and the type of place you might catch Chuck Mangione playing on the sound system while roast beef sandwiches and beef barley soup are being served. Plus, my Pappap was friends with the owners so I pretty much grew up there. It was always the first choice on the nights my Pappap felt like eschewing the finer establishments in favor of slummin’ it with a burger, because even though he was filthy rich, sometimes he liked to keep it real.

He would still get his glass of Lambrusco though.

Unfortunately, the economy hasn’t been kind to Blue Flame. People apparently would rather go to chain restaurants these days than authentic mom and pop establishments so choosing Blue Flame is always a crap shoot because there’s never a guarantee it will be open.

And as we drove past last night, it was honestly hard to tell. There were people in the lot, but it could have been a drug deal. We decided to just find a restaurant closer to the haunted house.

“There’s a place in Rostraver called the Roadside,” Henry recalled. “We can try that place.”

I didn’t care. Probably, I was going to end up with a grilled cheese anyway. Most places specializing in American fare hate me.

We rolled up into the parking lot just in time to see a pack of elderly zombie-walking their way to the front door.

“Well,” Henry bright-sided. “The food must be good. Old people always eat where the food is good.”

“Where did you hear THAT?” I asked, appalled. “That’s not true at all.”

And we both knew I was right the moment we walked into the Roadside and were slammed with the funk of nursing home and boiled carrots. I can’t emphasize how much I am not exaggerating right now. And the walls, they were wood-paneled. The floors? Green and white linoleum.

“Oh, Henry,” I murmured, as a table of white-heads turned to look at the two young’uns who just walked in. Yes, they were even coveting Henry’s youth with gummy, open-mouthed stares, like he was squirting the Fountain of Youth from his dick.

“Yinz can sit anywhere!” a haggard broad hollered from the kitchen, making my shoulders rise up like they were being puppeteered.

I chose the side of the restaurant that did not resemble a Bingo hall.

We only got one menu, and a Xeroxed copy of hand-scrawled specials. The waitress came over, pad in hand, ready to take Henry’s order.

“Oh, I’m not ready yet,” he said, and while he was still talking, she aggressively asked me for my order.

“Um, I didn’t even get to see the menu yet. You only gave us one…?” But she was already huffing back to the kitchen.

“What do you need a menu for?” Henry teased. “You’re only going to get a grilled cheese anyway.”

To the chagrin of our olfactory organs, our table was right next to the salad bar, which I quickly deduced was a large source of the offending stench. It was included with Henry’s $8  dinner special, and our red splotchy faced waitress made sure to remind him of it three times. He stood up, leaned forward to get a better look, then sat back down.

“That’s OK,” he mumbled. You know it’s bad when Henry passes up a salad bar.

Although, I’m not so sure where they got the license to call it a salad bar. It only had: lettuce, huge onion quarters, an entire vat of BEETS, tomatoes, mandarin oranges and a double-wide tub of butterscotch pudding that looked like it was scraped out of three dozen diapers. The other side had carrots, corn, mucous-y chicken noodle soup and two pans of apple sauce.  Clearly this was nursing home cafeteria leftovers being pawned off on people gullible enough to pay for it.

Suddenly, there were FIVE old people converging around the salad bar, plopping beets and apple sauce onto white plates. I was squealing at this point. It was like a bad zombie movie.

In addition to a medley of dream catchers and framed photos of lighthouses, the Roadside Restaurant had strung several of these elegant lampshades from the ceiling to better light the festering salad fixins below. I’m pretty sure the shades were embellished by Lite Brite and a gut feeling tells me if we would have walked through the kitchen, we’d have found ourselves in the nursing home rec room where a flock of blue-haired dementia patients could be found sitting with hunched backs, knocking out more restaurant decor.

The only thing on the menu for me was a grilled cheese. “Hard to fuck up a grilled cheese,” Henry said, jinxing my whole meal. Up until that night, I was the only person I knew who could ruin a grilled cheese. I’m so bad at it, that now I  just use the microwave now when Chooch says he wants one.

Roadside might have me beat.

“What the fuck—” I started, having just took a large first bite. “What kind of cheese is this?!” I cried.

My face must have reflected my cheese consternation, because Henry was doing that fucking laugh of his where his face is all scrunched up and his head bobs up and down on his shoulders, but no sound comes out.

Trying to suck the orange paste out from the backs of my molars, I realized it was a set-up. They managed to make me eat like I had just taken out  my dentures, like everyone else in the joint.  But the cheese, it was so sticky and Elmers-esque, I couldn’t get over it.

“It’s like goddamn bomb shelter Velveeta,” I spat to Henry. “I bet it’s been sitting underground since the motherfucking 50s! Taste this shit,” I thrust my grilled cheese over to Henry, who took a tentative bite and promptly started laughing all over again.

“Don’t forget to go to the salad bar!” the waitress said again, sashaying past with a pitcher of iced tea.

Our entire meal was only $12.99.

“Hey, you forgot to get your free dessert,” I reminded Henry as we left.

“That’s OK. I’m pretty sure it was just that butterscotch pudding.” The mere mention of it made me burp bile.

And then Henry, because we dined with octogenarians, drove like one the whole way home.

Even though I was deep inside your Grandma Edna’s heaven last night, we did nothing but laugh the entire time. And I guess that’s really what it’s all about anyway, right haters?

(Plus, the Penguins pummeled the Flyers. It was a night of win.)