It’s Thursday night, which means it’s Daddy-Daughter Date Night, while Mommy is out. Normally it’s a lot of fun, but tonight was the exception to the rule. Taylor had a great time; I didn’t.
We went to Jim ‘N Nick’s Bar-B-Q for dinner. Good barbecue, good staff, and right around the corner from Taylor’s school. All went well until the food arrived. Taylor, per usual of late, asked for “sauce” (ketchup). I picked up the bottle and shook it up. Bad idea.
The first realization that something was wrong was a cold sensation on my neck. The second realization was the unmistakable sound of a ketchup bottle cap bouncing across the table behind me. Sure enough, the lid wasn’t on the bottle tight, so I flung the lid, along with half the bottle of ketchup, all over me and the lady sitting behind me.
Hilarity ensues. The waitress sees me dabbing at my neck with a once white, now very red napkin, rushes over to ask if I need an ambulance. No, it’s just ketchup. Taylor asks “Daddy, are you ok? Do you need a band-aid?” Yes, I’m fine. I ask the waitress for more napkins, hoping for those big cloth ones they provide. She brings me over 5 of those little paper ones you put under glasses. I show her my shirt, now more red than blue. She goes back and brings me 5 more paper napkins. By this time two other waitresses have joined in. Slightly exasperated, I ask “Can I please have more of these cloth napkins?” All three run off and bring some back, so I’m left with about 30 nice cloth napkins. Finally.
The manager comes over. Kudos to the manager of the Gardendale Jim ‘N Nick’s for being so helpful. He heads up to the gift shop and comes back with an official Jim ‘N Nick’s T-shirt for me and the lady I baptized with Heinz. He also offers to pay for any dry-cleaning bills we encounter. Very nice guy. Very helpful staff. I’ll be back, but Taylor’s not getting any ketchup.
More fun. After things calm down and I go back to cleaning up the rest of the table, I discover I have covered my cell phone’s keypad in ketchup as well. Lovely. When I get home, I take the phone apart to get inside the keypad and clean the ketchup from between the keys. I pry the first key off, thinking this will be an easy task.
Free advice for cell phone users: If you have a Nokia 6600 model phone, please note that the individual keys do NOT come off the keypad. It’s one unit, and prying off a key actually breaks things. Now my beloved 6600 is missing a 0 key.
I share this on here for Lauren, who had the invitation to join me for dinner while our respective significant others were off doing other things. She decided she’d rather take a makeup exam than be seen in public with me. After tonight, I can’t say I blame her. Her loss – she could have gotten free Jim ‘N Nick’s swag instead of that bounty of network TV propaganda she’s always passing me over on.