Hello everyone!
Michael's blog mention of me has increased my profile views by nearly 20%. I am now up to a shattering 44 views. I know. I'm practically famous. I always tell my mom that she has to keep all the old wallpaper patterns after she rips them down so that someday the house can be returned to the way it looked when Megan Dickerson lived here. Velvet rope and all. People will wonder "ooh! I wonder what's behind that door!" Which will be stairs to the basement which will still be chock-full of all the crap it houses now, probably with a few new additions. "And this is the computer Megan began her career on with a blog..." A resounding "oooh" from the tour group.

So I've been working at D---'s and I come home with stories about work pretty much every day. My dad says I should write them down and publish it someday. I don't think they're that interesting, but they are somewhat entertaining. The story that prompted this publishing comment is from yesterday morning. I worked a double at Denny's yesterday hostessing. One of the other hostesses wanted the day off, so she needed me to cover for her. Stupid me, I thought it sounded like a good idea -- make some more money, ya know, proceed on the path to becoming rich and famous. I always think of my job at D----'s as the job I'll talk about on Jay Leno when he asks me what crappy jobs I had growing up before I started making tons of money.

But anyways. My story. It was a busy morning at D----'s -- well, for me, compared to swing shift (5-9pm) when I usually work. I was supposed to have another girl hostessing with me, but she had to serve (no, not time, though that's not too far-fetched) at the last minute because it got busy. So I finally get a minute to breathe, probably around 1:00pm. And I'm standing up at the front of the restaurant by the register just minding my business, and this man comes up and asks if I have a rag or something. And I interrupt him "oh of course!" and grab a rag and walk over to his table to see a lovely display of child vomit all over the table, the booth and the culprit himself. How one child can make that big of a mess, is beyond me. Maybe I should ask Mollie -- she has a babysitting horror story that tops all. And that one time when I was probably 8 or so when a girl from church slept over and then threw up popcorn and chocolate pudding ALL over the bathroom in the middle of the night. But once again -- someone else, namely my mom, cleaned that up, not me. In my defense, I'm not a complete wuss! I've changed nasty diapers that have been worn so long there's literal crap oozing onto the kid's back and down his legs. I've cleaned up dog throw up. But man, this was something else. I was so unprepared. Maybe it was because I round the corner all innocent Denny's employee, rag in hand, ready to be the helpful hostess they hired me to be, to come to their rescue to clean up the spilled soda or whatever it is, only to be hit with the undeniable stench of child vomit. *shudder* It was the kind of smell that your nose finds so offensive it can't help but try to find somewhere to hide. And I stand there for a second, stunned. The little kid is standing on the booth looking up at his dad who is standing right next to me. The mom is standing there lying to herself, the kid, and everyone around, telling him "honey! it's okay! don't worry!", I'm assuming to try to avoid a full out temper tantrum. Probably because if he started crying and screaming, she wasn't going to touch him to calm him down or drag him out of the restaurant. So I put the rag on the booth and start to slide it around to clean up the mess. My mistake. I disturbed it. I made it angry. And I try to smile at the customers so they don't feel so bad, and they don't hate Denny's, when really I'm thinking "exactly how many pancakes were in this kid?!!!" immediately followed by "I hate my job, I hate my job, I hate my job." The father asks me for a bag. I go get him a plastic D----'s bag we put carry-out orders in. He puts the boy's soggy shirt in it, and I smile at the thought of a throw-up covered shirt as your carry-out order. Straight from D----'s to you. (A la Camelot Inn) And then I catch a whiff of it, and quickly seal my mouth shut again. I retreat back to my station at the front of the restaurant, leaving the server and the dishwasher (who came up with the brilliant idea that the guy who's in charge of producing clean dishes is also the man wiping bodily fluids off the floor?!) to clean it up. Later that day, a couple of girls come in, and the manager seats them at the throw up table which is, by now, all cleaned up. Although I have to wonder if they didn't think "what is that terrible smell?!" when they sat down. And as I clean the table next to them, I think... if only they knew.