Tuesday, February 03, 2009

Full of pancakes and exhausted.

Today I had what I originally thought was a brilliant idea: “I’ll take the girls to get that free Denny’s breakfast and won’t that be so much fun. A mommy-daughter date!”

So then I found myself standing in the snow outside of Denny’s, holding the 18-month-old, and trying to convince the 3-year-old that maybe we should go across the street to McDonald’s instead. But by that point she already had it in her mind that she wanted “pancakes at a restaurant.” (It was early afternoon and McDonald’s wasn’t serving pancakes at that point.)

To my relief, we got inside the restaurant about five minutes later. But then I looked and saw that there was yet another line that wrapped up and down next to the bar. The place was a zoo. It took 45 minutes before we were finally seated.

What was I thinking? Why on earth was I participating in Denny’s Feeds America?

Oh yeah. In addition to our “free” breakfast, we ordered hot chocolate and juice for Clara. Considering that, and the fact that I gave the server a humongous tip because I felt really bad for him and he was unbelievably patient, breakfast wasn’t even all that cheap.

I left the restaurant completely exhausted, with my back hurting from holding Clara so long, and my belly full of greasy bacon and pancakes.

When will I learn not to be baited and hooked by this “free” stuff?

Kevin had this “I told you so” look on his face, and a huge smile in his eyes, when I told him what I did. I told him I was NEVER going to do something like that again.

But then, as I was walking out of the room, I mentioned, “You know, maybe it would be kind of fun if it was just me and you, with no kids, or me with a girlfriend. Then we could talk while we waited in line.”

Yes. I’ll be a sucker for life.

6 comments:

Rose said...

Ha! I was so going to do this today, but then I imagined it exactly as you described: 'There will be a long line...I would still tip the waiter generously...the pancakes will be white flour...' We sat this one out.

JoMama said...

What's wrong with white flour? Are you racist or something?

Unknown said...

Ahh... I bet Meredith will always remember that pancake outing as a good memory. It sounded like an adventure! =)

Jen S said...

That is hilarious, Amy! Sounds just like something I would do, except that I've made a promise never to go to Denny's! ha ha

quizwedge said...

I actually got in rather quickly, but it's because I was a party of 1 and didn't mind sitting at the counter. At the Denny's I went to, they didn't make people that wanted to sit at the counter wait.

Rachelle said...

Mike and some friends from work thought they would be so smart and go at 11am. The line was out the door and they realized they would never make it back to work in time. Like Mike said, "Denny's raked it in with that promotion." Think of all those beverages sold.