Driving With Idiots

I thought the only idiots that I had to deal with were drivers who left their furniture on the road, but I came across another idiot this evening.

When I heard a friend of mine was sick, I went to visit him to see how he was doing. He was doing fairly well, but a bit fatigued. He was getting ready to watch a couple of DVDs to pass the time away, so I joined him. Fear dot com was a waste of time. After that horrible movie, we both got hungry. Although I was willing to do a food run for the both of us, I wasn’t familiar with the area he lived in, and I wasn’t going to go out by myself at 9:30PM (three hours earlier, I would have had no problem), so I dragged him along for navigational purposes. He suggested we go to In-n-Out. He warned me that In-n-Out has the longest lines for drive-thru service, but I didn’t mind. I don’t usually go to In-n-Out, so their service and their food would be a first for me. While we waited in line, we discussed the menu and how to pay when we noticed that the car in front of us passed the speaker for ordering.

My friend said, “Don’t pull up too close. If he realizes that he didn’t order, then he might want to pull back.”

“True,” I nodded. I stayed my car well behind the driver of the red Acura to give him room to reverse if he needed.

A couple minutes passed and he continued through with the queue.

“Did he order? I don’t think he ordered,” I said.

My friend only shrugged. If he didn’t worry, I wasn’t going to worry. I pulled up to the speaker and I placed our order for one cheeseburger, a 3x3 animal style, and a medium Dr. Pepper. Our total was given, and we proceeded through the line.

Suddenly, I began to muse about the driver of the Acura. “What if the cashier gives him our food? That, or we’ll end up waiting in line longer because he’ll end up ordering at the window and they have to prepare his food, you know?” Yatta, yatta, yatta.

“No, they would make him pull aside. Besides, they know from your voice that a girl ordered," he pointed out to me. Then he added, "How can he forget to order anyway?”

When the driver of the Acura approached the window, we watched while there was an ordinary transaction of food and money. I watched the driver as he nodded and paid for the items simply and without complaints. It appeared that everything was in order and he drove off. I slowly approached the window, with money in hand. The employee poked his head out the window with a paper bag ready to go, but he had a suspicious look on his face. He hesitantly asked me, “Did you order the double-double with ketchup... and fries…?”

“No?” I replied, like a question. “I had a cheeseburger, a 3x3 animal style, and a medium Dr. Pepper.”

The employee’s jaw dropped and looked out to the street for the driver of the Acura. “I can’t believe that guy. He said that was his order.”

“What?” My jaw dropped. “He said that was his order?”

“Did he order?” the employee asked. “I didn’t think he ordered.”

“No,” I nearly laughed. My friend was laughing, too. “He never made it to the speaker.”

The employee, seeing as we were not upset about it, smiled, quickly apologized, and immediately got started on our order. From the conversation of the window employee with his other co-workers, it seemed that the driver of the Acura confirmed that the cheeseburger, the 3x3 animal style, and the Dr. Pepper was, in fact, his order. He even paid its full total of $6.52.

I turned to my friend. “He said it was his order,” I said. “How can you go up to the window and say it was yours when you never ordered?”

“How can he pass the speaker?” he laughed. “It has a big stop sign on it.”

“I know! It should have a different sign on it, like ‘Step One: Place Order Here.’”

“Stupid.”

So, not only did the cashier give our order to the driver before us, but my friend and I ended up waiting for our order to be prepared. When our food came (pretty quick, too), the employee confirmed our items. I smiled and nodded that it was our order. We paid him and went on our merry way. My friend and I had a good laugh on the way back home. Burgers were good, too.

Dear readers, beware of idiotic drivers who leave furniture on the freeway and stupid lying drivers who don’t know what to do at the drive-thru.