Worth it.

In this city there is a fast food joint best known for their hot dogs and Italian Beef sandwiches. What I love most about it is its super-efficient drive thru. It's manned by anywhere from five to a dozen workers all standing outside in the heat and cold, rain and snow. One takes your order, another puts a number under your windshield wiper. A third takes your money and gives you change right at your car, and another has your food ready. They can get dozens of cars through the line in a remarkably short period of time. In this land of terrible customer service, I sometimes like going through the drive thru just to see this process in action. It always makes me happy. Well almost always.

The exception to that rule is a day like today -- a grey, cold, cranky Friday -- when at 3:30 pm, after my second trip of the day to Home Depot, I had a fit of emotional eating and got into the drive thru line to order a large fries and a Coke. I do this very rarely; but am always a bit embarrassed when I do. I gave my order sheepishly and then heard it repeated back to me. "Large fries and a Coke?" "Yes," again, sheepishly. I gave the order to the next worker, "Just large fries and a Coke?" Yeah. (I began to think that maybe I should get out of line and go to the grocery store next door to get carrot sticks instead.) Then to the person with the money, "Large fries and a Coke?" Uh-huh. (I almost asked her to make it a Diet.) Finally, the person standing out in the cold with my order. "You are the one with the large fries and a Coke?" That's me. Hand it over.

Once I had run the gauntlet and had my sugar, caffeine, salt and fat safely in the relative privacy of my own vehicle, I took the first bites and immediately knew the truth: It was worth it.

Some days a girl just needs her fries.