One Hour into Ohio

It takes about 12 hours to drive to Jonesboro from Pittsburgh unless you are under doctor's orders to get out of the car and walk every hour. I was feeling about as energetic as a wet noodle when we pulled into the McDonald's parking lot. I was going to just stand up near a bush Dogzilla could use but My Beloved suggested I take my walk into the McDonald's and get him a coffee while he had a cigarette.

So in I went and oh, the humanity! Being tired and in poor physical condition I think I was in a heightened state of sensitivity because what I found was McDonald's a la Fellini. Reeling from the shock of the brightly lit plastic environment my eyes fell upon two horribly disfigured children. The girls were in softball uniforms and I truly believed them to suffering from some dreadful birth defects only before my brain started to generate a differential diagnosis I realized they were just fat. Their deformity was adipose in nature. I looked away more disturbed by the sight than I think I would have been if they'd had two heads a piece.

I studied the floor carefully while I waited and eventually it was my turn. I stepped forward and raised my gaze to the cashier. I was in for another shock. Behind the cash register stood one of those painfully awkward boy-men. Very child like in appearance only tall and adorned with downy whiskers. To complete the effect he was sporting a 2 day old black eye. Before I could stagger back out to the car I received my change in the form of the dirtiest and most worn looking dollar bills I've ever seen that weren't just dug up from a tin in the back yard.