She has been asking for me to have lunch with her for a while. I've done this before and so again I packed up and went to lunch with Little Hoss and her little table of 5 year old cohorts. Little Hoss likes to show me off, just because I'm Dad. I'm her dad and therefore I am special. I have raised her right and I'm sure that her vision of me will ruin many relationships that she will have in the future. I am also ok with this because if they don't measure up to me then they can go suck a toe. I'm also trying to cut down on my cussing here and there, thus the "suck a toe" comment. I would prefer to say they can go suck a dick, especially the mythical Chester and his stupid garage rock band, but I'm trying to be a better person. I will kill Chester though, if he ever shows up with his high school drop out friends and children from 4 different women.
I do enjoy going to lunch with Little Hoss. Not the food itself mind you, but just the experience. After 4 years of being surrounded by children, I find that I can very easily hold their attention with wild tales of my awesomeness and knowledge. This is probably why Little Hoss wants to show me off. I tell the 10 assorted children epic tales of me battling dragons in order to get the special unicorn. I tell them that I once met Darth Vadar and he said he was sorry for trying to hurt Luke. I tell them that this one time, when I was going to the moon, I had to fight off aliens in order to save the very same unicorn that I got from the dragon. It's not a very good unicorn, always finding itself in trouble.
I picked today to eat with my daughter because today was pizza day. I used to love pizza day when I was in school. School pizza was just awesome and I planned on indulging in a past favorite of mine. The limp nonexistent crust, the can like taste of the sauce, the government quality of the cheese, I was looking forward to it. My son was in his preschool class that he goes to twice a week and where I am also a legend. Little Hoss leads me through the lunch line, she's buying today.
She grabs me a tray and I get the pizza which looks a bit different than I remember, but no worries. I am also informed by my daughter and the lunch lady that I also have to choose a vegetable, it's school rules. I was aiming for the green beans but the lunch lady insisted on the hockey puck. She was quite pushy about it and I can only imagine that they have 5000 of these things in the back on a truck and are trying to off load them quickly. There is no way a kid is eating this thing so 100 bucks says that every parent that is having lunch at the school today gets this thing. I take it as my daughter gets the green beans and I'm a bit jealous.
We sit and I start talking to her friends. She is having a good time laughing with them as I tell them my stories. The pizza turns out to truly suck and is not even close to what I used to have. I'm a bit disappointed. Another childhood memory is destroyed. Lunch is almost over and the hockey puck remains on my plate, I don't want to eat this thing. I'm not even sure what it is. Then the kids tell me that the school rules is that I've got to finish everything on my plate. They are looking at me, at the puck, at me again. I get the feeling that this is the equivalent to eating worms on the playground. I have to be a role model, I get that. My actions will determine the actions of my children well past just tomorrow. I am adventurous. I am brave. I don't want to eat the puck.
But I have to. I cut into it and take a bite. Hmm, maybe not a worm, but defiantly something that a worm has spent some quality time in. The texture puts me off for a minute, it's like a burlap sack, and it takes me a while to identify the taste. Finally it hits me, it's a sweet potato hockey puck. It's got a very rough exterior that has baked a hard outer crust. I didn't know it was even possible to make a thing like this but apparently the laws of physics do not exist in the lunch room.
The kids look at me and I declare that my worm dirt is delicious and try to entice the kids to go back to the lunch line and have a second helping of warm orange sweet potato hockey puke. They believe my unicorn lies but this one they see right through. However, I choke it down to set the example and resist every urge in my body and purge myself of this lunch like some supermodel that just ate a cupcake.
Next up is recess where I have been informed I will be the "monster" and chase them. I can do monster. And after that, I plan on teaching the kids how to do the Star Trek Vulcan greeting. By the end of it I will have the kids telling their teachers Live Long and Prosper.
And stay away from orange hockey pucks.
Person lay I think the recipe for Hostee Twinkies has been changed since my childhood for I remember them tasting great ! And don't despair-lunchroom menus have changed since you were in school so your memory of pizza can stay intact... My best memory was the baked from scratch hamburger buns. The wonderfull smell of bread baking traveled all over the school by 8 a.m. And no it was not a private school. It was a public high school serving nearly 4,000 students.
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