First of all, if five-year-old Kyle knew that someday he would live two blocks from a McDonald’s, he would have reacted just like this. But then I saw Super Size Me and it totally ruined everything–I now allow myself a Big Mac once a month. I could eat them every day.
Anyway, I’m walking home after picking up family dinner at McDonald’s tonight, a situation that has literally NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE, but Corinne was desperately hungry and didn’t feel like ordering from the falafel place that we usually go to when she’s desperately hungry. So I’ve got my big bag of food and my other bag of drinks, and I’m feeling pretty good about things. I’m a provider, I’m thinking. I work hard, and I keep my family fed. Like a dad should.
I get home and lay out our high-calorie spread. It’s Ada’s first Happy Meal, so we marvel at how adorable the tiny fry carton is, how sensible the apple slices are. Corinne suppresses her gag reflex over Ada’s McNuggets, opens her Chicken Selects, and we tuck into our food.
Only Ada won’t eat anything. Not fries, not McNuggets, not apples, not anything. She only drank half her chocolate milk! We were confounded. Billions of dollars in R&D and consumer research have been spent to scientifically guarantee that children will like Happy Meals, and she won’t eat it. She’s flying in the face of decades of science!
Guess that was our first and last family meal from McDonald’s. I suppose that’s fine. But, they did just install a new soda dispenser that lets you use a touchscreen menu to add in syrups and flavoring. Pick from the 34 base drinks, and then add orange, cherry, strawberry, raspberry, lemon/lime, or whatever else. There’s gotta be at least a couple hundred drink options.
(Word of caution re. Raspberry Coke Zero: don’t do it.)
We broke my 10 year no McDonalds streak. Here’s hoping for at least another ten…
I’m a sucker for McDonald’s cheeseburgers. I feel like Jughead when I eat ‘em. But I only allow myself McD’s when I’m at the airport. It’s tradition.
Mindy is not a fan.
I once went 8 years sans Arby’s , but those were extenuating/projectile circumstances. Pretty sure there is something in our genetic sequence that draws us to the golden arches. Or it’s cocaine.