Blog Wheel: A Trip to Waffle House

Gonna cut to the chase quick here because this shit is long. Earlier this month, Big Cat suggested I write a blog from multiple perspectives, so that's what we're going to do this week. There were a lot of solid suggestions. The topics that made the wheel this week are as follows:

- Vacation Cities

- Labor Day Plans

- Trip to Waffle House

- Backyard Games

- Air Travel

- Dates

- Wedding Gifts

- Owning a Pool

All those make sense, and could be written from the perspective of multiple demographics. Let's spin to see what we get.

Trip to Waffle House. I've always been a big fan of Waffle House. It's one of my favorite places to feel unsafe while I eat my breakfast.

My original plan was to do John Rich (wealthy version of me), John Poor (poor version of me), and Juan Rico (Mexican version of me). However, I was afraid Juan Rico would be problematic, so I had to pivot. My full name is John Dubach Rich, so for my third perspective, I'm going to go with Jean Dubois Rich (French version of me). I think I'll be ok making fun of France. It is all in good fun, France. I love your wine. 

There's a lot of different directions I could take this. The easy thing to do would be to write 3 separate short stories about how each version of John Rich experiences a Waffle House. However, because I have to make things difficult for myself, I am going to write 1 long story that involves all 3 characters and weave them all together in a way that is funny (hopefully). This one is probably going to take me while.

John Rich takes a trip to a Waffle House

A couple months back, I visited my family in Columbus, Ohio. They have a nice little summer home on the 12th green of Muirfield Village Golf Club. Muirfield was hosting a PGA Tour event that weekend (The Memorial), so we invited our friendly neighbor Urban Meyer over to enjoy some golf and talk about the importance of family. But before Urban came over, I had to fulfill a craving. Every time I go back to Ohio, I make a solo trip to the Waffle House. 

So I took a Xanax, got in my Lamborghini full of treasure, and drove to the inner city. Everyone knows the best Waffle Houses are in the worst areas of town. Plus, the Xanax I took that morning was my last one, and if I didn't get more within a few hours I was going to lose my fucking mind. They always sell drugs outside of the Waffle House.

I parked my Lamborghini across 3 spaces in the parking lot. I opened and closed my automatic suicide doors over and over again to let the locals know I was looking for drugs. Within minutes, an employee with the posture of a crack spoon sauntered up to my vehicle.

Employee: "I see you're looking for drugs. What do you need."

Me: "Xanax, a lot of it."

Employee: "You're in luck, I have a huge bag a Xanax right here."

Me: "Perfect, do you mind if I pay you in treasure?" 

Employee: "I prefer treasure"

Me: "Terrific. Thank you."

I kindly exchanged my treasure for drugs, honked my horn 5 times as a thank you, and went into the Waffle House. 

Whenever I go to Waffle House I like to order one of everything on the menu and have a single bite of each item. Unfortunately, the cook who I had just bought drugs from was on a well deserved cigarette break, so I would have to wait. Luckily, I had just taken a handful of Xanax, so I sat in silence and stared at a wall without a single thought in my head for a full hour. 

After an hour, I had forgotten that I was even in a Waffle House. I looked to my right and saw an open grill, so I took it upon myself to make a delicious breakfast. I turned the stove on full blast to warm it up, and grabbed some steak and eggs out of the fridge. I cracked 12 eggs, put 3 T-bone steaks on the grill, and watched them cook. The fire was relaxing to look at, and the heat from the flames felt like a nice warm blanket. I was so comfortable that I didn't bother taking the food off the grill. I just stood there and enjoyed the warmth. I become intoxicated with the flames as I watched them reach the ceiling. Fire is such a crazy thing. It was one of the first inventions. Imagine being the first caveman to discover fire. They must have been so excited. I'm sure they didn't even know what to do with it at first other than enjoy the heat. It must have been a while before they learned how to cook with it.

While I was thinking about fire, a Waffle House employee came sprinting into my home. It was the nice man I had bought drugs from an hour ago. I thanked him for the drugs again, but he rudely dismissed me. He filled up a pitcher full of water. "Ah, I bet that's for the flames." I thought to myself, "This guy is smart."

He quickly dumped the pitcher of water onto the beautiful flaming stove and--

John Poor

It was Sunday morning, I had just been released from prison the night before. I spent 7 years at the Marion Correctional Facility for assaulting a police horse. Seeing as my household (me, my ex-wife, and our 4 children) had a total of $248 dollars between us, I needed to get back to my job at Waffle House immediately. I was excited to return to work. Minimum wage had increased over a dollar since I went to prison, and Waffle House gives a raise to all employees after their first felony. I was finally making double digits per hour. My ex-wife had left a half-smoked Newport Red on the window sill, and I found an enormous bag of Xanax in my cool son's bedroom drawer. My day was off to a perfect start. I put on my most grease stained Waffle House uniform and walked to work. 

I arrived to work dripping in sweat after a 90 minute walk down the highway. I live a long way from the Waffle House. It was a busy Sunday morning, so I got right on the grill. It felt good to be back. After 30 minutes of cooking up some breakfast, it was time for my first cigarette break. I didn't have any cigarettes on me, so I decided I would rob the gas station across the street. However, before I could get there, I noticed a man opening and closing the suicide doors of his Lamborghini, which of course means, "I'm looking for drugs". I traded the man my son's bag of Xanax for a handful of rubies and pearls. Now that I had some treasure, I decided against robbing the gas station across the street, and went to the pawn shop next door.

I cut everyone in line, walked straight to the front counter, and shoved my treasure in the employees face. The man gave me a scared look as he grabbed my treasure. He walked to the back of the store and whispered something to his manager. Then they opened a secret panel in the floor, and took the treasure into a secret basement. I waited over 10 minutes for them to come back. Music started to play over the loudspeakers and a mosh pit formed behind me. I couldn't tell what was happening. Were they upset about the wait? Or is something foreign going on? Either way, the scene in the pawn shop was starting to get out of hand, so I hopped the counter and went down into the secret basement. 

As I descended into the basement, I heard some whispers and the squawk of a parrot. To my surprise, when I got to the bottom, I saw the 2 shop owners talking to a real life pirate. The pirate told me he was a direct descendent of the Great Blackbeard, himself. In the early 1700's, Blackbeard and his merry men pillaged their way through the state of Ohio. While they we're here, they misplaced a treasure chest. A rich man found the treasure buried behind a Raising Cane's a few years ago, and the Blackbeard family has been trying to find him ever since. They knew I had given them Blackbeard's treasure. The pirate asked me if I knew where to find the man who gave it to me, and I told him he was at the Waffle House.

The pirate sprung into action. He walked into the dark part of the basement, and emerged with 2 cannons.

Me: "Pirate, what are you going to do with those cannons."

Pirate: "Arghh, we're attacking thee Waffle House"

Me: "I think the guy is just sitting inside why don't we just go talk to him?"

Pirate: "Arghh, if we're going to do this, were going to do this thee right way. Now help me find thee cannonballs"

I didn't understand his methods, but who am I to tell a pirate not to fire his cannons. Unfortunately, the basement was dimly lit, and we couldn't find the cannonballs anywhere. The people upstairs were getting rowdier. It felt like a mixture of a rock concert & and an earthquake. I urged the pirate to abandon his cannons and leave the basement, but he was having none of it. 

We eventually found the cannon balls and started loading the cannons. The ceiling of the basement was starting to cave in. What could be happening upstairs? As we prepared for fire, the ceiling collapsed on top of us. We were fully trapped in the basement. Still, the pirate was undeterred. He was going to blast us out with his cannons. He lit the cannon and fired a cannonball through the rubble. Then he fired another one. Then another one. We were starting to make some progress. I could tell we were close to breaking through, but we only had a single cannonball left. I held the pirate's hand as he lit the cannon. The cannonball shot through the rubble creating a hole that was barely big enough for me to crawl through. As I crawled through the hole, I heard a massive explosion, and thick black smoke filled the air. Suddenly the pawn shop was on fire. I crawled underneath the smoke and through the flames. I looked behind me to see if the pirate was ok, but he was too fat to fit through the hole. It was too late for him. He handed me his parrot, we said a tearful goodbye, and I escaped to safety. 

As I made my way back to work to finish my shift, I noticed that the gas station next door to the pawn shop was on fire. There must have been some sort of explosion that carried over to the pawn shop. When I got to the parking lot of the Waffle House, people started pouring out of the restaurant, and smoke was coming out of the doors. The Waffle House was on fire too! 

"Someone on drugs must have taken over the grill", I thought to myself, "What better way to redeem myself after a 7 year stint in prison than to save the town Waffle House." 

I stopped, dropped, and rolled through the door. I made my way to the sink and filled a pitcher of water. It was my time to be a hero. I poured the water directly onto the flaming stove and--

Jean Dubois Rich

I had just moved to America from the Capitale de la Mode, Paris, France. I was able to save up money by moonlighting as a mime underneath the Eiffel Tower, and could finally afford to make the move. I arrived in America with nothing but my beret, a black and white striped sweater, a bicycle with a giant front wheel, a small gay dog, various fresh breads & cheeses in a woven basket, a carton of cigarettes, a bottle of wine, and a small rat that lives in my hat who gives me instructions on how to cook gourmet meals. 

It was my first morning in America, so I wanted to experience a traditional American breakfast. My Mexican friend Juan Rico told me the first place I need to go is Waffle House. 

As walked Frenchly towards the Waffle House, I suddenly realized that I didn't have any money. I had spent all of it on romance novels when I arrived at the airport. So I did what I always do when I'm out of money, I started to mime. I did my signature, trapped in a box, escape from the box, pull a rope, then lose my umbrella in the wind routine. Nobody stopped to give me money. Luckily, there was a pawn shop next door to the Waffle House. 

The pawn shop was busy with people selling their belongings for less cash than they're worth. The line was long, and it was being held up by a man at the counter trying to exchange a handful of gold doubloons for cash. I was originally going to pawn off my extra long cigarette handle, but then I had a better idea. I decided to mime for the people while they waited in line. I raised a French flag, played the French National Anthem over the loudspeaker, and began my routine.

Within minutes, I had made hundreds dollars. I was a hit. This part of town had never seen a mime before, and they were LOVING it. There were no employees at the counter, so people started robbing the cash register and giving the money directly to me. The crowd was going wild. The pawn shop turned into a Woodstock 99' situation. A gang of teens ripped a down pipe from the ceiling and water sprayed everywhere. When I tried to end my routine, everyone stomped their feet demanding an encore. The ground started to shake, then the walls began to crumble. I quickly grabbed my hat full of money and sprinted for the front door. As soon as I made it out of the building, the ceiling fully caved in on itself and the building collapsed.

On the bright side, I had made nearly $10,000 miming. I was going to eat at Waffle House like a king. As I walked to the Waffle House, a cannonball flew out of pawn shop and landed on a gas pump. There was a massive explosion. I had never had a performance get that out of hand. Still, I needed some breakfast. I entered the Waffle House and saw a man in the finest clothes cooking on the grill. He looked nothing like what I expected from a Waffle House employee. He was standing there staring at a massive pile of overcooked steak and eggs. I took a seat at the counter and watched him for a minute. Soon the food began to burn, and flames rose from the grill up to the ceiling. What a day for fire. I tried to put out the flames with an imaginary fire extinguisher, but it did nothing. Everyone in the restaurant evacuated except for myself, and the man on the grill. The man on the grill was still just standing there, when suddenly, a Waffle House employee came sprinting through the front door. He ran over to the sink and filled a pitcher with water. In France, pouring water on a grease fire causes an explosion, but I wasn't sure how things worked here in America, so I let him do his thing. He dumped the pitcher of water onto the grill and BOOM! There was an explosion. The explosion blasted all 3 of us through the front window of the Waffle House, and onto the street.

I managed to get to my feet. Somehow I survived the explosion. The two other men who were inside the Waffle House were laying dead on the ground next to me. The well-dressed man who started the fire had a fancy looking car key hanging out of his pocket. I knew it had to be for the Lamborghini parked out front. I quickly sprung into action. The flames hadn't yet reached the car. I stole the keys out of the man's pocket, and hustled over to the Lambo. I opened the automatic suicide doors, hopped in the front seat, closed the automatic suicide doors, and drove away to safety. I had made $10,000, and acquired a Lamborghini full of treasure. It was a successful trip to the Waffle House, and a great start to my time in America.

The End.

Note: If you couldn't tell, I wrote the first half of this story and didn't know how to bring it all together, so I decided I would just blow everything up.  Not thrilled about the ending, but I gave it an honest effort.