Why do they make it delicious? Why would a young girl with innocent red pigtails use her freckled mug to sell something so delicious, so addictive, and so effectively lethal?
It is a Wendy's on Fulton St. and Nassau in the Financial District. I stop there sometimes after work if I am feeling low, ostensibly to cheer myself up if the workday didn't go so well. This is a lie that I tell myself. Nothing here could cheer anyone up, aside from the occasional drunk that has had to pee for three days and managed to sneak into the rest room (I use that term because people do, in fact, rest there. Sometimes for extended periods).
The local crackheads make it their business to keep at least two guys on duty there on six hour shifts, occasionally asking diners for change but mostly just sitting there ensuring that the whole place smells like human waste.
There are six tables for me to choose from. The downstairs and upstairs dining room are always roped off. I believe it is to lend these areas a air of exclusivity, like there will eventually be a man with a filthy suit on, only letting in the vagrants that have the right connections . My first instinct was that it's a device to keep these room from needing regular cleaning, but that kind of thing isn't really emphasized here.
I can't get it 'to go' because I don't want to be holding food on a crowded J train, with a white a paper bag advertise my puerile eating habits. Also, I got the Baconator, the double Baconator.... because I obviously came here to kill myself, and I should at least have the pleasure of consuming the agent of my demise while it is still warm and gooey rather than soggy and congealed.
As per usual, I made it about halfway through the delicious, repulsive, greasy ball of death before reflecting that I have made a grave error, and that these are not the actions of a man with reasons to live, nor of a man with loved ones. I have both, Ghost of Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's and community activist! What wicked group of chemicals did you synthesize that cause me to forget how lucky I've been???
Anyway, I finished the meal without school kids picking a fight with me, and took the train the whole way without my body punishing me for my terrible meal choice. It was kind enough to wait until I was home.
Pray for me, as I may not have long.
Teach your children to love green beans.
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