Greasy Spoon

I came home late Saturday night from New Zealand and, after looking in on the beautiful faces of my boys, fell into a deep Ambien induced sleep. 

The next morning, jetlag woke me up before Elijah and Luca.  I couldn’t wait to see the looks on their faces when they saw me in bed next to their mom. 

At long last, I heard them creep in and I faced them, wide-eyed and happy.

“Hey guys,” I yell/whispered.  “I’m back!”

“Dada, can we go watch TV?”

Yeah, it was business as usual.  My number one goal Sunday was to let Diana sleep.  Let her sleep as long as she wanted.  All day.  All night.  For weeks and weeks.  Like sleeping beauty, but with Target sweat pants instead of that blue gown.

After a few cartoons, I suggested we three go out to breakfast.  I’d been wanting this to be our Sunday morning tradition ever since I decided to rip the idea off from my co-worker Jimmy.

The boys were game.  So I looked up “Evanston Breakfast” on the Google machine and looked at a few reviews.  I decided on the one with the most references of “Hangover.”

We drove across town and ended up in front of a dilapidated brick building.  The parking lot was empty expect a police car.  But cops know their omelets, so we went in. 

We took a seat next to the aforementioned officer and he greeted us with a hearty hello.  Luca could not believe it.  A police officer.  A real, live police officer. Speaking.  To him.  He stared at his paper napkin in shock.

The waitress broke the spell by asked what they wanted to eat.  They ordered pancakes.  They ordered eggs.  They ordered bacon.  Lots of bacon.  I though, holy cow, these kids have finally lost their picky eater syndrome.  I sadly ordered a veggie egg white omelet (on the cop’s recommendation).

The food arrived and it quickly dawned on me that the boys had not lost their picky eater syndrome.  They just liked to order food.  They did not touch a thing.  With the exception of the plate of bacon, which they wolfed down like animals.

Looking at the table of uneaten food, the restaurant suddenly got very small.  The owner came by and asked if we didn’t like our food.  He seemed genuinely hurt.

I said, “No!  We love it.  Yum yum yum!”  And I began jamming my fork into the boy’s plate and crammed the contents into my mouth.

My stomach distended, we paid our bill and went home.  We spent the rest of the day playing laughing and rolling around on my round belly.

It’s good to be back.