Sometimes when driving from point to point, from race to race, from hither and yon, I personally need fuel as much as my car does. So into the land of fast food chains I ride.
Most recently, I was thwarted at a number of places on my drive back from Carolina to Florida. Every exit I took seemed to be the land of misfit drivers, a parallel universe wherein the worst of the worst drivers lived. And whoever designed the exit ramp and roadside off/on restaurants must have been heavily influenced by Ivo Shandor or MC Escher as nobody should have built them like this. At least three times I got off the interstate only to be unable to find a way IN to ANY fast food establishment, let alone to place an order to fill my belly so I could carry on the drive.
Eventually, proverbial tail tucked between my legs and stomach growling, I pulled into a McDonald’s. It may be lingering memories of SUPER SIZE ME or just general vibes but McDonald’s is rarely if ever my top pick. Occasionally I’ll go for it at an airport or actually their dollar ice cream cones aren’t a bad cheap dessert when in need. Full disclosure, I recently had a Grilled Snack Wrap at the Boston airport McDonald’s and it was pretty good so I thought, well, hell… at least I can get to the place relatively easily and with minimal attempts to be mowed down by lackadaisical drivers.
Big mistake.
I thought, hey, that Snack Wrap was good and I really don’t want anything heavy here … so I ordered one of those along with a large soda (as it’s a $1 for any size drink at Macca’s… meaning, really, why WOULDN’T I order the large?).
Ya know that internet hoax/reality of fast food joints using pink slime in their chicken nuggets? It was kinda like that… the grilled chicken felt… gristly? Slimy? Tough? It was a lousy “meal” and did little more than serve as a distressing stopgap fueling effort. This is no way to prep one for a race the next morning…. and yet that’s what I did.
I regret it though. Oh, how I regret it. Sometimes you get the food you deserve. Sometimes you should demand better.
This was one such case.
So if you find yourself in Santee, SC at a crossroads, both physically at Highway 6 and I-95 and spiritually at a point of hunger, do yourself a favor and skip McDonald’s 6081.
And I know I’ve discussed this apocryphal misquote before but we’ll just stick with it as coming from The British Bulldog:
