Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

So I guess I’m now cooking Christmas dinner for my parents. Our plans for Christmas had been to go to the Ramada buffet on Christmas day. If you know me, you know I HATE buffets, but was willing to endure the so-so food to make my parents happy. Although it was quite festive last year watching children play in the “oh so classy” chocolate fondue fountain. But my dad called tonight and said that he couldn’t make reservations because the Ramada will not be open this year because of some management problems. He said not to worry that we would find somewhere else to go. And then he uttered a statement that I swear stopped my heart. He said, “There’s always Golden Coral.”
Now, to understand why this sends shivers down my spine, we must rewind back to last Thanksgiving…

Last Thanksgiving my family (me, my mom, and my dad) were supposed to go to my aunt’s house for dinner. At the last minute my mom got sick, and my dad didn’t want to go that far. He suggested the two of us go out to eat instead, “Golden Coral is open,” he said. As much as I hated the thought, I went because I knew that’s what he wanted to do. I had no idea how bad it would actually be. Let me start by saying normal families do not go to Golden Coral on Thanksgiving. If your family was there, I’m not apologizing. Just face it, you’re not normal. Anyway, I digress. I honestly do not know where they found the people to populate the restaurant on this particular day. Possibly a bus traveled into the past to the old “Let’s Make a Deal” television show and Monty Hall opened up door #3 and announced “Road trip for everyone!”

For example, as I walked up to get my salad (which is about all I can stomach at a buffet) I came upon a woman in a jumper. Now there’s nothing too out of the ordinary about a woman in a jumper, except this woman was not wearing a shirt under this jumper. It was 20 degrees outside and this woman was wearing a plaid jumper with no shirt. Oh, and there was the bow tie. Yes, she had on a plaid jumper with no shirt and a black bowtie.

The best though was what happened to be sitting right in front of me. Sitting in front of me was a woman, or what I thought was a woman until he/she turned around. This person had on an orange vest, a bright, florescent orange vest. As if the vest wasn’t blinding enough in its natural state, when the man stood up, the vest had been bedazzled with “Jesus Loves You, " across the back. A bedazzled Jesus vest. I could die. I had now seen everything there was to see. Well, that's what I thought until he (I was pretty sure it was a he at that point) put on the hat. Yes, there was a hat. It was black felt with a wide brim. And there were streamers. Like the streamers attached the end of a little girl’s bicycle handlebars, there were red and blue streamers adorning this hat. The hat on the head of the man in the bedazzled Jesus vest.

So, as soon as my dad blurted those two most dreaded words, I swear I had a vision of sitting there on Christmas Day, walking to the buffet, and drowning myself in the large vat of orange jello with pineapple chunks.
I couldn’t let it happen. No more holiday atrocities. I immediately offered to make dinner. Dad did try to protest, but I said that my mom had never seen my house, and they should just come over here. It would be NO problem for me to make dinner. Anyway, I like to cook, and I will do anything, absolutely anything to never, ever, have to go to Golden Coral for any holiday again. Unless of course…it’s Halloween.