Happy Birthday Gumball

I went to Magic Mountain last weekend. To celebrate my friend's 28th year of life. Because where else do you want to go when you turn 28? Disneyland? Well....Maybe. But Disneyland doesn't have that thrill that Magic Mountain does of possibly getting into a gang fight. Nor does Disneyland have a ride that shoots flames past you in 90 degree weather. So, yah. .....I think I make my point.

It was a good day and there were definite highlights: the birthday boy standing in front of one of those mist-making things cooling off his face, and realizing a little too late that there was also a mist nozzle aimed right at his pants creating a distinct "I had an accident" look; the various poses of high-fives for our rollercoaster pictures; and, of course, the delicious fast food which only tastes that good when you pay $20 for it. I mean....right? You will savor each one of those nacho chips.

But possibly the best (or at least most memorable) moment of the day didn't happen at the park itself. It happened at the birthday dinner. At IHOP. Ah, IHOP. Nothing tops off a day at Magic Mountain like a trip to the International House of Pancakes. You sit down after walking around all day in the sun and are presented with pancake options from around the world! It is amazing.

Dinner (or breakfast?) was good, and we enjoyed our meal there, but it turns out we are evil and inconsiderate group patrons and we didn't even know it. Well, now we know it. We should've realized that IHOP does not hire mind-readers. Because at the end of the night when it came to splitting the check we, as IHOP novices I guess, were under the impression that we could take the check to the cashier (I mean c'mon, you take your check to a cashier) and each just tell him we wanted to pay for whatever it was that we ordered. Split it right there. Badda bing badda boom. But it's not like that. Or so our old comrade informed us when we attempted said splitting technique and he asked us with that look of "I hate you and the fact that you are in my IHOP" if we asked our waitress for separate checks and if we were then aware that our waitress wasn't a mind-reader. Which, to be honest, with his thick accent I was just impressed he knew the english words "mind-reader." We said no, we didn't ask for separate checks, apologized and then watched as he went through the arduous 3 minute process of dividing our totals in his little computer.

At the end of it all - right at the moment we're all looking for the toothpick dispenser and heading out the door - one of our number says "thanks for doing that" to the unhappy Sergey, and he responded: "I hope you learned your lesson." And he meant it. But it didn't end there (although it kind of did because we stopped listening). He continued to lecture us (yes, actually lecture like you would an errant child) that when you have a group come into a restaurant (ah-ha! So he hasn't mastered english quite yet. Or else he's using the term "restaurant" very loosely) after 4pm you can't expect the restaurant to just know that you will be paying separately, you have to let them know, blah blah blah. He was still talking as we walked out the door. Which was probably rude on our part to walk out on him but c'mon. We get it. You made it abundantly clear to us that you thought we were idiots already. And we apologized and thanked you for your trouble. You're still going to continue angrily lecturing us? ....yah.....we're gonna go. And by the way you need to refill your toothpick dispenser because it is empty. And that's just bad customer service.

I took away two things from our IHOP experience. Number one: before 4pm the waitresses at IHOP are mind readers. And number two: the strawberry banana pancakes there are delicious.
So really....win win. What a great day!