#49fridays

Worry? Why let myself worry? Wondering what in the world did I do? I'm crazy for tryin'... written by Willie Nelson who I'm pretty sure was not writing about Waffle Houses... and recorded by Patsy Cline in one take

According to the internets there are currently 1,891 Waffle Houses scattered across the country (well…26 states of it anyway). 493 of them are in my home state of Georgia. 'Round here we are literally smothered with 'em. And it seems a good many of them are scattered within a half hour drive of my house. Surely I can cover one a week and provide a thoughtful, intelligent, well-crafted review of a different one. Each. Week. For. A. Year.

One way to look at this is that by the time next year rolls around I will have ONLY reviewed 2.6% of all of the possible Waffle Houses out there. It seems more less daunting that way. And I'm not sure how all of this Waffle House reviewing will square with my goal to drop 3/4 pound a month for 2014 or how cheese grits really fit into my resolve to eat more like I'm on the Mediterranean Diet (note to volleyball officials- if you see someone eating hummus, carrots and olives in the work room between matches it might be me). At least until I succumb to the pizza when it's offered.

Which I already did during last week's tournament (first of the year- this Mediterranean Diet thing may not work out). 

But it's a big world and there's a LOT of Waffle Houses in it- so let's get started:

Waffle House #1000

Located in Avondale Estates and a stone's throw from the original Waffle House (and maybe 10-15 throws from my office) ...

...wait, how far IS a stone's throw? Are we talking about when I was young and could pitch a stone clear down the railroad tracks so far you almost couldn't see it land? Or are we talking about how far I can throw it NOW, roughly as far as a pair of VERY near-sighted eyes not wearing glasses can see?

But we were talking about Waffle House #1000.

The picture you see above is the $5 menu which A Handy Man (it says so right on his business card) and I eat from almost every Tuesday. It's an extraordinary deal and we can get out the door for $10 plus tax if the aforementioned doesn't add a bunch of extras to his hash browns (see my analysis of Waffle House gravy in an October 2013 post). Plus tip. 

That tip can be expensive because we sit a LONG time and drink a LOT of coffee. So much time that our tip represents what would normally be considered a rental fee on the booth. Suddenly $10 turns into a minimum of $15+. Like I said- we rent the booth.

What in the heck do we spend all that time talking about? Well, what do any two people talk about who have known each other for over 30 years, watched each other's kids grow up, have roughly the same political views (I'm the more reasonable one...just ask me), have generally the same sense of what's right and wrong with the world, have somewhat similar religious notions, and are fans of musical comedy and take to singing show tunes when they have had too much holiday egg nog?  

Well, there are a couple of significant differences. A Handy Man will go see any production of The Sound of Music or A Music Man or Cats no matter how tired and shop worn  the production may be. And he'll say it's great. Me? I'm a little more particular. I recently walked out of the musical Ghost  at halftime intermission in protest over yet another production culled from a popular movie with generic pop music and horrible writing masquerading as a Broadway musical...after paying good money for those tickets.

In fairness I was egged on by my wife.

On the other hand, A Handy Man has snored his way through more productions of Samuel Beckett, William Shakespeare, and Harold hallowed-be-his-name Pinter than any 10 people I know  maybe anyone who has ever existed in our current time-space continuum.  Me? I try to stay tortuously awake out of some sort of misguided allegiance to the actors and the director who thought he or she was making...art.

But we were talking about Waffle House #1000.

Decent people who have worked there a while. Basic Waffle House food prepared pretty decently most of the time. Occasionally sanitary restrooms. A very friendly guy who is the manager. They always forget that we don't drink cream in our coffee. Nobody calls us "sweetie" or "hon". But they let me substitute wheat toast for the biscuit on the $5 Sausage, Egg, and Cheese Grits Bowl and that counts for something.