I stood in line at McDonalds last night. I wanted a simple wrap and iced tea.

It was one of those Macs attached to a gas station and that is usually a bad sign.

I counted at least seven employees including the very large and slovenly (sorry, but she was both) manager and quickly noticed the disorder, disarray, and rather disgusting filth behind the counter. Granted, space was tight, but the view was one I am much more accustomed to seeing at, well, a Burger King.

I also noted that this particular establishment did not have any foreign-looking or foreign-sounding employees as is the case often. They was all home-growed (except for maybe the younger girl on the grill).

My bill was a bit over five bucks and I handed over a twenty. I usually use plastic as it is quicker and easier for me. The girl who took my order also took the twenty and opened the cash drawer.   She said she needed singles and mentioned this to another employee who went toward the back (to get the singles I assumed). So I waited for what should only be a moment or two. Right?

Next I stepped aside so that the girl at the register could take the next order. As I watched I could not help but listen to the two “ladies” behind me.

“So he said ‘fuck it’” the one said in only slightly hushed tones. “So I called and couldn’t believe it. He said ‘f u’ and hung up.” And so the adult conversation proceeded along similar lines.

I took a quick glance and, sure enough, the attire matched the vernacular. Is it the same to pre-judge and assume how someone is going to talk based upon the way they look as it is to pre-judge how someone is going to look based upon the way they talk? In any event, the pre-judgments lined up fairly well in my biased, prejudiced, profiling mind.

Both were dressed for the cooler weather else I was sure I would have noted some classy tats as well.

Meanwhile it was getting on toward several minutes having ticked away and no one had returned with singles for the cash drawer. The girl at the register neither went to look for the lost courier nor managed to take the next order which was, of course, the lovely ladies in line behind me.

“Do you need singles?” asked the more neatly-attired one of the two ladies. “How many do you need?”

“That’s okay, I need more for my drawer” responded the friendly though clueless employee as she seemingly managed to guess that the lady was offering to trade singles for a larger bill. Y’know, just to get things moving along.

During this I noted how many people were waiting for their orders. I also noted as the large manager ambled out and seemed intent on locating some missing keys while all the world about her screamed chaos. Good manager, thinks I. Wonder what I could do in my sleep to improve this franchise.

Still no change. Still the ladies chatted but now more about the fact that no one was taking their order. Not sure if they f-bombed the order talk or not.

About then I got my iced tea! I expected my wrap to be out at any minute so left the tea on the counter. I had ordered the chicken grilled after all and I know that usually takes a little longer than crispying it up.

Now it is past five minutes (that’s 300 seconds) since I placed my complicated order. I looked at the clock and while I was sure when I entered the place that I would have ample time to make it back to the field and my son’s baseball game I was then beginning to get a bit concerned.

Finally the manager seems to rouse from her hibernation and goes to help retrieve the George Washingtons so badly needed at the only manned register (of the three there). Seven employees- two are cooking, one standing helplessly and hopelessly at her open-drawer register, one working the drive through, and one delivering overdue orders to the many people waiting around. This is good, thinks I.

Back ambles the manager with the bills! Hurray! thinks I. She takes care of the money-hungry cash drawer while finally (!) asking if the register girl had taken the next order. When the girl cheerfully responds in the negative and mumbles some excuse as to why not the manager, obviously a top-notch trainer of men and women alike, mumbles something in return. Mumbling before me; f-bombing back behind. Caught in the middle is I.

So now the society women behind me can finally place their (rather large) order. Hurray for them! And I finally have my change- after they re-figure it that is. So hurray as well for me!

I also now see the manager ambling back (did I mention that she really should have worked a bit more on tucking in her greasy shirt?) to the counter to check on orders.

During this the sweet-looking young drive-through girl comes over to make a shake. She grabs a can of whipped cream and fills up the cup nicely though I did note how there was less shake and more cream. Cost-cutting there Mr. Big Mac? Anyhow, she jams the can of whipper, upside down, back into the quite filthy plastic receptacle that it came from. Though she tries carefully the angle at which she is forced to tong and retrieve a cherry is a bad one and she manages to drop a couple into some receptacle on a lower shelf. Wonder what is in there, I wonders. Cherries no doubt, I responds.

Oh oh oh. Did I mention that while waiting for my change a woman had returned to the counter and asked for some ketchup for her to-go order? Well she did and register girl obliges generously and dumps maybe twenty packets into the opened bag. I’m thinking it might have been better for her to offer 3-4 packets, confirm that that was enough, and then handed them to the woman but I guess burying the defenseless fries, in the bag, in unopened ketchup packets was the training she received. I suppose it was a better approach then pumping a bunch of ketchup from a large bottle directly into the customer’s bag. Not my problem I realizes but, notes I, the stone-faced customer receives the Halloween-like dumpage of ketchup packets into her bag without comment and turns and leaves without a word and, quite possibly, without much of a pulse. Kinda reminds me of Charlie Brown getting a bunch of rocks with the only difference being the missing “thank you (for blindly dumping an avalanche of unopened ketchup packets into my bag, register girl).”

Correction. I cannot absolutely say that I know for sure that all of the packets were unopened.

Where was I? (Sorry, longer story than I remembered).

Oh yeah.

So I finally (!) see a wrap get passed to the front from the back and the manager takes it and places it on a tray. Yikes go I. Did I mention I had ordered it to go?

Oh, I forgot. As I was calmly surveying all of this action, or, rather, inaction, I took a welcomed sip of my iced tea through the straw. (By the way, why was there a straw in it already? I don’t want to think of the possibilities…) And guess what? It was sweet tea!

Did I mention I had ordered my now no longer welcomed iced tea to be UNsweetened?

So over comes my wrap and I have to tell the manager that my order was to-go. With a somewhat frustrated, but also resigned, look on her face she turns and goes to lose the tray and get a bag.

Somewhere in here I told the manager about the tea. She starts to look a bit unhappy as if maybe I am causing too many problems for her.

So she returns to the counter with the bag but just as she hands it to me someone must have said something because, without a word to me, and as my empty hand reached out, she turns and leaves the frickin’ counter! (That one is for you, classy ladies). She goes back to the “prep area” (?) and takes the wrap OUT of the bag, to look at it. She places it back in the bag and then walks it over to some waiting, starving customer and what seemed a minor apology. Or maybe she just burped.

“Check your drink!” I wanted to yell to the customer.

But of course I was better behaved than that because my mama taught me some manners that stuck.

Miss manager returns to the prep area and tells the kitchen folk that she needs another wrap and explains what kind she needs. Still no word to me.

Seems like it must be going on about half an hour by now, eh wot? Seemed that way to me too but we were probably just over ten minutes at this point. Be patient, advises I to myself.

Register girl is back to taking orders- from the person now AFTER the classy ladies.

At around this point Miss Manager ambles over with my new and improved iced tea! After she confirms that it is unsweetened and that it is for me (could she have forgotten me so soon? Guess I should learn to raise more of a fuss in such situations- y’know, to gets remembered). No need to worry that her greasy shirt or likely dirty hands would touch my new and improved straw because this time there was no straw! New, improved, wrapped, or unwrapped. None. I mumble something and then just reach over to my old and unwanted sweetened tea which was never removed from the counter and retrieve my old straw. I jam it into my new and improved iced tea as if I am stabbing something. Or someone.

I notice at this time that another customer, a pleasant-looking chap in his twenties, is standing back and looking on to the scene with a look that is hard to describe. Not smiling, but maybe thinking he should. The shorter and less-better-dressed of the classy ladies now engages me in conversation as I relate the series of events to her and, also, as I am not speaking softly, to the obvious interest of the pleasant-looking young man who is waiting to either deliver or receive his order. Though gruff and without a ton of oratorical class she does seem a bit sympathetic. That is until they bring out here and her friend’s food on a tray. Looks good. Smells good. And poof she is off.

“Enjoy your meal” I offer to the contrail. This time pleasant-man manages a wry smile.

Where are we at- maybe twelve or more minutes now? Game starts real, real soon folks!

Let’s see- got my change and got the real deal iced tea, with a straw. Now just need my food.

So then lo and beholden before I know what happens the wrap is finally done, handed over, bagged and given to me with nary a word- no apology, no excuse, no “have a happy life”, no “thank you sir, please do visit us again.” Nothin. They just move on to their next adventure with their next victim, er, customer.

I leave but not without one final contact. Outside of the fine establishment I note the better-dressed classy lassie on her cell phone, still issuing stinging invectives to whoever is fortunate to be on the other end of the wireless.

Oh, and I almost get run over by the Big Mac 18-wheeler as it barrels through the tiny parking lot and then, as I enjoy my tasty wrap, a good bit of it squishes out and lands on my pants. Oh yeah, it is time to get to the game with my attitude damaged but not destroyed. Same story for my jeans.

So there it is, a snapshot of America and what we have become or are continuing to become.

The service, the attentiveness, the self-respectful attire, the cultured language and communication skills, the civility, the general state of things that are as they are or are all too soon becoming.

It’s a fade route and then the final tally to lock down the final score.

Game over man. We lost.