In N' Out

When the clock strikes noon at General Mills, the employees disappear faster than Winona Rider with an armful of stolen purses. It's as if a fire alarm is sounded throughout the factory and even the conveyor belts sense that operations will have to be put on hold for a time while personal mastication needs are satisfied. We become Maslow's ants and focus on our hunger needs to the exclusion of our financial ones.

I am more than a little proud to say that I am no different. Lunchtime is an almost sacred rite and bringing face to food, while always a priority, becomes an obsession at twelve noon.

One particular lunch break in the not too distant past, I was hungry but distracted as I ran over an old woman who works in the factory office on my way out the door. That morning, I had been thinking about my diet and wondering if regular visits to In n' Out Burger constituted good eating. I had frequented that fine burger establishment every one of the last three days and, while the thought of an Animal-Style Double-Double with a Flying Dutchman chaser was appetizing, I figured I owed my body better.

I wanted something healthy, something green, so I hopped into my car and sped down my town's main thoroughfare, scanning restaurant titles for the anti-burger.

As I drove, I pensed. Without the steady blare of General Mill's quality control operations to plague my thinking, my thoughts were actually fairly lucid. I thought about the elderly woman I had run over and the merits of spending hours a day in a smelly cereal factory. I considered the recent Cabinent shakeup in Japan and then, tired of thinking, I tuned into VH1 and relaxed to the gentle thump-thump of the latest pop hit.

Before I knew it, I was at a restaurant. I stepped out of my car and walked forward, my mind still thump-thumping. Then, just as I was about to step through the doors of the establishment and into the air conditioned comfort of modern dining, I glanced at the name of the restaurant: In N' Out Burger.

I couldn't believe it. The car had practically driven me here of its own accord. I had made no conscious decision to come here - in fact my thoughts were about health and alternatives the whole time - but here I was nonetheless.

At first I was mildly upset that fate and destiny had denied me the opportunity to have a healthy meal, but I wasn't about to let fate ruin a good time.

I went to the counter and ordered a 4x4 burger, fries, a Flying Dutchman, diet coke and, after the main course, a vanilla shake (see right, click for enlarged image). I wasn't especially hungry, but In N' Out has a way of making room for itself.

My food came quickly and smelled of rich salts and heavy fats. I found a place to sit and thanked God quickly for his providence and direction. Then I lit into the food, enjoying each bite as an original delicacy, despite the fact that this was my fourth time this week eating from the limited In N' Out menu.

I was just stuffing the last bites of the 4 x 4 into my mouth and beginning to eye the lightly crisped fries when a the violent tones of a car alarm cut the air. Everyone in the restaurant heard the noise and the gentleman sitting to my immediate left made a cynical comment about modern gadgetry.

Everyone expected the alarm to subside quickly, but just the opposite happened. The noise continued with the throbbing regularity of the pop song I had just heard in my car.

I looked around the restaurant to locate the car's owner and saw an elderly gentleman who couldn't have been younger than sixty fiddling with his car keys and pointing them out the window toward a Toyota Tundra that looked new enough to have an anti-theft alarm.

The elderly gentleman fumbled and fiddled with his keys for some time, making facial expressions like John Belushi and generally looking defeated by technology. Then, tired of the window, he moved to the door and began clicking at his unresponsive car from beneath the fan that keeps the warm air out.

An In N' Out employee approached the man and asked if he wanted any assistance. I am not sure of the man's exact reply, but it was obviously negative and harsh.

The man's wife vocalized her support, announcing to everyone within earshot that the car was new and that he would "have to get used to the alarm." I thought her choice of words was comically poor, but said nothing.

Between us, the sound got annoying really fast. With the door open, one had to speak exceptionally loudly to be heard above the din and, although I was more focused on face stuffing than conversation, the sound was beginning to give me a headache.

It was about five minutes between when the alarm began to sound and when I left In N' Out to return to work, but the alarm was going full bore the entire time. I think I can be fairly confident when I assert that that is one car that will not be stolen. Or maybe it will, just to halt the alarm.

In Defense of Moronitude

I recently took an online IQ test. You know the type: 40 questions to determine the taker's Intelligence Quotient. The test I took had an introduction that correlated IQ with "success" in life and a final page that completely contradicted the opening by disclaiming any accuracy of the test and pointing out that dumb people can be successful as well. Incidentally the disclaimer was about six times as long as the introduction.

They say you can't fail an IQ test, but I think I came mighty close. My intellect puts me among the company of the smart domesticated animals and retarded children of the world. The short blurb offered at the end of the quiz advised me not to have children so I wouldn't pollute the gene pool and presented several examples of "famous" people with a score like mine, the most notable of which were Jessica Simpson, Paris Hilton and Harpo Marx.

I scored a 41 (click on the image for a larger view).

But 41 out of what?

Being (apparently) dumb and unfamiliar with the IQ scoring system, I went back to the internet and located this snazzy webpage which gives a thorough if not succinct explanation. The first chart of details that anyone scoring below seventy suffers from "Definite Feeble Mindedness."

The website also says that only 2.2% of the population falls into this "defective" category, putting me in what I like to call elite company.

In search of a finer classification of my mental capabilities, I continued my trek further down the page and found a graph which breaks up Definite Feeble Mindedness into four distinct categories.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am a moron.

But I am a proud moron. I take pride in the fact that I am not an imbecile and I most definitely am not an idiot; I am a medically classified moron and there is a certain rest that comes with being a peace with one's mental deficiency.

Some years ago, after the rabble of society hijacked terms like idiot and imbecile for use as pedestrian insults, the psychiatric community resolved to use more suave terms to describe my condition, or inability to pense as the case might be. They must have been concerned about my feelings and how I would react to school yard taunts being handed me in triplicate by a licensed shrink. Regardless of their intention, people like me were relabeled as "Moderately Mentally Deficient" and, with the exception of the new title, treated with the same disregard as before.

I know, turn on the violins and begin feeling sorry for me. I am slightly mentally retarded and well below the intellectual capacity of most of my peers. I will never live a truly normal life and will always wonder what my existence could have been - or would wonder if my brain allowed the activity.

Look at the bright side: my score qualifies me for a long list of educational and financial advantages, most of which will be paid by smarter people like you. I can go through life ignorant of many evils and enjoy the fact without ever paining to ask why. I can be simple - in every way - and never have to worry about things getting complicated, because they can't.

You are probably scoffing right now; maybe even considering a comment that pokes fun at my retardation. And, as long as you aren't a beautiful celebrity or a sports star, you can probably get away with such a wisecrack. That's something your intelligence let's you do better then me.

But before you get too self confident in your own abilities, I want to remind you that the great intellects of history, the true brilliant minds of the past, all lived miserable lives marked by more suffering than morons like me can imagine. Intellects like David Hume, John Belushi and Ernest Hemmingway were just too smart for their own good. Their lives would have been much nicer and much longer had they not overthought their own existences.

Mental ability makes life so much more complicated, so much more intense. God above has spared me the horrors of that kind of existence by giving me a 41.

So go on living your smart life. I'll just be the moron; happy, simple and alive.