JimmieJoe

NOT what I ordered!

I never order a cheeseburger. Never.

I keep being served cheeseburgers.

Now, I don’t hate cheese. Really, I don’t. I’m quite content to have a splattering of cheese on my taco, or a slice of American on a sandwich (on occasion). I’ll eat a slice or two right out of the ‘individual wrapper’. I’ve even been known to chow down several slices of pizza, as long as it’s ham and pineapple.

I just really, really, REALLY don’t want it on my hamburger.

Why, then, do fast food places around here insist on giving me a cheeseburger?

I’ve tried to figure it out, and I can only come up with two explanations.

One, the burger makers love cheeseburgers, and can’t conceive of anyone NOT having cheese on their burgers, so it never occurs to them that the lack of “cheese”, or “minus cheese”, on the order ticket might mean that the customer DOESN’T WANT ANY GAWD DAMNED CHEESE on their burger.

Two, I have offended some god somewhere, somehow, and (he-she-it) throws cheese onto my burger when nobody is looking. If so, I beg for forgiveness.

Today, I stopped at a place that had been calling my name for a while. It’s a place that I used to eat at every day, on lunch break. That was back in my high school days, when we fled the campus at noon. I haven’t been to this place very often in the years since, and the only reason I’m not calling them out by name here is that they are not the only ones to have recently tried to slip me some ‘processed cheese food’ (it might at some point in it’s past been near something that was cheese, but that was a long time, and a lot of processing, ago).

I went inside and ordered, instead of using the drive thru. Score one for JimmieJoe. Once I got my order, in it’s neat little paper/cardboard box (styrofoam no more, like back in my high school days), I sat down and opened the box.

And immediately closed it again.

Mayor McCheese is no doubt hiding around a corner somewhere, snickering.

I got up, walked back to the counter, and expressed myself very politely. The lady who took my order picked up the receipt and studied it like it was a winning super lotto ticket, trying to figure out why I was claiming I ordered a burger with no cheese.

Fortunately, the  manager stepped in and simply told her to fix my order.

It was quickly replaced with a cheese-free version, and I sat down and took a jaunt down memory lane.

It always tastes better in my memory than it does today. I’m not sure if it’s because the burger has changed (I don’t think it has), or if my tastebuds have simply evolved a more discerning set of receptors.

I’m good for at least six months, now. I’ve been stopping by this particular place about twice a year for a while now, just because something grabs my steering wheel and won’t let go until it reaches this un-named (but I bet you figured it out, right?) fast food giant.

It’s not just them. I’ve had the same experience at five or six places, so it’s not like it’s endemic to this particular clown.

For some reason, they ALL try to put cheese on my burger.

NO. THANK. YOU.

I’ve been supportive of the $15 minimum wage proposal since it first came around. If this keeps up, however, I may have to reconsider, at least for fast food. I really don’t want to go there, though. I’ve worked fast food, I know how hard it can be. But, still…

DON’T PUT CHEESE ON MY BURGER!