What a great lunch it was! The Grumpy Old Dude (writer of Archon’s Den) and his wife stopped off in Tonawanda, NY as planned and had lunch with my mother-in-law and me at The Olympic Restaurant. The Olympic is a family-type diner with nice large booths, just perfect for meeting total strangers for the first time.
Not one of my “what if” scenarios came into play.
♦ They had no trouble whatsoever getting across the Canada-US border. In fact, they called me 45 minutes sooner than I had anticipated. I called my mother-in-law to let her know I was on my way to pick her up, and was greeted with an intake of breath followed by “Well, OK, but I’m just getting dressed.” As I drove the two blocks to her place, all I could imagine was her stumbling around frantically throwing clothes on, and I felt bad about that.
♦ My mother-in-law had no problems getting into my SUV.
♦ Mr. & Mrs. Grumpy Old Dude (hereinafter, G.O.D.) are not grumpy at all – in fact, they are the type of people whom, 5 minutes after meeting them, you feel like you’ve known forever. I had told them they could identify me by the teddy bear on the table, and they showed up waving a stuffed lamb toy – would grumpy people do that? I think not.
♦ I may be socially inept, but I felt extremely comfortable sharing a table with Mr. & Mr. G.O.D. We chatted, and we laughed. At one point, I realized that I had forgotten to actually eat my sandwich!
The restaurant management obviously wanted the table during the busy lunch period, so although we easily could have sat and chatted the entire afternoon, we finally had to leave.
Since I had the afternoon off, I volunteered to lead them to their motel, which was about 20 minutes away. Sure, they could have found it taking the 190 to the 290 to the 90, but I was able to guide them on the more scenic route consisting of lots of stores, plazas and businesses.
Of course, traffic was slow and we hit EVERY SINGLE RED LIGHT. At one point, my mother-in-law wondered if we were really making a good impression. Gee, I’ve driven that route numerous times and never had to stop at so many lights – WHY TODAY?
Be that as it may, we eventually got them to their motel. Stupid me, I couldn’t see the big “Lobby” sign right in front and drove all around the buildings looking for the office. G.O.D. had already parked and watched me as I came around the corner AGAIN. He had the courtesy not to laugh (at least not out loud).
All in all, it was a very pleasant afternoon, and I would do it again in a heartbeat.
My very first blogger meet-and-greet. Guess I’m not a blogging virgin any more.
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Images by: Cordelia’s Mom, and David Lofink, respectively
Cordelia's Mom, Still 