Apparently I didn’t get the memo about post-ironicism, because in addition to reading (and reviewing) a book called ttyl, I went out to the suburbs.  On purpose.  Cause I thought it would be funny.  Anyhow, I don’t have anything interesting to say, so I can’t recommend continuing to read this post, however I’ve already decided to write about it, so, despite having nothing to say, here goes…

I’m not sure how it happened, but we decided that we should go to the mall, people watch, shop, and then eat at one of the chain restaurants that dominate the suburban culinary landscape.  The mall wasn’t terribly interesting.  I mean, it was huge and there was plenty of parking, but it was still just a mall.  A huge mall.  It had four giant long wings and between 2 and 5 stories, depending on where you were.  That’s kinda bonkers, but I suppose it’s an efficient way to do business.  Why build your own parking lot when you could team up with a hundred other stores and build a super parking lot?  Malls are like Captain Planet, or Voltron, or OPEC.

We did come up with what would be a fun game for urban folks like myself- mall bingo.  You have a card, with a free space in the middle of course, and you have to find things like “Cool Kids Hanging out”, or “Tantrum child in/mear toy store”, or “Teenagers awkwardly and publicly making out.”  It could be fun.  Really, the best part was after we left the mall, where we went in search of our dinner.  I’d wanted to get an awesome blossom, but, not sure which restaurant sold that particular fried delight,we opted instead of an Olive Garden.  We shouldn’t have been surprised, but the Olive Garden had a wait out the door.  Instead, we went to TGI Fridays.  I figured it wouldn’t be too hard to get something to eat there, but it was.  There wasn’t a single entree that could have been ordered without revealing my status as a vegetarian, including the salad.  I tried for the Mac and Cheese, but it had bacon in it.  I ended up getting angel hair pasta, asking them to hold the chicken breast.  Easy enough.  We also got some appetizers, as I showed in the photo I posted yesterday.  Fried green beans and fried macaroni and cheese.  We couldn’t finish either one, thankfully.

To drink, I ordered a Bud Light.  They actually did have beer that I liked there, but I figured in the spirit of TGI Fridays, I should order something…  more gross and generic, basically.  It was gross and generic, for sure.  We also got a gigantic margarita they served in a shaker, so that was kinda cool.  Non-culinary highlights include a posse of gothclowns (think ICP), one of whom had the biggest posterior I’ve ever seen crammed into raver pants.  One of the waiters had a Dane Cook hat and a tribal sleeve, and, despite having made fun of the gothclowns to us, was also good friends with a different gothclown.

Anyhow, the real point of visiting wasn’t just because we were bored, and also not purely to give me something to pretentiously make fun of.  I’ve lived outside the ‘burbs for about 8 years now, and I wonder whether I’ve just become a city snob because I never go to the suburbs and I don’t know better, or because I actually have a developed preference.  One night isn’t enough to really base a decision, but having long waits at Olive Garden and TGI Friday’si sn’t a good indicator that the area is ripe with good food options.  Plus, even though the restaurants were just on the other side of the mall, they were still about a mile and a half from where we’d initially parked the car.  So even two stores that are ostensibly in the same place and share a parking lot require a 10 minute drive.  I complain now about how far the grocery store is- you could easily be ten miles away outside the city.  So..  Yeah.  That’s all I got.  I don’t really have a good conclusion.  I’m not leaving the city any time soon, so who really cares.