Jason Roeder

I was self-pityingly in need of a cheeseburger, and there, only a block from where I just had an interview, was Johnny Rockets, which, if you don’t know, is a chain of restaurants with a half-chewed ‘50s theme—jukeboxes, milkshakes, and so forth. The restaurant at midday was empty, so I had to guess where the Whites Only section was. The waiter, whose soda-jerkish uniform included a paper hat that I think will drive him to hurt innocents someday, asked me straightaway what kind of milkshake I wanted. Not drink, milkshake.

“Water,” I said. I wanted a milkshake, actually, but I can be like that if I’m gloomy. Maybe someone who looked like he was there only because he couldn’t find the “Nighthawks” diner shouldn’t have sat down in a place like Johnny R’s to begin with. I also ordered a bacon cheeseburger. The waiter didn’t ask me how I wanted it cooked, and I didn’t volunteer the information. That would have deprived me of resenting him for getting it wrong.

Here’s something they do at Johnny Rockets: At certain diabolical intervals, normal manufactured fun gives way to supercharged manufactured fun. The lights blink and the ‘50s music (“In the Still of the Night,” in my case) gets guillotined for…disco? Suddenly, it was like a Bee Gees air raid. The waitstaff, a member of which was supposed to be getting me a glass of water, began a loosely synchronized line dance to “Stayin’ Alive.” It was like the electric slide, but infinitely less rococo. Half-turns, claps for no reason, roof raising—truly, any three delegates plucked at random from the Republican National Convention could’ve improvised something better. I myself could’ve, and I dance as if in my own personal earthquake. And I was the only person there. This was for me. Throughout the whole song, I just sat there pretending to read the only material I had with me: my resume. I so do not know Photoshop.

Anyway, there’s no real story or epiphany here, so don’t bother workshopping it, okay? My understanding is that I would have had a far worse afternoon in Zimbabwe than the one I had at Johnny Rockets. I’m just trying to blog at bit more, that’s all. So, Johnny Rockets sucks.

Posted December 12th, 2008 | Comments are open