New Topic

It's been a long week, and everyone we know greets us with a question about how Jackson is doing. I honestly spent about two hours of each day answering this question the past three days. I appreciate the thoughts, prayers, and concerns from all of our friends and family, but when it's worrying me, I hate getting others worried too. I also hate describing all of Jackson's symptoms and describing how he still smiles and laughs even though he's in pain or woozy. It makes me all emotional in the workplace, and that's getting old for me. I know I'm a sensitive male, but I hate being the most sensitive male at the school.

So, Jackson is doing better, thanks for asking. He slept through Thursday night and he's sleeping now, which is what I should be doing. No fever since Friday and Dr. Gonzalez, who is awesome, says his ears are getting better. (Dr. Gonzalez and I got to talk comics for a solid five minutes the other day - this is a rare treat for me. I keep my hobby under wraps because of its dorkiness, but this is my fantasy football league or Halo or fishing, and it's not often I get to discuss it. Also, Dr. Gonzalez asked me if I was a professor, trying to remember what my job was. That was another rare treat - someone assuming I have a respectable job.) (I know I have a respectable job now, but teaching is not actually respected, for the most part. True story.)

Anyway, new topic now, so everyone can begin to shift out of uberconcerned mode. Tonight we took the boy out to dinner to celebrate the end of the week, his seeming recovery, and the beautiful weather. We have only a few good restaurants with outside seating in Katy, and we decided to return to Jarrito's to try their patio.

Well, it was a long wait for outdoor seating, so we eventually opted for the empty inside. Our waiter Bryant arrived on the scene, and I was sure something mind-altering was impeding his logic and conversation from the start. We'd ask for something simple (water, straws) and he'd disappear for twenty minutes before bringing them by, usually after someone else showed up with what we needed. Whatever though, it made us laugh. Eventually we got to order dinner, and when he failed to write it down, we gave each other the "this is going to be wrong" look, but it was still more entertaining than frustrating. Noelle wanted her chicken on the side of her chalupa and extra beans, no rice. I wanted my usual - no beans, double rice. Well, as Noelle changed Jackson in the Ladies' Room, when the food arrived, there was the rice and beans on Noelle's plate and the rice and beans on mine. I actually really hate beans, so I brought it up to Bryant that we had requested our beans and rice a certain way - segregated to separate plates. There was that moment where he was wondering if I was going to ask him to take it back, but I told him I'd be okay and I'd see if Noelle was okay with rice up in her beans and all. He pointed to the chicken, on the side of the chalupa, and said, "Well, at least I got the chicken right."

Wow, Bryant. You're right.

We ate the food as was, and after ordering some more chips and salsa, we finally just got the check. It took about twenty minutes of wrangling for that, and we never got the chips and salsa, but we made it out of Jarrito's. We were trying to remember if we had ever had a worse waiter. It seemed like we must have, but Bryant really stands out with his getting the chicken right.

(Second favorite Bryant moment - when he was spinning around near our table with a hot tray of food, trying to remember which of his tables the food belonged to. Classic.)

So, rather than showing us how lucky we are to have such wonderful friends caring about our boy and all, please instead regale us with awful waiter experiences.