IHOP

This is the story of one of the most horrifying events our family has ever had to endure – and every word of this is the true!!
We have a large family, and when the kids were all younger, money was a little tight. We didn’t go out often, so when we DID get to have a family outing, it was a Very Special Event. Early one Friday evening, we decided that we would load the whole family up and go out for supper. The problem was that everyone wanted something different: burgers, spaghetti, biscuits & gravy. We decided to go to the one place in town where you could order anything at any time of the day – IHOP! Since it was still early in the evening the place wasn’t yet packed, so we pulled 2 tables together in the back of the room and put in the orders. Soon the food started arriving – and it was GREAT!! We had spaghetti, burgers and onion rings, chocolate milkshakes, pancakes and coffee, nachos - piles and piles of delicious food! The youngest, Chase, was about 4 at the time, and he was circling the table like Helen Keller, taking samples off everyone’s plate. We were having a blast! After about 45 minutes, we were all stuffed to the gills and asked the waitress for some doggy bags (not that the dog was gonna get any of it!). She brought a stack of those hinged Styrofoam deals and we started shoveling in the leftovers. At this point Chase was sitting in the middle of the table, being very, very quite. I was right across from him, and I suddenly noticed that he looked a little green.. his oldest brother, Andrew, was beside him, shoving a foam container in front of him so Chase could save his fries. All of a sudden, Chase began to barf – tons of barf, chunky, spewing – oh, Gawd! Luckily the foam buckets caught it – but when someone in our family barfs, it starts a domino effect – immediately there were 8 people, packed tightly around the table, trying to claw their way to safety, gagging and coughing – it was HORRIFYING!! And those poor folks in the booth next to us!! To this day I can still see that old lady’s face!! My hubby at the time, Gene, did what he usually did in situations like this – yell ‘I’ll start the van!’ and shoot out the door like he had a rocket strapped to his @$$, a flutter of 20’s cascading slowly down like leaves in the Fall behind him. Andrew, being the athlete that he was, managed to long jump over the table and ran outside and around the corner, where he sagged weakly against the building & tossed every cookie he had consumed for the last week – and then looked up to realize with horror he had just spewed in front of the plate glass window of the restaurant! Gasps of horror, sounds of retching and gagging – and that was just from Andrew, magnify it by the 99th power, and you’ve got an idea of what was going on inside the building!! We did the only thing we could do: run like hell! Gene had the van revved up and all the doors open wide, so we dove in while he burnt rubber off all fours, out of the parking lot.
I liked IHOP, but since they had security photos of us and the van taped up at the front door, we could never return…
Do they still use those foam buckets?