Never be afraid to face where you came from, I always say it. Even if it’s spurted all over your scrambled eggs by a monkey in a chef’s uniform, remember: The Truth shall set you Free.

Does life begin when the sperm meets the egg? What about pancake batter? Where does religion begin and science end? Was the omelet was asking for it?

I really believe that if you CHOOSE to go to a place like Denny’s it’s because you WANT someone to masturbate into your eggs.  I do. I believe that.  It’s absolutely the best case scenario.

Denny’s was founded by a convicted food rapist, Percival P. Denny.  Upon being released from state prison after serving a 10 year sentence for raping a ham, at Easter, in his parent’s home, the very first thing he did was buy some pork and start a restaurant.    

“I’m cured!” he told his community, holding up some bacon that was suspiciously misshapen and dripping. That he had produced it from his pants seemed to bother no one. The crowd cheered wildly and a band started playing as a stripper shot eggs out of her vagina into a pan. Back in those days ‘hash browns’ were not potatoes. The Denny’s Special was born.

All the dishes at Denny’s are named after perverse acts of food sex.

‘Moons over My Hammy’
’Grand Slam Breakfast’

‘Eggs Over Easy’

It had been years since I visited a Denny’s restaurant and I really had no desire to go back last weekend.  When I was a child, my grampa used to take Gramma and I to Denny’s every Sunday to watch him eat. We didn’t get to order anything because Grampa was too cheap and he always said we weren’t as hungry as he was.

“I won’t be able to eat all my breakfast,” he’d say, “It’s enormous.  You two can have some of that.”

He’d order the Grand Slam breakfast and eat every last bite in front of us. Gramma and I just sat there while he shoveled in his enormous plate of eggs and pork and potatoes and toast…pancakes…he even opened all the jam and licked the little plastic containers clean.  Except for one tiny curl he’d pluck from the deep recesses of his saggy trouser and leave swimming in some egg yolk. 

Wiping his crusty lips on a napkin, he’d motion the waitress over and point a shaky finger at the hair, which seemed to point directly back at her.  Grampa would feign indignation, summon a few tears.  The waitress would look increasingly aghast and embarrassed as he went on and on about someone not washing their hands back there in the kitchen, at the very least.

Was this hair from a MAN? He looked apoplectic, clutching his heart.

He was in the war, you know, he’d whine. Didn’t she love her country? Didn’t Denny’s?

Despite being in the theatre, he was not “one of them fairies.” 
 

”I am scandalized!” he would rave, belching.

In the end, despite his gaping zipper, Denny’s management would give him the meal for free, just to shut him up.  Satisfied, he’d sit back and motion for a coffee refill.  He would ask the old people at the next table if they were going to finish their waffle, even as he was reaching for it. 

Gramma and I were offered whatever was left on other people’s plates. Old old people who blew their noses on napkins and placed the napkins on top of the food.

“It’s perfectly good,” Grampa would say, moving the soiled cloth to expose tepid leavings. “I knew you weren’t hungry!”

When Grampa was finally ready to leave he’d tip the waitress a nickel and lay his clammy hand on her flat behind. Winking he’d say, “Thanks, toots.”

He would pay every third or fourth visit, with piles of loose change, mostly pennies and nickels. 

If it weren’t for parole violations, the staff would never have turned over often enough for him to pull it off Sunday after Sunday for so many years. They did finally catch on, though and Grampa stopped going when, one Sunday, his food came with an enormous dark black coarse hair already in it.  He was charged extra. That was more than 25 years ago.

Mother’s Day, Eric got up early and left the house.  My breakfast remained unassembled in various cupboards and the refrigerator.  I waited, but he did not come back. I knew, of course, where Eric and his family were going for mother’s day brunch.  I make it my business to know these things. Besides, Eric and his sister Christx’s code-talking and whispering were so obvious that even my dogs knew where they were going. My dogs, however, preferred to stay home and eat their own poop. Sadly, my options were limited.

At 10:00 am, Kym called and asked if I could watch Andre because Perry and David wanted to take her out for Mother’s Day.

“You are not their mother,” I reminded her, adding, “I am very hungry.”

“No, but I am their baby’s mother and this stretched out 'giny must be thanked.”

She brought the monkey by less than 10 minutes later.  I still had neither breakfast, nor any hope of it in sight. Cruelly, yet somehow delightfully, Andre was dressed exactly like a French chef.  He was adorable in his large white cap and double breasted uniform.

“Maybe he can whip you up something,” Kym sang out as she was leaving, laughing as Andre’s ever active little monkey paw fished frantically in his pants. His other hand held a spatula from William Sonoma.

The phone rang and I rushed to get it, using the last of my strength. It was Grampa.

“Denny?” he wheezed.

“No, you dimwitted cheese curd, you dialed Katy,” I said.

“Oh. Sorry. Wrong number…”

Two seconds later he called back.

“Katy?” he bellowed.

“Yes…” I sobbed, lying on the floor, where I’d collapsed, thinking wistfully of cheese curds…

Andre kissed me softly and whacked my behind with the spatula.  Grampa wheezed into the phone, “If you pretend to be my mother, we can get 2 breakfasts for the price of one at Dennys! Or half price on ONE BREAKFAST, if you’re not hungry…”

“FINE!” I screamed. It was my only choice.  “Fine. And I am VERY HUNGRY.”

I met Grampa in the parking lot 15 minutes later. I parked the car and watched Grampa’s car creep up the rode for at least 5 minutes after parking, his hands at 10 and 2 o’clock, level with his huge ears which stuck out below his hat like hairy ads attempting to lease the useless space between.

He chose to drive, despite living 100 yards from the place, and it still took him 15 minutes to get there. 

Inside the foyer of the restaurant, Andre and Grampa casually regarded one another before adjusting their respective soggy crotches.  Andre’s starched stand up collar and little apron looked just right. His hat fluffed to full splendor.  In his pocket was a single peanut that he was apparently saving for later.

The hostess greeted us with, “Three of you?” in a tone that would have been more at home saying, “Yes, the dingo ate my baby, but he deserved it.”

Grampa chuckled, “Yes, indeedy, we are here for the Mother’s Day special…”

The hostess squinted and asked if my “mother” needed a booster seat. I wondered what she meant and looked around for a mother. 

Andre monkey-hopped along by my side, picking things off the floor and pocketing them with his peanut. He had on a new medical bracelet which says that he hates spray bottles. It’s true. He really does.

Suddenly it dawned on me.

 “This man is NOT my FATHER!” I huffed, slapping Grampa's arm from my back.  “My father is a respected ANCHORMAN on a highly rated syndicated news show…it’s possible…”

Grampa guffawed meanly.

The hostess was looking at her watch, tapping the menus on her knee.

“Anyway, my mother….” I tried, turning all our attention, wrongly, to Andre who had the spatula deep down the front of his pants and was hooting.

I saw a tawdry shadow out of the corner of my eye and turned to see the cook peaking out through the Order Window. He was a large unshaven man with a cheap paper hat. His uniform was splattered polyester in a dismal shade of brown. A cigarette dangled from his crusty lips as he stared wistfully at Andre’s perfect lapels, the 12 shiny buttons marching down his monkey chest all the way to where the expensive spatula disappeared bucking and heaving beneath expensive all natural French fiber. 

“Nevermind.”

It was useless to explain the relationship to Andre; evolution is complicated and I was very hungry.

She shrugged, “Follow me.”

The hostess led us past a huge table filled with laughter and food just being served. I immediately recognized Eric’s family, plus a few people I didn’t know. Eric noticed us, but everyone else was fully occupied with enjoying themselves. Eric looked guilty as his French toast was placed before him, heaped high with whipped ‘crème’ and a side of bacon. He avoided my eye contact, which I’ve seen hamsters do in the wild.  I stopped at the first table I came to right next to theirs, about 5 feet away.

“We’ll sit here,” I announced, grabbing the end and pulling it closer.

The little table was occupied by people who were clearly finished eating, a man and woman both in their early 60’s.  Clearly not a maternal relationship. The woman was playing with her food, pushing it around, not really concentrating the way one who was serious about eating would.

The hostess said, “These people are not finished,”

“Oh, I think they are, get her a box.” I said, handing the woman her plate and putting my hand on her chair, giving it a little shake, “And hurry before my ‘mother’ is finished grunting or you’ll need two boxes and some gloves.”

Fact: Some people consider monkey poop a novelty.

The couple stared at us. Blinking. The hostess looked uncertainly from man to woman to me to monkey.  Andre hooted more urgently. I moved the table a little farther away, despite the man struggling to hold on to his end.

The man started to say something about enjoying his coffee when Andre proved my point by pulling a nicely formed monkey trout out of his pants and deposited it on the woman’s plate.  

The table was nearly there when I heard Eric’s mother, Dottie, moan, “OHMYGOOD LORD! It’s HER, and that MONKEY!”

The hostess looked at Grampa pityingly.

“I played a monkey on Broadway in the blockbuster hit Planet of the Apes.” Grampa whispered. 
 

Christx and Eric were whispering urgently to one another.  Andre screeched, pulling his soiled spatula out and flinging something warm and gooey at Eric. It splattered down the freshly pressed shirt that his mother had given him for Christmas and dripped onto his plate. It just missed the French toast.

“OH! Well! Surprise! Mind if we join you!?” I asked Eric’s family, rhetorically.

“Well, actually…” Christx started to say, then Andre knocked a glass of water into her lap. She screamed as the ice water pooled in her crotch, a response I found unlikely.

Grampa and I pulled up the now unused chairs from the other table and slid them in. I sat next to Eric and a man I didn’t know, who introduced himself and the woman across as,

“We’re Bob and Mary, Leo and Dottie’s best friends!” he extended a meaty freckled paw. 

Andre shrieked and I could see why immediately. The man wore a rayon shirt with American flags on it in not quite the right hues. Orange, cream and seafoam.  I counted 3 stars on each flag. Clearly Sears. Probably came free with a lawn mower. 

“Are you Bob or Mary?” I asked, touching his hand lightly.

He frowned, “Why, I’m Bob. Of course.”

He looked at Leo and they exchanged eyebrow action.  Leo’s eyebrow hairs stick out in all directions, as if trying to escape his head before something awful happens.

Mary giggled like a deranged horse.

Meanwhile, no one took our order.

Mary started blathering on about the “griddle cakes”, and how they weren’t quite right. Somehow she'd managed to eat more than half of them, grease and syrup dripping from her big furry chin. She dabbed at all the wrong places with her napkin. I was so hungry that I could not be repulsed. 

The waitress came over to take our order and Mary clinked her fork on her glass, the international SOS call for waitresses to spit in someone’s food. The waitress rolled her eyes and went to Mary. Our order remained unplaced.

“These griddle cakes aren’t quite right,” Mary stated.  “Take them back and bring me a waffle, would you? I’m not paying for these. I think they aren’t done…”

The waitress whisked the plate away.

“I’d stick with semen if I were you,” I told Mary. “I don't know about you, but I can’t swallow spit.”

Mary looked as if she had no response to this. She looked to her husband, who guffawed, “I wish!”

Christx tsked and elbowed Eric, who shrugged.

Christx was the only person not eating breakfast.  She was eating a fish sandwich. She’d scraped everything off of it was mechanically chewing the de-breaded cod fillet.  The ice was still not melted in her crotch.

The waitress came and refilled everyone’s coffee.  Grampa stopped her to tell her she reminded him of Dick Van Patten and she cringed.
 

She slid away so fast that I was unable to establish contact. My arm waved uselessly in her wake. 

Christx told a story that was so boring and pointless that it made me reach over and borrow Leo’s fork to stab myself in the hand a few times, alarmed that I was still unable to feel anything I stabbed harder before realizing it was Eric’s hand.  Happily, the screaming brought the waitress.

Just when she reached our table, Bob started spastically clinking his knife against a glass, causing her to scowl, grab his plate of pancakes, eggs and sausage, and stalk angrily back to the kitchen. 

Bob said he wanted to initiate a toast to Mothers. “Well, I know Kaitlyn and Bob Junior would be here if they could…” he started.

“Why aren’t they?” I asked.

“Well, uh..” he chuckled, “They have their own families…”

“Ah. Well. I guess you’ve out-lived your purpose,” I said, “like these guys,” I gestured at Leo and Dottie.  “Dottie wears diapers. Leo is already courting maggots…” It was true, flies were buzzing all around him.

Grampa farted and started to say something about Brian Keith, but Mary interrupted,

“Kaitlyn and Bobby love us VERY MUCH!” Mary told her toast, as she slathered on extra 'butter', one eye on Andre and his frenzied little fist.

“Of COURSE they DO!” Bob cried. “They sent you that lovely card…”

“I got a card from my Gardener on Cinco De Mayo,” I said, eating the fruit off of Eric’s plate after first washing it thoroughly in his coffee, “Of course, he is very fond of me.  He’s hotter than Jesus in June…ohmygod…he is hot, like Tabasco on the virgin’s crotch.  For Mother’s Day he gave me flowers…”

Mary looked up, eyes shining with tears. “You got flowers?!”

“Well…I’m no mother, but it was nice.” I added, “I bought my own mother a car…”

This was only a slight exaggeration. I had actually purchased a bright pink Barbie™ Dream Corvette for the shelf in our living room that will eventually hold my mother’s shrunken taxidermied remains. Still, it’s the thought that counts.

Andre wasted no time in putting his spatula to Mary’s new waffle, now that she was crying. 

I hadn’t even seen the waitress deliver that. She must have crawled…

“Yes. Well” Bob tried again, clearing his throat, “As I was saying, here’s to Mary and Dottie, two wonderful gals and great mothers!”  He raised his glass of diet pepsi™ and drank deeply, spilling some down the front of his hideous shirt. I could smell sweat and whiskey mingled with cheap appliances.

I stood and raised my own glass, which was actually Eric’s and had a piece of stray kiwi floating in it,

“I think Dottie abused Eric when he was little,” I toasted. “He doesn’t remember, but I know I didn’t exactly introduce him to the idea of testicle clamps.”

 Eric moaned and lay his head down on his plate, “That never happened.”

“With mom,” he added.

“He still pees the bed.” I finished, extending my glass toward the others.

“Your Aunt...it was your aunt who pee’d in our bed...” Eric muttered, face down in the french toast.

Leo looked from Dottie to Eric, mouth agape, face red and sweating. He was eating link sausages. Four of them. Despite not having a plate in front of him. The waitress had taken it on reflex when Christx screamed a second time, as Andre dumped hot coffee in her lap.

Dottie turned white and Andre scooted over and ate her bisquit. He rubbed her head with his soiled spatula before putting it back into his pants.

Grampa farted.

Dottie put her fork down and looked around the table.  A little piece of ham hung from the side of her head.  In front of her were the remains of the Slam Bam Thank You Mam Mother’s Platter she’d ordered. Her eggs were scrambled.  There was a great deal of cheese. Andre poked at a piece with his finger, at least I thought it was a finger, at first, and Dottie turned on him, swatting. He screeched.

“Don’t blame the monkey,” I counseled her, “I’m sure that your mother was a monster...”

“SHE …WAS… NOT!” Dottie and Leo exhaled together, although Leo was nodding when he said it.

“OH! GOD!” Christx screamed, getting up. “I HAVE HAD ENOUGH! Eric, you need to do something. This is beyond what any family should tolerate!”

She took her mother’s hand and led her out of the restaurant.

Leo pocketed the sausage and followed. As did the flies.

The waitress brought a new waffle and put it down where Leo had been sitting. “I’ll take that,” I told her.

She also brought the bill and set it down between Grampa and Bob.

Grampa’s hand moved causing Bob to naively protest “Oh, let me see that bill…you don’t…”

Seconds later Mary screamed, “OH MY GOODNESS! OH! THAT’S….HE… HAS HIS PENIS OUT!”

You could hear pans crashing to the floor in the kitchen.

Grampa left a dime on the table, Andre left a peanut.  I left Bob and Mary and a side of bacon. 

© 2005, Katy Hipke and Mark Hoback

Mark writes at Fried Green al-Qaedas

Katy writes at The Stain and I Am Eating My Husband's Soul
 

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