Make Mine Sasparilla!

Caption: "Cause Baby Look at You Now!"

When I stop learning? I think I've said this before. Put me out on an ice floe.

So I was in this restaurant bar two nights ago, and I think as you can see I pretty much take a pencil with me everywhere. So I see these two kids at the bar, just sitting there with angelic behavior. It makes me curious, and those of you who know me pretty well...know I'm pretty driven to get answers when I'm curious.

Well, as you can see I sketched them in their environment and then took the sketch to my journalism class today and passed it around. What did they see in the sketch. Was there a story there?

I'll offer you entry into the same game. "What's it all about Alfie?"

While you're pondering the picture I'll get in a postscript on yesterday's posting. Then I was crying, today I'm laughing. It's odd that when you've got your tongue in your cheek, it's almost impossible to get it out.  No one will let you. 

Here I was trying to deal with what I believed to be a monstrous social ill.  Well, five of you wrote back. Four of the five of you said, in essence, and in my friend Paula Vargas' case, verbatim, '"PAUL, YOU ARE SO FUNNY!" 

So I guess that's what I'll stick to.  So anyway, back to the sketch.

"Who are these kids? Who do they belong to?"

For me that is not a Social Services question. It is clear this pair in some sense belong here. They are sipping Pepsis, quietly playing some hand held electronic games, and chatting with the Bar Tendress.

"Hmmm? Her kids maybe? No it seems more like she is babysitting them. They are probably the offspring of a single parent cook who can't afford day care."

 We could make a movie out of that one. Well using my POLITE journalistic bent I stage whisper to the bar personage, "these kid in here often.?"

"Well yeah, quite a bit. They are waiting for their mother to come pick them up."

"Kids of the cook?," I ask.

"No, the General Manager," she replies.

This could be a movie with a sequel. But then it dawns on me...THIS isn't a movie it's a news story. Times have gotten so hard that the HIGH FLYIN' GENERAL MANAGER, and HIS PROFESSIONAL WIFE ...between them, CAN'T afford day care? Mortgages be damned.  What is the world coming to when the G.M'S can't afford day care.

So I think I've got it all figured out and tell the class so. WELL....in case you're not up to speed on this? Tending bar is one of the more popular ways to finance one's education at a commuter school. So I typically have five or six in each class every semester.  So as I'm spitting out my speculative profundity one seasoned bar tendress blurts out, "I've tended bar all over town, and guess what?"

"What?"

"All general managers bring their kids to work."

"Why?"

"Well you had it right already.  They can't afford day care."

"So it's true. It's an economic bellwether. If the GM can't afford daycare we're all headed for the poor farm. Looks like depression is just around the corner.."

"Don't be a drama king. Who told you GM's are highly paid. Let's see, they are the first ones in, in the morning, last ones to leave at night.  They get no overtime, no tips, no breaks."

Well here's what I learned. GM's are poor, but looks like the ECONOMY might be okay.

BUT WAIT! I'M IN ANOTHER RESTAURANT BAR THIS AFTERNOON, AND A YOUNG LADY (estimated age, 8) LEAPS UP ON TO A BAR STOOL SHE'S CLEARLY MADE HER OWN.

The waiter seems to know her well enough.

"Yours?," I querie?

"Nope. I'm just keeping an eye on her!"

"So don't tell me she belongs to the poor General Manager."

"Nope 

"Well who then?"

"She belongs to THE OWNER."

I wonder if he gets tips.