Sorry Guys, "To Go.”

Loyal readers may remember Holy High.  I’m back at Holy High tonight.  The soups are sold out, but they still have their quesadillas and their salads.  This is one of two salad bars I have developed a regular patronage relationship with here in this Puxi vicinity.  Each one allows me to get nearly anything I could conceive of on my greens.  I tend to top the salads with everything.  My tongue’s a bit leathery after all this kale and sauce on the chicken chunks. 

Holy High will now need some time to prepare all I’ve ordered.  I walk down the block a hundred yards to the Family Mart.  It is never closed.  I am welcomed each time with a chirpy auto-welcome voice when I enter.  I grab a beer for my dinner bev.  I’ll take an orange juice and two bananas for the morning breakfast. 

Back at Holy High my salad is ready.  But they’ve served it up on plate.  It looks lovely, arranged with care.  Sorry guys, “to go.”  I’ve gotta eat that up in my apartment.  Can you put it in a takeout box?  Please don’t worry about trying to make it look nice. 

They worry about trying to make it look nice as they meticulously transport the salad from a big open plate, back into a plastic tray.  There is a poached egg, which they remove like medical students and place in its own special plastic container.  I keep repeating that it’s no big deal.  But they essentially insist that it be transported with its aesthetics in tack.  I wonder why they do that?  I wonder why they care?  I usually only confront that stubbornness and adherence to the guild’s way, at a chain restaurant when I’m in Japan. 

Up in the room I consider their work.  They really did an admirable job relocating the salad and I commence to toss it all. 

Saturday, 7/29/17