Fishy

As most of you know by now, I have no shortage of ways to amuse myself. I suppose I’m somewhat easily bored…so I’m usually on the lookout for something to keep me entertained.

I’ve been known to play catch in the doctor's examination room with one of da boys…with a wet paper towel as the ball. This, in addition to the “close your eyes and guess what this is from the bowels of mom’s bag” game is pretty much guaranteed to elicit an eye roll from my child but they’ll willingly play along if it means the time passes quickly.

On Friday night, I found myself in my old neighborhood and within 20 miles of my all-time favorite Chinese Restaurant, Fortune Garden. (Shout-out to Jill, Jackie and 'Bene…you guys know what I’m talking about!) The temptation was too great…so I headed over to get some delicious food to go. This place makes the best sesame chicken EVER. It’s so good, it will spoil you for all sesame chicken for the rest of your lives…that’s how good it is. You’ll see it on some random Chinese menu and you’ll wistfully think, “Fortune Garden….awwww” and then you’ll order the Moo Shu Pork and the Chinese lady will ponder why you’re choking back a sob as you dejectedly place your order. This is what happens once you’ve had the best…

After placing my order, I sat down to wait the standard 15 minutes till it was ready. Now, they have an incredible salt water fish tank right next to the waiting-chairs. Seriously beautiful…live coral…fish with colors so bright, they take your breath away. So, I did what anyone who’s waiting would do: I pulled out my cell and started taking photos:

I was getting annoyed, because the fish were being a tad temperamental and I kept getting shots of fish butts as they’d swim away from the annoying lady with the stupid, flashy box.
I kept going…not really caring who saw me. Surely, I wasn’t the first person to do this.

Dammit! This was starting to annoy me. That one stripey guy would not stay still long enough for me to capture him…I began to think he was doing it deliberately….and did he just flip me off with his dorsal fin? ‘Cause I’m thinking he may have…

I sense, more than see...a group of people enter the restaurant and I hear a gentleman ask for a table for ten. I’m still clicking and checking and muttering and discarding and re-taking and when I pause to check the last few, I see another cell phone slide up next to mine. I blink and follow the hand, then the arm up to the face of the elderly gentleman standing there. “Would you mind?” he inquires. “You obviously know what you’re doing,” he adds…and he smiles.

“Um. Sure.” I say. And as I’m focusing and framing, I hear mumbling and jostling and I can see the flash of cellphone lights blinking around me and I hear someone say, “Let her take it, Millie…she obviously knows how to do it” and I’m thinking, “No, I don’t!” as that cell is whipped from my hand and another is placed there. Somehow, I wound up using three other cells (besides my own) before their table was called and the party of ten wafted off to find their seats.

I smiled as I watched one woman clock a patron in the head with her oversized purse…she was too busy looking at the photo on her cell to be mindful of where she was going.

I figure that ought to be my good deed for the day…or hell, maybe even the whole weekend.