Lunch: Brought to you by Scabby McSnotty

Chick-fil-a. Everyone's got a soft spot for it, right? Well, those of us who eat poultry anyway, or so I'm going to assume for the purposes of this blog entry. Chick-fil-a is arguably one of the best places to get a chicken sandwich on the planet and their sweet tea is, in the words of the Teen Girl Squad, "Soooo good!"
A little "Me Trivia": sometimes, I inexplicably crave Chick-fil-a sweet tea. No apparent reason. No particular time of day. I can't ever tell when it's going to strike, it just does. And when it does, I must succumb. I awoke to one such craving out of the usual blue this morning about nine o'clock and went about the first part of my day determined to enjoy some of that delicious tea over lunch. My sister Elizabeth appreciates Chick-fil-a sweet tea almost as much as I do so when i mentioned my plan to her as she was trimming my hair late this morning(lovely job, by the way), she happily accepted my invitation to join me.
Now most people can appreciate how busy the local Chick-fil-a tends to be more often than not on any given day (except Sundays, which I more than don't mind)between the hours of twelve and two. Elizabeth and I pulled into the parking lot and had a bit of trouble finding a place to park before weaving our way nervously through the long drive-through line that had wrapped itself around the building.
Upon entering the restaurant, we were greeted with that unmistakable, mmm-mmm good Chick-fil-a chicken smell and in my eagerness for a large sweet tea, I more than patiently took my place in line to give my order at the counter. When we finally were able to place our order and get our change from the gentleman behind the register (shortish, thirty-ish and with a schnoz that was begging for a mustache), we were presented with our two sweet teas....taaadaaa!
Ladies and gentlemen, it's hard for me to describe to you the disgust bordering on horror with which I beheld ....well, what I beheld. What was it? You probably would rather not know, but I'll tell you anyway. The aforementioned shortish gentleman that prepared my and my sister's sweet teas had, wrapped around the middle finger of his right hand, the most grotesque, scabby, brown, peely looking band-aid I've ever seen in my entire life. The finger around the band-aid was rather red and irritated looking and it was all i could do not to stare at it in blatant disgust. He smiled at us innocently before dismissing us quickly and looking behind us with a loud "Next!". I looked at my sister to see if she could have possibly missed what I had seen. She had already turned but I caught up with her at the (and this is for Jeffrey) condiment counter where I waited for her to notice my disturbed expression.
"Did you see that?" I asked her. "The band-aid? Yeah, that was pretty disgusting. I wondered if you'd noticed," she replied. "I didn't really want to touch my cup after I saw that. But at least he didn't touch the tea or the straw."
I found little comfort in this but we collected our food and proceeded to our table where, for the next fifteen minutes, I observed our scabby little friend wiping down counters, picking up trash, dumping and wiping off nasty trays, and waiting on customers, all without stopping to wash his hands. And as if this wasn't bad enough, Elizabeth said that (and sadly I missed this spectacle) she even saw him wipe his nose on his sleeve!
Needless to say, my appetite was a bit dried up after that. I was incredulous that the manager would allow him to persist in helping customers with a dingy, brown band-aid dangling from one of his fingers.
Amazingly, we made it through our meal, trying to distract and passify ourselves with the comfort of knowing that Scabby at least hadn't touched our food. And he didn't touch the contents of our drinks either, but come on! That's disgusting! I waited all morning long in anticipation of that sweet tea. Alcohol and cigarettes I can more than happily do without in my life but for the love of dear Pete, let me have my sweet tea! And have it with the sound assurance that I'll find no scabby finger remnants in it! I couldn't enjoy this tea, even with it's whimsical little cows wearing sandwich boards saying "eat mor chikin" on the styrofoam cup and despite the fact that it was just the right amount of "sweet". Crap.
People in the food business: please, oh please, take into account that your personal hygiene has a drastic effect on the appetites of your customers!!! My dad loves to tell the story (often when the family's out to eat somewhere) of the time he went out for dinner with a bunch of friends, only to completely lose his appetite at the sight of their waitress's infected belly-ring. Come on!! Who can eat in the presence of infection?? Who?? Who????
I realize that maybe, just maybe, there could be a small handful of you out there who possibly think i'm overreacting. You just eat the food, you don't worry about where it came from or who prepared it. And that's a nice little bubble to live in. I'm happy to live in that bubble most of the time myself. It's comfortable in there and most of the time, there's A/C and digital cable. However, when my food is prepared in front of me (a la Subway or Moe's) or in this case, my beverage, I can't help but notice and take into account the appearance of cleanliness in whomever prepares it. Wash your hands, people! Brush your frappin' teeth!! Scrub and comb that hair! Dandruff does not a desirable burrito topping make!

All that being said....buon appetito!