Cruddy Duck
Sipping yummy coffee at the Ruddy Duck at the Ramada in Pittsburgh. Also squinting at my notebook, as I left my glasses in my room. Five good-looking men just walked in — total Pittsburgh redneck types, but still young enough to be stripped down and cleaned up. (Men are the ULTIMATE artsy-craftsy fixer-upper creative projects!)
Just ordered a Ruddy Croissant with Sausage.
It’s quiet in here — the tourism industry truly is nothing like it was before Sept. 11, 2001 — the Ruddy Duck used to do a fabulous business on its own, not even factoring in the hotel guests who wandered down for a bite. Now, though, you can tell that the six of us who are here right now rolled down from our rooms, and there seems to be no hope of anyone else wandering in anytime soon.
It’s funny how, now that I live in D.C., I don’t bat an eye when I see outrageously priced food items. My breakfast will come to $10, and while it’s appalling, given the quality and quantity (when I can get an equal-sized and tastier breakfast at Mickey D’s for $3.21), now I just accept the fact that shit costs too much and I am grateful that it doesn’t cost any more.
My Ruddy Croissant is more like a Cruddy Croissant. Yeeeaaaccchhhh. The potatoes are dry (where’s the damn Heinz Ketchup? It’s only manufactured across the fucking street!!!!!!!), the croissant’s OK but the sausage on it is simply two links sliced in half to look like four pieces, which doesn’t even cover the fucking bread. And I could really use some more coffee, before I choke to death on this crappy breakfast. Shit. I should’ve gone to Starbucks for a cranberry bliss bar. Or I could’ve had another grease fiesta at Ritters — the good thing about Ritter’s is that for $5, your digestive tract gets opened for the whole day.
Damn it, I am going to go to Fathead’s when it opens for some garlic-parm wings. I know this breakfast is going to join yesterday’s breakfast in the river very soon. … I’ll take the wings to Mom’s — they are her favorite, and she never goes to the South Side without me.
I love Samantha, my car. At least she can’t be repo’d by GMAC ‘cuz they don’t know where I am right now. Woo hoo! I’ve put on 550 miles so far since my oil change — it’ll be at least 800 by the time I get home to the land of warmer weather and cheaper cigarettes. hee hee. I keep threatening Mom that I’m going to kidnap her and take her back with me. She laughs but I know she’s intrigued. But really, once my grandfather is gone (and unfortunately, that day is probaby going to come sooner than we would like to believe), there is no reason for her to stay in Pittsburgh — she can go anywhere, and I know she’d love to live closer to me. I have no doubt that she will end up down here. I think she’d love that, although she’d have to share my closet with Maddie. But then again, I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart, curled among the boxes of shoes with their similarly colored hair. 🙂