Tuesday, May 25, 2010

the 8th street tabouli drooler



look, 8th street tabouli drooler, i understand that the pita is so packed full of falafel that you can't cram in enough tabouli and veggies all at once.  yes, the pita is unbalanced - falafel bunched at the bottom and veggies can barely fit in the top.  i get it.  i too once suffered from a plight of too much falafel in my pita.  i also get that your book was so interesting that you were floating off in a cloud of oblivion ... no one could expect you to concern yourself with mundane hygienic issues ... or with the disgusted comments coming from customers behind you (i seem to remember hearing "that is so not cool" and "gross!").  ordinarily, i would really congratulate you on your complete indifference to the opinions of strangers.  ordinarily, i would be rather impressed and i would have nothing critical to say to you.  but to be fair, you were infringing on their right to drool-free tabouli.  


you see, 8th street tabouli drooler, you may be perfectly aware that you are free from such minor annoyances as the herpes simplex virus or h1n1.  you know you are clean.  and sure, i believe you.  but just try for a second to put yourself in the place of the other customers.  they are patiently waiting for their falafel-packed pitas, some of them perhaps contemplating how to get enough tabouli into their own pitas.  they are calmly minding their own business when they see you stand up with your half devoured pita and return to the toppings bar.  and okay, sure, haven't we all been tempted to do that on occasion?  so the threat level at this point is probably orange (you know, we have some inkling a threat is there, but i'm not sure any of us really took it seriously).  i think maybe we expected you to go ahead and get another scoop of tabouli but show some consideration by shaking the spoon until the tabouli dropped onto your sandwich of its own accord.  that, my dear 8th street tabouli drooler, would have been forgivable.  but it really is "so not cool" to scoop out the tabouli and wipe the serving spoon against your half-eaten pita.  not just once - several times.  you just kept scraping the serving spoon up and down your drool covered pita.  and when you finished, we watched what you would do next.  as though there were some possibility that you might not wedge the serving spoon right back into the tabouli.  of course we should have known better.  now, again, i believe that you are clean ... but how do the other customers know this?  how do they know you didn't just break up with your boyfriend because he didn't tell you he had herpes and now you want to punish the world by spreading your disease to everyone you encounter?  the point is - they have no idea that you are just a sweet thoughtful young lady who was just too enthralled with her fiction to pay attention to hygiene.  but think of the other customers.  humor them.  keep your drool out of the tabouli.


now please don't think i am unsympathetic to your quandary.  i have solutions for you.  you can order the junior falafel sandwich - it only has 3 falafel balls in it, leaving plenty of room for your precious tabouli.  or, do what the guy behind you did.  get a tray.  put a piece of paper on it.  then just start dumping giant spoonfuls of tabouli onto the tray.  sure, the guy behind the counter raised his eyebrows and probably contemplated calling mr. tray dumper on his not quite kosher behavior.  but at the end of the day, the falafel joint was just too busy and mr. tray dumper was on his phone, appearing to be far too engaged with a matter far more important than smuggling out a week's supply of tabouli.  so mr. tray dumper carried about his business, and the guy behind the counter helped the next customer.


please, for the love of tabouli, just dump it into onto your tray.

1 comment:

  1. Snappleworth McFiddlebottomsMay 26, 2010 at 10:55 AM

    It is good for our collective immune systems to share germs at the buffet. I applaud the 8th st. tabouli drooler for her devotion to public health.

    ReplyDelete