Oh Shit, My Parents..

may be embarrassing me. I did not think that this was possible as pretty much nothing embarrasses me anymore - I worked at Hooters!!! Duh.

So I called my mom (stepmom - long story) for Mother's Day and she and my father were driving from Georgia to Gettysburg with my grandparents (step-maternal). My dad answered the phone and sounded semi-suicidal which is justifiable, since my Grandma loves to bust my dad's balls at any given opportunity and he had been stuck in a car with her for the last 12 hours. So I did what any loving daughter would do, I laughed. Hysterically. Seriously, for like 5 minutes I couldn't stop cracking up because the visual of Grandma P in the backseat fucking with EVERYONE for half a day was just too much.

When I finally stopped laughing, dad put mom on the phone and I wished her a happy M-day. We chatted for a while and then I talked to Grandma P, blah blah, blah.

The next morning, I get a message from my mom on my cell phone. She was like "ADW, you will never believe what your father and I did, call me when you get a minute." Since I wasn't sure whether this little incident happened before or after I talked to my mom - hell it could have happened the previous year with the way they are forgetting shit - I didn't call her back until later that evening.

So I finally get a hold of the folks and my mom forgot why she called me in the first place. After some discussion with my dad and grandparents, she finally remembers why she called. They got kicked out of the restaurant they went to the evening before.

The Fuck???

Seriously, my parents - and subsequently the grandparents, got kicked out of an eating establishment.

The reason?

The host accused my mom of being drunk and making a scene.

My parents' excuse?

They say that the waitress was very rude to them and threw silverware at them. When they complained, the host accused my mom of being drunk and beligerant.

My take...

Yup. I can totally see my folks pounding down a couple of bottles of wine and pushing their waitress too far. Sometimes I think that if I was waiting on them, I would throw knives as well. I thought that I had trained them to behave better than that. You would think that after working in the service industry for over a decade, my parents would have figured out what passes as acceptable behavior. Apparently, they have not.

You see, my dad is a retired Command Master Chief, US Navy. He totally reminds me of Robert De Niro in "Men of Honor". Seriously, he spouts this kind of shit off all the time:

Billy Sunday: My name is Master Chief Billy Sunday. There was a preacher by the same name who cleaned up Chicago of all the whoring xxxx, drunken xxx and motherfucking xxxxxx that was making that place unfit for decent folks to live. The only difference between me and that old preacher is that he worked for God, and I *am* God!

OK, not exactly the same, since he doesn't use the racial slurs, but you mostly get the idea.

My dad also likes to say things like:
"Pain is vastly underestimated as a positive motivator."
"You deserve what you tolerate."

And other such shit.

Anyway, the point is, my dad will fuck with anyone, anywhere, at anytime and doesn't give a shit who it is or what they do. Maybe that is where I get my brass balls and irreverence. Probably. But I can totally see him fucking with a waitress, not meaning any harm by it, and having his jokes taken the wrong way.

No matter what, I won't know what really happened until I talk to my Poppa. My parents will each have their own story and Grandma P will most likely take whatever side is the opposite of my dad's. But Poppa, he is the quiet one. He will observe and wait in any situation. But when someone asks his opinion, that is the one that is usually right.

I'll just have to call him up secret-like in a week or so and get the full scoop.

Until then, I am left with the vision of my parents being forcefully escorted from the PennsylTucky Dutchhaus after too much Gewürztraminer.

Ha!
ADW