Eat it

As a considerate parent, it seemed like the right thing to do.

Brad the Tradie (BtT) and I asked the adolescent if there were one last thing she’d like to do 'as a family' in Boganvillea. We were totally committed to following through, thinking that perhaps the BHG would ask to pop into the Art Gallery, maybe undertake a bit of Outlet shopping or a movie at the Hippodome (just not bloody Avatar again… my bladder just can’t take it!!!) But...No such luck. The Better Homes and Gardens addict wanted to go, for one last time, to ‘the upstairs jelly square restaurant’.

I nearly vomited on the spot. But there was no ‘taking it back’ or convincing her to be happy with a trip to a different local Bogan landmark. It had to be the 'upstairs jelly square restaurant', in the very Boganist part of town. Apparently it reminds the darling thing of ‘her childhood’. Oh. Gosh we’re super parents if her childhood is defined by memories of a crappy all you can eat establishment. I bet her favourite stuffed toy is filled with toxic polyester as well.

The thing about buffet culture is that the menu is literally, all you can eat. Little stations filled with various salads and slops. So I suppose it’s $18.50 well spent, if you can actually eat a lot of jelly squares (weird how firm it has to be to cut into squares don't you think?) and deep fried spring rolls. You accompany the ‘meal’ with an all you can consume fizzy drink. The kind that’s made in that syrup machine thing and you push your glass against the dispenser. God don’t Bogan kids love those! Basic economics and psychology tells us that our primal need is to maximise value for a price paid. Therefore, we see the Bogan Buffet as a challenge. “Hah! They’re not gonna make any money off us tonight luv!!!” I calculated that it would only take about 57 glasses of Pepsi Max to break even on my refillable drink. If I could only live through the phenylalanine overdose.

As if on cue, there was a Bogan Birthday party on during our family outing last night. The fat little sprogs could barely be contained as they saw the buffet. Woah! ALL YOU CAN EAT!!! What to do? Open the presents from Hot Dollar or gorge on curried chicken and icecream (in the same bowl apparently)? “My, commented BHG, "some of those children shouldn’t really be going to an 'all you can eat'. Not to be mean or anything… just sayin’.”

After a few plates of variously coloured Chinese-style slop where the MSG separates from the oil upon contact with crockery, the BHG got creative and created ‘a bowl of chavy'. This Bogan treat is (exact instructions) two ladles of runny gravy in a soup bowl, topped with a neat layer of hot chips, then a half a ladle more of gravy. Noice. High on my fifth glass of Pepsi Max, I suggested she make a creative drink to go with the Chavy. After convincing her that it wasn’t illegal to mix the flavours, she went to the fizzy dispenser and returned (giggling like she’d done something totally naughty) with a brownish orangey concoction. Woohoo! Score! We then put icecream in it to make a Spider. “Should I dip a spring roll in and see what happens?” she asked. “Oh, cut sick kid! You’re not in Advanced Science for nothin’!” I replied, before attempting to ‘carve my own roast’ into shards with a battery operated electric knife.

 

Meanwhile BtT just sat there with a morbid expression on his face, an active and experienced participant in many a Vegas buffet, deemed "better than this shit". He peeled plates full of prawns, rating the various coloured leggings and muffin tops around the room:

“Geez, do those those suck-em-in body suits only go up to a size sixteen luv?”

“Hey mate, it’s all you can eat, not all you can bloody carry!”

"Why doesn’t that chick just take her chair over to the Sweet n Sour Pork. Save her time walking back and forward from the table…”

“Christ, that’s a helluva lotta back fat. You could feed an African country on that sheila!”

“So…”, I asked the BHG as we left, suffering a combination of Buffet Bloat and cultural embarrassment, “was your last family outing in Boganvillea everything you expected?”

She didn't answer. She’d already made a beeline for the stairs, hoping for fresh air, but ran into a cloud of ciggie smoke and coughed her way out the door.  Apparently her ‘childhood memory’ wasn’t nostalgia central after all. But she’s obviously been brought up with a fully Bogan cast-iron stomach, because as BtT squealed the tyres of the Kia home as fast as he could, I could’ve sworn the BHG muttered “You know, a McFlurry would go down well.”

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

'Eat It', Weird Al Yancovic, 1984