On Tuesday we went out and toasted ourselves for the last time. We were then officially really, really toasted. Judi had gone topless all three days, and today she wore her thong, so even her boobs and buns were toasted.
For lunch we walked back down to Big Pink. I'd been wanting to have the TV dinner there, but on Saturday it was a hot turkey sandwich -- didn't appeal to me. Even Sunday, when we went there for teas, it was something that didn't appeal to me. It was as though I was waiting.... Today, I felt, was "the day." And we wouldn't be on the beach anymore, so if I wanted to pig out this was the time. And the TV dinner today was... fried chicken. Yay! Mashed sweet potatoes, corn, cole slaw, cream cheese, and key lime pie for desert.
It was all great, but I have to say something special about the key lime pie: This was the greatest. It was exquisitely tangy. I know you thought you would never hear "exquisite" and "tangy" in the same sentence, but there it is. It literally melted on the tongue.
After lunch, we headed out for some shopping. I bought a pair of Teva sandals. Then we biked up to Lincoln Road. Judi wanted an ice cream at Ghirardelli. The last time we were in SoBe, Ghirardelli was a chocolatier. Now they've expanded. Now they're a soda fountain. But this isn't your grandfather's soda fountain. No indeedy.
To begin with, you don't have a soda jerk in a paper hat leaning across the counter to take your order. Instead, a very young girl permanently on the verge of confusion taps your wishes into a touch-screen computer. I design software for a living, so when I encounter software in the wide world I'm always interested in how well it seems to work. With point-of-sale systems, the measure of how well it works is how many strokes it takes to enter an order. Especially a difficult order. The champ in my book is In-and-Out Burger (see my album for the 2003 Palm Desert trip). They're at the top of the list. I'm sorry to say there are quite a few systems at the bottom of the list. The one used by the Wendy's fast food chain is down there. And so is Ghirardelli's. Who designs this crap, anyway? Any why aren't they cursed into using their own software forever?
Judi ordered a chocolate-vanilla swirl -- one of their standard flavors -- in a small sugar cone. She was asked, one scoop or two. She answered "two." I ordered a cherry coke. It only comes in one size. That was it. It took Miss-on-the-verge-of-confusion more than a dozen taps to enter this simple order -- it was obvious she was going through a series of cascading menus. And it's not like Ghirardelli has hundreds of items on their menu. It's a soda fountain, for gosh sakes!
But it gets worse: When she got to the end she realized she had put in a waffle cone instead of sugar. And there was no editing the order. She had to cancel the whole thing and start over -- more than a dozen more taps.
Ah, but the march of progress wasn't over there! No, sirree. The next step was to receive a number to be placed on our table, and then take a seat and wait, while our order was beamed electronically to a "plant" somewhere in the back, to be put together and brought out. This took ten minutes, even though the place was practically deserted.
Did I mention your grandfather's soda fountain? Do you remember how that used to work? You gave your order to the soda jerk, and he filled it. Period. Pay attention, Mr. Ghirardelli.
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