From The Onion (hat tip: John Derbyshire).
HUNTINGTON BEACH, CA–Resentment, anger, and pity were among the emotions mutually felt by Burger King employee Duane Hesketh and customer Robert Lalley during a class-conflict-laden transaction Tuesday.
According to sources, at 4:22 p.m. PST, the upper-middle-class Lalley approached the working-class Hesketh's register at the Beach Boulevard Burger King to order a meal. The two men instantly became locked in an icy showdown of mutual loathing and disrespect, each resenting the other and everything he represents. For the next seven minutes, the age-old conflict between the haves and have-nots was played out in a passive-aggressive verbal exchange that betrayed no trace of the roiling vortex of bitter hatred that lay just beneath the surface.
"May I help you?" Hesketh asked the golf-loving, SUV-driving financial planner standing before him. Without making eye contact with the mulleted cashier, Lalley replied, "Whopper Jr., large fries, and a large Diet Coke."
Hesketh, who as Lalley ordered was "thinking about how maybe I should get my G.E.D.," stared blankly at the cash register, stunning the customer with his inability to carry out the most basic instructions. As an irritated Lalley repeated his order, Hesketh made an effort to suppress his anger over being forced by economic circumstance into a life of blue-collar servility and mindless, soul-sapping repetition. He expressed this resentment by acting as if he'd failed to hear Lalley's order, asking three times, "Did you say fries with that?"
The conflict deepened when Hesketh rang up the order incorrectly.
"Eighteen dollars? That can't be right," said Lalley, his weak-chinned face, conservative haircut, and business-casual attire repulsing Hesketh. The cashier's mind then wandered to the upcoming getting-high-after-work-in-the-parking-lot-with-Shawn-and-Joe ritual that constitutes one of the few moments of pleasure in his largely intolerable life.
"Huh?" said Hesketh, putting Lalley's middle-class Baby Boomer liberalism to the test by forcing him to realize that he deeply despises the blundering ineptitude of the uneducated.
"Christ, I've seen trained chimps respond to verbal cues better than you," the stone-faced Lalley did not say aloud. "If you were one-tenth as good at your job as you are at slouching around in baggy pants, you'd probably own the whole fucking Burger King corporation by now," he opted not to add, instead toying anxiously with his Citizen watch.
Hesketh then told Lalley that his order would have to be voided and rung up again.
"Maybe you should ask someone to help you," said Lalley, struggling to resist the overwhelming urge to grab his social inferior by the collar and smash his vacant head into the cash register until one or the other cracked open.
Eager to antagonize the despised customer, Hesketh continued to putter, spending two minutes fumbling with the "void" process before mumbling to Lalley that he would not be able to refund the money until the manager opened the register...
