Betty Boop

I enjoyed a nice lunch on Thursday with several friends at The Peppermill restaurant.  Several of us used to work with one another and one is my new sales guy for an equipment rental company.  It was nice meeting him as my former salesman is working out of a different location so it was one of those quickly planned lunches that are usually made within the hour of everyone meeting.

This day the morning started off with snow coming down on top of the semi breakup melting that happened the day before.  The water runoff had refroze overnight as the temperatures dropped and once the snow hit this morning it turned all of the roads into a slick mess.  There was a couple inches on the ground by the time I left the house and the short drive to my office found several vehicles in the ditch or others involved in a crash with someone else or into an object.

By lunchtime another three inches or so had fallen and with the compaction of the vehicles the roads were in sad shape.  Plow trucks were out moving snow putting sand and gravel out but they were behind the snow curve with only some of the major intersections getting the first round of attention.  The other roads that had not yet been attended to were an ice covered mess.

Everyone made it to the restaurant mostly on time and as we sat talking and telling stories while waiting for our food I had something that caught the corner of my eye.  I sat at one end of the table looking across the other people when you sense something but not sure what it is. 

I look past to a table across the room and I see a woman that reminds me of Betty Boop.  Here is a lady who looks somewhat of a caricature of Betty Boop with extremely long red fingernails.  They had to be 4 to 5 inches long painted to a high gloss red color.  She had on a tight dress cut in the Betty’s style and her hair with that crazy curl. 

It was a cartoon come to life . . . then she turned my way and I could see this large toothy overbite.  She looked like a beaver we used to have close to our house and it reminded me of the Dennis the Menace movie with Walter Matthau’s character Mr. Wilson.  Dennis had gotten into his dentures and broke off the two front teeth so Dennis glued white chicklets onto the partial and Matthau shoved it in his mouth.  It was so funny to look at him trying to talk and smile with these oversized teeth.

As we ate lunch I kept looking over watching the woman talking and eating with these long fingernails.  I could not see how she could hold things or even dress her self if she had any buttons.  Maybe she wore Velcro clothing that she could just pull on to open or close the fabric.

This was another Observation moment in life that strikes when you least expect it . . . all you can do is watch and try not to chuckle or laugh out loud while you cannot stop watching what happens next. 

She picked up a piece of celery and then a carrot and with that overbite all I could think of was “What’s up Doc?”  It was hard not to break into laughter knowing that everyone at our table would want to know what I thought was so funny.  We made it through lunch with our own cast of characters. 

I should not talk about people but when it is funny all bets are off and everyone is fair game.

Oh yeah, I had the Cuban sandwich and it stayed with me all afternoon, filling and it was flavorful so a satisfying meal from the Peppermill.  Too bad my drive back to the office took longer than I planned due to the weather as the ditch divers were out in force.

Thanks “Betty” for bringing me a smile and provoking funny thoughts from several old but great movies.

Ice