If I had a nickel

First read this if you haven't already heard about the latest Man versus McDonalds.

If you are lazy and don't wish to read here are the bullet points:

• Man goes to McD's yearning for that greasy goodness
• Orders quarter-pounder repeatedly telling staff: no fromage
• Goes home and eats in "darkened room"
• Gets ill and has to go to the hospital
• Sues McD's for $10 million (for those fans of Wendy's that's 10 million frostys or 50 million chicken nuggets)

It is likely that most of us repeated connoisseurs of the nearly instantaneous have received an order that wasn't right. I surely can relate to this man. Unlike Jake Blues and the Lord, me and cheese don't have an understanding. While my temperamental tum-tum doesn't fancy the lactose offerings, it is thankfully not to the degree of this man. I have gone to restaurants and fast food chains and received my food with shavings of Parmesan or slices of American.

In our haste to feast, when do we usually figure out the mistake? Only when we free the burger from its constrictive foil wrapper and lift the bun do we spot the pernicious pickles or the melted, inseparable cheese. How do we respond? We respond as if this is some malicious catastrophe.

"I can't believe it! I told them no ________. I hate _____. Next time I'm checking the bag before I leave. I should take this back."

But we don't go back. At least not often. But why? Fast food is usually a last minute decision to put food on the table and quickly thereafter in the belly. We get the grub on our way home from work or during a lunch break. We simply don't have time to go back. By the time we get the food, after waiting in either the drive-thru or in-store line, we drive home wafting the aroma of a juicy burger or greasy, salty fries. The stomach juices start flowing; sustenance is near.

It's very logical, you see. The only thing you perform at the restaurant is a cursory count to see if everything you ordered is in the bag. You may toss in some sauce, napkins or straws. Rarely does someone check the food before they leave. Maybe it's because we don't want to disrupt the process of other people in line. If you think about it, we, the consumers, act much like the cattle that found their way to the "Burger Shack." We wind through the metal fencing/stockades and then take part in a routine transaction. (Sidebar: are we all really that tired that we ALL need to lean against the railing thing?)

One final point before I make a run to eat great, even late: cut the workers some slack. How many burgers do you think they make per day? Perhaps you are the lucky one that continuously gets the burger with mustard despite emphatically declaring that if a seed of mustard is on your food you may die. Sometimes they get your order right, sometimes not. I am not sure how accurate I would be after hours in a hot kitchen with the only reward being that huge check I could expect.