Go on, bow to 'er -- the queen of filth! The queen of slime!

Y'all.

Y'ALL.

Newsflash: Chili's is AWFUL.

Maybe you already knew that, but maybe, like me, you hadn't eaten there in like fifteen or so years and still had semi-fond memories of it being a pretty OK place when you went there with your friends or on a date back in high school or with your boyfriend for a $4 happy hour pitcher of beer and some free chips & salsa during grad school.

I had to go to Target one last time yesterday for some baby-related odds and ends, and after shuffling around in there, leaning on the cart for actual support, feeling like an obese 103-year-old for way longer than this type of errand normally takes, it was 2:00 and I was fucking starving. I didn't feel capable of making my own lunch, so when I spotted the Chili's directly in the path between me and home (o, the suburbs ... my heart weeps), I stopped in. I thought, I'll get some sort of poppin'-fresh appetizer something-or-other, or like a quesadilla, and that'll do it. How bad could it be?

It was so. bad.

I ordered a combo appetizer plate as my lunch -- the Southwestern egg rolls, the hot spinach & artichoke chips 'n dip, and something called "chicken crispers." The "egg rolls," while not anything that any reasonable person would recognize as egg rolls, were OK -- basically pastry dough wrapped around black beans and cheese and some kind of corn-based salsa. But the alleged spinach/artichoke dip was yucko blucko -- I can't imagine what was actually in there -- and the chicken strips were fucking horrifying. The chicken, though cooked white all the way through, was ... soft. Squishy. Like -- was this even chicken? Or was it Chickie Nobs? The fact that I ate two bites of the Nobs, not just one, should tell you how desperately hungry I was. Eeeeegh.

You could not possibly do worse with this shit -- it was clearly all manufactured in a Chinese nail-polish factory using whatever is left over after they finish making McNuggets, Payless shoes and feline leukemia meds, then partially frozen, shipped over here, warmed in an Easy-Bake Oven, and sold to me for $10.79.

And the more I think about it, the more I realize that this is one of the keys to what ails Republicans -- if THIS is what you think food is; if THIS is what "going out" means to you -- then it's no wonder that your inner life is arid, mean and bankrupt from the very most basic level.

If I'm going to keep living here -- and chain restaurants aside, I do love so much about it -- I might have to quit my job as a professional verbal tap dancer and open a few real restaurants in which actual food is sold to people with functioning taste buds. I'm hereby soliciting spare change, donations, investors and backers of all kinds ...