Whenever I decide I'm going to eat well for the day (usually after spending the previous two or three days eating nothing but junk), it always turns out to be a bust.

I went to Jack in the Box in Vista, because it was near my parents house.

I saw an advertisement for their new smoothies. I thought I'd run in and grab a strawberry one while reading the L.A. Times.

When I walk in, I see they have a big machine right before you get to the register. You are able to put your order in it and do the entire transaction, without dealing with a pimply faced kid working on his day off from school.

But there was a woman at the register, so I went up to her instead of trying this device.

As she's taking my order (and in her defense, was zit free)...I hear this chick with ADD walk in. She starts screaming, "Oh my god! Look at this machine. This is like, so weird. What is next? A drive thru where we don't talk to people? You text your order in from your cell phone on the way in... Is this what the world is coming to?"

Another customer walks in, and she starts showing him the machine. I glance over, and he really couldn't care less. But she keeps explaining all the wild things that we'll have in the future. And she's talking about 100 times louder than she needs to.

I get my "healthy" lunch of a smoothie, and she asks if I'd like anything else. And, those crappy tacos just sounded good. And hey, it's two for a buck. I also got a Jumbo Jack, which aren't nearly as good as I remembered them when I was a kid begging my parents to take me here.

As I'm sitting there, I hear another couple ordering. It sounds like they aren't happy with the prices on the menu. The guy looks like he just got out of prison, with tattoos on his bald head and around his neck.

His woman has tattoos all over her back and arms, but none on her neck. I notice a huge swastika on the back of her neck.

I start reading about the Lakers, and she asks me if I could spare the 73 cents she's short on her order. I said, "I don't give money to people with swastikas."

There was silence, and I wondered why I just said that. I figured she would start calling me a "cheap Jew" or worse.

Instead, she just walked away uttering an expletive under her breath.

I thought about taking my paper and leaving. Then I thought...forget that! If her and that dude say another word to me, I'll just ignore them. If they continue, I'll get up and get in their face if I have to. Maybe I should put 911 into my phone, and be ready to dial it.

Then I realized, the 30 seconds thinking about it, was giving them way more time then I cared to. I finished the entire sports page, enjoying my lunch. They sat at the other end of the lobby. And they were well behaved. I then read a story about a school back east that had a "hit the Jew" day. I laughed at the timing.

I saw a homeless guy outside as I was leaving, and thought about giving him a few bucks, and telling him there was a couple inside that would surely give him some money.

Then I thought how uncool it would be to put the homeless guy in the middle of that.