Would You Rather…?

One of the most important things for any parent to know is the schedules and locations of any restaurant where kids eat free within a fifty mile radius of their house.  The closest and most popular place for my personal family is Denny’s.  Tuesday nights.  Kids eat free.  We go there a lot.  Not as much as we used to, but a lot.

Anyway, the kids’ menus are full of games and mazes and things to color in, as one might expect from a kids’ menu, but at Denny’s they also are filled with a list of questions in the “Would you rather…?” category, I think mostly as an advertisement for some sort of actual game that you are supposed to buy.  You can scan a code with your phone and it will take you to a website with more questions, and a suggestion that you ought to purchase the home version.

Ruby loves these questions, especially now that she can read them herself, and we always have to play a game of “Would you rather…?” while we wait for our free food to come.  They do change the questions every month or two, so we are spared the torment of having to answer the same queries over and over again like we are stuck in some sort of time loop, or “Vine.”  The thing about these questions is that, while some of them seem to make a sort of sense, some of them are just crazy.

Sure, you have some logical questions, like “Would you rather go back in time a million years, or go forward in time a million years?”  That makes sense that you would pair those options.  But half the time the questions are more like “Would you rather live in an abandoned amusement park, or have spaghetti for hands?”  Okay, that’s not a real question, but I’m telling you, some of these questions are real non-sequiturs.

“Would you rather meet a unicorn, or have unlimited bacon for life?”  That is a real one.  That was on their menu.  How is that comparable?  They should ask if I would rather meet a unicorn, or a mermaid.  Or maybe they should ask if want unlimited bacon, or an artery declogger, but how is a unicorn going to go up against bacon?  And while I’m on the subject, why are half of them so gross?!  Like, “Would you rather sweat uncontrollably, or have a constantly runny nose?”  Hey!  I am about to be eating here!  Do not ask me about sweat and boogers!  Not cool, Denny’s menu.  Not cool.

Why can’t they ask things that I might want to know the answer to?  “Would you rather eat chicken strips, or grilled cheese?”  I would love to know what my children would answer to that question, because whatever we order them, they do not want to eat it.  At least it is free.  Or they could ask things that would really get the conversation ball rolling, like “Would you rather ban all abortions, knowing that some people would get them anyway, but in an unsafe environment, or work to reduce the number of total abortions through education and outreach, while still keeping it legal?”  I’m sure my three-year-old has a lot of opinions on this, but he never tells me about them, so this game could be a good way to get to know each other a little better.

Well, anyway, my point is, who writes these things?  I’ll bet they get paid lots of money to do it.  I think they should hire me to do it instead.  I would do a far better job.  Here is a sample question that I just came up with, off the cuff: “Would you rather attend a string of young artists’ programs, or move to Germany and work your way up through the Fest system?”  And that was just on the spot here!  Think of all the good questions I could come up with if I had more time and put a little thought into it!  I could write questions like “Would you rather have children, or money?”  Man, I am great at writing questions.  Game people, if you are reading this, you know where to find me.