The Pony Farewell Tour

Over the past week, we have been having a lot of lasts.

"Pony! This is the last time we'll watch the live eviction on Big Brother together!"
"Pony! This is the last time we'll do the Walmart shopping together!"
"Pony! This is the last time you'll take the trash up to the end of the driveway!"
"Pony! This is the last time you'll put gas in T-Hoe!"
"Pony! This is the last time we"ll have lunch at Imo's together!"

As you might imagine, I'm a little more hyped about these lasts than The Pony.

After we bought his phone Saturday, The Pony suggested we stop for lunch. He is the one who suggested Imo's. You either like their pizza or you don't. I happen to like it. A lot. The Pony detests it. So he was doing this just for me. Woevn thoug I jbwv ge  Excuse me...I had something in my eye again. Even though I knew he would prefer Steak n Shake. I offered. But he insisted on Imo's. "Come on. I really like their breadsticks!" So in we went, with me ordering the sausage pizza lunch special, and The Pony having the toasted ravioli lunch special. And an order of breadsticks.

We don't eat at the Imo's adjacent to Backroads. No siree, Bob! It is staffed almost entirely by former students of Val, and the manager they all complained about. But the one in Phone Town has been a favorite of ours since before Hick and I were even married. We used to shop for $17,000 house accoutrements at Hoods or a Central Hardware in a plaza nearby. And would stop in to have pizza and salad and perhaps an adult beverage. Ah, the salad days. Literally. We always got the special with pizza and that large salad, and split it. Sometimes we had Hick's older boys, ours being just a twinkle in Hick's (good) eye back then. Those boys loved playing the golf video game. And Ms. Pac-Man. That's how long ago. Then our own boys joined in the tradition, with Genius pulling a chair over for The Pony to stand on and play golf. That place is not known for updating their dining room.

Anyhoo...The Pony and I got two dollars worth of change in quarters, so we could play the coin-pusher game. Which didn't take long. "Mom. Did you see the name of that game? It's called Bonus Hole!" I won't even go into that one. The Pony was in rare form on this day. Perhaps some of his words of horsy wisdom will show up over the next few days as we ship him off to Oklahoma. But here's what I wanted to show you from our last Imo's luncheon:

True to form, The Pony had picked up a fork for me, and somehow, he got one that was damaged, and somehow, it ended up at my place setting, and somehow, neither one of us noticed until I asked to see his fork for comparison. It was like eating with the tip of a ski. Or a sleigh runner. Or the toe of an elf shoe.

It's the last fork The Pony will ever get for me at Imo's!