There's a McDonald's that is four stories tall where I grew up.

It was pretty big news when it was built.

The tall slides were a local landmark for a while.

Our middle school went there for field trips and our track team would run to the tower

and back for practice.

It was at the center of a square used for car shows and pep rallies.

The four-story playground was paradise for children and teenagers.

The ball pit, the rope bridge, the N64 games kept everyone entertained while the slides were the

main attraction. It was quite the climb up, but the payoff was sure worth it. The giant slide was

equivalent to the top thrill dragster at Cedar Point. It was a thrill ride, especially with our modification.

We would sneak the food trays up with us and bobsled them down the slide at super high speeds.

We were thrown out and chased out a couple of times after some trays were broken.

The evil-coneval stunts were a blast, but there were nothing compared to what happened

one innocent summer morning.

We walked from Southwick to the McDonald's for some breakfast.

I had hot cakes and sausage with water.

The boys ordered their meals and met me in the back to eat.

We played Madden on the consoles, and I enjoyed free refills or power aid with their cups.

The place was fairly busy, but we pretty much had free Roma the entire back area, and

that was our hangout spot.

It came time to watch them play and I figured I would burn some time and I started wandering

around looking for coins and dropped knick-knacks.

...