I will now tell the story of the best thing I ever saw in playland. This was at Burger King, not Macdonald's. In the South these things are all simply called "playland".

A few years ago me and my kids were eating at Burger King and of course we had to eat in playland because kids. Burger King had at this time installed talking garbage cans in there. It was probably intended as a way to get kids to throw their own trash away so employees wouldn't have to do it so much. Whoever designed those things knew _nothing_ about children.

When you put trash into the talking trash can, pushing your garbage in past that plastic spring-loaded flap which says THANK YOU on it, the trash can would say "Thanks for the garbage!" or something like that. You know, things a talking trash can would say.

ANY PARENT could tell you what would happen next. Children know that trash cans can not actually speak. So each successive child, having been congratulated by the trash can, would do the obvious thing, and put his head inside the trash can to see who is in there.

Then the spring-loaded THANK YOU flap would swing shut and grab the children by the neck in the manner of a squirrel trap, and they could not get their heads back out, and there would be flailing and muffled screaming, and they would have to be rescued by their Mom.

This happened over and over and OVER. Kids of a certain age will put their heads in a talking trash can even if they just saw the last kid get garroted by it. It kind of makes them even more curious. Just one kid after another getting choked by this evil instrument of torture. "THANKS FOR THE TRASH!"

It was the best thing I have ever seen. Kids leave, new kids take their place, new victims for the magic trash can. I never got tired of it. Next time we went to Burger King they weren't there any more but I hope someday they will come back for another try.

EDIT: tHanKz fOr thE sTaRz!