Those who are cafeteria wise can choose a good meal for 28 cents or 33
cents at the most. They don't take food just because it looks delicious.
They "yield not to temptation." They have a plan and stick to it. Wise
and strong-minded, they shuffle their way bravely to the end. It is said
that in time they acquire a cafeteria shuffle which one can detect even
on the street. But I don't believe it's so.

Other sections of the country have cafeterias and in some parts of the
South, especially in Louisville, they are run quite extensively. But it
is in the West, especially in California, that they have attained a
dignity and even lavishness that makes them the surprise and delight of
the tourist. Irvin Cobb says that this is the cafeteria belt of which
Los Angeles is the buckle.

We have music in our cafeterias. We have flowers on the tables. People
don't just eat in them, they dine. They take their guests there. Our
cafeterias have galleries with rocking chairs and stationery. They have
distinctive architecture. We take visitors to see them. We brag about
them, and when we wish to be especially smart we pronounce them
caffa-tuh-ree-ah.

Personally, I am proud of our cafeterias, but I do not get on in them. I
enter hungry. I look sideways to see what other folks are eating. I
decide to have corned beef and cabbage and peach short cake and nothing
else. Then in the line I have the hurried feeling of people back of me,
and that I ought to make quick decisions. Everyone ought to eat salad,
so I take a salad. Then some roast beef looks good so I take that, and
the girl asks briskly with a big spoon poised, if I'll take potatoes,
and I don't wish potatoes, but she makes a great nest of them beside the
meat and fills the nest with gravy and I pass on. According to Hoover or