Besides, we were fresh out of leftovers in the fridge and neither of us felt like cooking. By “neither of us” — I mean Diane. And, neither of us had much of an appetite. Again, by “neither of us” — I mean Diane.

We did, in fact, beat the crowd. We moseyed into Los Amigos at 7:55 p.m. and there were only 2 or 3 tables in use. That’s when we got the clue that we had arrived just in time, as they locked the door behind us.

Closing time was 8 p.m. Who knew? — not me. They were happy to seat us and serve us. True to her appetite, my wife had a single taco. True to my appetite, I ate all the chips, had a combo deal, resisted the temptation to lick the plate, and downed a tall horchata.

As I “burped” my way out of the place (sorry, Mexican food sometimes has that effect on me), I determined that we needed to go to Walmart.

When I was asked why I needed to go to Walmart, my response was, “to take a walk.” Fortunately, the missus often agrees with me that a walk is a legitimate reason for going to the store.

And usually those walks don’t cost much over $50, unless one of us decides that we’re running low on soda pop, ice cream, twinkies, ding dongs, potato chips, protein powder and purple, unicorn motif, fleece, throw blankets from the clearance aisle. By “one of us” — I mean me.

Just as we were finishing our walk and approaching the check-out area (with our “walk reward items”), we ran into a long time friend. We hadn’t seen this woman in ages (years) and her 11-year old daughter was a “new person” to us because of the time passed.

We must have stood there for 40 minutes chatting and catching up. A good share of that time was spent with me visiting with the 6th grader and my wife talking to the mom.

Here’s the part (finally) that relates to the title of this column. The girl was very sociable and had no problem making conversation with a mature (old) guy who knew her family and extended family from years ago. We ended up standing side by side and showing each other stuff on our phones.

She laughed, quite hard, when she saw that I had the apps TikTok and Snapchat on my phone. She also laughed a lot when she said, “It’s really funny watching old people navigate their smart phones.” She wasn’t being mean-spirited, but that was the moment I started feeling really dumb, in comparison to her.

This 6-grader could find her way around my phone faster than I could. And I, presumably, know where I have things on the dang thing.

In the spirit of full-disclosure, this isn’t the first time I’ve felt dumb with kids and phones. My granddaughters, again not being mean, know way more about phones and apps than I’ll ever hope to learn.

When we finally said goodbye to our friends, I had two new free apps on my phone. Block Blast reminds me of the old game Tetris.

Capybara Rush is “an exciting endless runner game” according to what I have read on the internet. “Choose your capybara pet pal and get ready to run, dash, race and collect treats and free secret prizes.”

Capybara Rush is characterized as an “insanely addictive game.” Great! — just what I need on my phone.

If you’re like I was the other night, you might be wondering what the heck is a Capybara. Here’s what I learned. It’s the largest living rodent. It’s 77 – 150 pounds (think St. Bernard). It’s native to Central and South America and is considered a very friendly animal.

Back to my “dumbness issue” (make sure you read that carefully), let me set the record straight. Here’s my very brief version of a smattering of information I got when I googled, “Are kids smarter than adults?”

The answer is, “Yes and No.” Adults have more experience and knowledge. Kids seem to often have more creativity and can adapt better than adults. When you get down to the nitty gritty, both groups have their strengths and weaknesses in lots of areas.

I don’t mean to cut this piece too short and leave you hanging, but I’m feeling a need to “get to something.” (Could it be Capybara Rush?)

— Merrill