Woman’s Awkward Drive-Thru Chat Goes Viral

By Lydia Patrick

Life & Trends Reporter

ShareNewsweek is a Trust Project member

A woman who regularly goes viral for filming her drive-thru experiences has responded to trolls who claimed she was “rude.”

Frankie Petrino (@frankielovespinkk), 23, from Atlanta, built an online following by capturing her daily conversations with drive-thru workers. While studying at the Savannah College of Art and Design, she worked at a Target Pizza Hut and became disillusioned with the transactional way customers interacted with staff. The Gen Z creator values genuine human connection above anything else and began documenting her own interactions at drive-thrus—a habit that soon blew up online.

A recent visit to an Andy's Frozen Custard drive-thru caused a stir after some viewers accused her of being rude. The original video has garnered 948,300 likes and 7.6 million views. "Sweet treat drive thru except I have [a] nut allergy and she thought I was being rude," she wrote as the text overlay of the video.

Loading tiktok content...

In the clip, Petrino greeted the worker, and revealed that she had almost hit the building before ordering a small Boot Daddy, a concoction of frozen custard, caramel and hot fudge.

She asked whether they had an “extra small,” and then requested a fresh blender since she has a nut allergy.

“Tree nuts happen to murder me. Sorry for the inconvenience, it’s also an inconvenience to my life," she added.

After some confusion about payment, the worker asked if she had ordered the item with the peanut allergy, and Petrino confirmed. When the worker told her not to worry, Petrino replied, “I’m not worried at all,” prompting the employee to ask whether her tone was sarcastic. Petrino explained that her voice simply “doesn’t shift very much.”

Speaking to Newsweek, Petrino said she has a naturally monotone voice and is “very rarely sarcastic.” She added: “I mean everything I say,” explaining that her communication style is straightforward in a world where joking and sarcasm are the norm. She described the interaction as one of her typical drive-thru conversations.

“I have a nut allergy and so I was trying to explain that… I said, you know, I know it’s an inconvenience, I’m sorry about that… And then of course, you know, I said it’s inconvenienced me too, trying to relate to them.”

Petrino also clarified that the viral moment was only one part of a longer, friendly exchange. With the window open, the two chatted while waiting for the allergy-safe item to be prepared. They engaged in reciprocal conversation and even played two truths and a lie.

...

However, TikTok commenters weren’t as convinced.

“I hate customers who try to tell jokes with monotone voices,” said Gilly.

“It’s giving Holly Madison when she’s being mean but playing it off like she’s awkwardly funny,” said Zoe.

“Making jokes and trying to riff with a flat, monotone voice is NOT the move girl,” wrote former Starbucks worker Raegan.

“You can’t do monotone voice with jokes. It sounds super sarcastic,” another user added.

"I think it's a very saddening thing that hatred is a lot more normalized online than kindness. And so it's saddening to see, but I also know that the 400,000-something people that follow me are just some more people trying to spread kindness," Petrino told Newsweek.

Others defended her. On X, Amber (@deerestbones) wrote: “I'm too autistic for ts… i thought this was a completely normal interaction.”

Loading twitter content...

Another viewer added: “As an autistic person who interacts with others a bit like this it lowkey hurts to see every react negatively, she seems so sweet.”

"As for questions about my diagnoses or, as the internet phrases it, 'what is wrong' with me, I don’t have much to say other than I am just being myself.

"I am saddened that our modern-day society tends to believe that in order to accept someone different than them, they must first hear an explanation for those differences. Diagnosing creators on the internet has had a big (negative) effect on creators' mental health as it feels dehumanizing," Petrino said.

Petrino says her content is built around “human connection,” a value shaped by her time working in food service, where she often felt reduced to “a transaction.”

After graduating and returning to Atlanta, she found comfort in chatting to drive-thru workers during her job search. “I try to speak to everyone as if they’re a friend of mine,” she said.

While backlash can be disheartening, she says she rarely questions herself for long.

"I know that I'm a little bit weird. I know that I'm not I know I'm treating situations a little bit differently than other people."

"I base my platform on is kindness and human connection," she said.

Above all, Petrino hopes her videos encourage people to talk more, connect more, and treat every interaction as an opportunity—not a transaction.

Petrino said: "I don’t have a specific reason for the way I am, other than that I’ve always been a bit eccentric, bubbly, and talkative. I’ve always loved talking to everyone and making people smile and laugh. There’s nothing I love more than watching a stranger become a friend in a mere moment of vulnerability and kindness.

"I hope one day our world, including the online world, can learn to smile more, hug more, and to accept others as they come."

Do you have funny and adorable videos or pictures of your pet you want to share? Send them to [email protected] with some details about your best friend and they could appear in our Pet of the Week lineup.

Request Reprint & LicensingSubmit CorrectionView Editorial & AI Guidelines