Quarantine boredom is setting in....

Let’s play a game, what’s the funniest thing you’ve seen or encountered at a restaurant

I’ll start, with photographic evidence no less

Wife, daughter(not the mom) and I took the grandkids out to dinner at a local Mexican joint last summer

Place was packed, and they had a guy doing face painting for the kids

He was kinda creepy looking, but whatever, gave the daughter $5 for the tip and off she went with both kids

Came back 10 minute later, here is the older kid, apparently she asked to be a unicorn, I had to ask to figure that out

I wanted to confront the guy and give him some friendly advice, but the wife talked me out of it

They went to Walmart after dinner, granddaughter cried and wouldn’t wash it off before they went

Glad I drove separately....

Mrs.BurtonRW and I were once at an Olive Garden (I know - that was our first mistake) when we asked our waitress for some oregano, which they didn't have on the table.

She didn't know what oregano was. She wasn't sure they had any. She had to write it down when we told her to go ask in the kitchen and assured her that they would know what it was and produce some for us. Literally had no clue what oregano was... waiting tables at an Olive Garden.

Our other best story happened at one of our favorite restaurants in Stuart, FL (which I won't name b/c it's a great place that we frequent when we're down there). The service from our waiter was SO bad - ridiculously bad. He was completely absent from the floor and on one of the rare occasions when he showed up and refilled our drinks, he literally poured them all over the table. First Mrs.BurtonRW's water... we didn't say when and he didn't stop pouring until her glass had overflowed by several ounces at least. Then, he did the exact same thing with my iced tea. Things were so ludicrous by then that we just watched in amazement. No reason to stop him. We were both seriously looking for a hidden camera, it was that over the top. I was convinced we were on a hidden camera show. He did not get a tip.

-Rob

Was hanging out at the bar at a "Texas Roadhouse" back in college because I was dating a waitress. She was serving a table of East Cleveland's finest "Sunday Church Folk" that had taken the drive to the burbs for what I assume they thought was a high-falutin' meal. Loud color suits with church crowns and all.

When the salads were delivered all hell broke loose. Church lady jumped up on the table, all floor is lava style, screaming at the top of her lungs. "Deys bugs in ma plate, deys bugs in ma plate"! Hilarity and chaos ensued. Seems the romaine was chock full of tiny insects. They stormed out with gift cards screaming racist tirades that whitey was trying to poison them. Once arriving outside their POS GM G-body hooptie with $4,000 rented wheels wouldn't start. They then took the RTA home! I still laugh about it 20 years later.

During the first tech bubble, we lived in Silicon Valley. Things were so tight in the job market that the people who led you to the open tables in restaurants were getting hired as HR managers, getting stock options, and cashing in. Everywhere you looked there were 'Help Wanted' signs.

Well, our family went into a Carrows, one of our favorites at the time, and ordered. Our family and one older couple were the only folks in the place and we were seated next to one another.

Waters and iced teas show up, waitress chats us up and talks with the older couple. Time passes, drinks were gone, and cheerfully replaced. Repeat. Repeat again. No food. Kids start getting antsy and we look at our watches....been 65 minutes since we sat down?!?!?. Wife and I start talking to each other about what to do, and the older couple chimes in.

"Our daughter is the waitress. They only had the one cook working, and he got a new job offer just now and quit with no notice."

Yeah. With that, we put a few dollars on the table for the iced teas, and headed out for fast food.

Funny in retrospect; with hungry toddlers, not so much so at the time.

I lived in Houston in the 1980s. There was a popular but mediocre BBQ place called House of Beef.

My friends and I went there after school one day and there was a sign on the door that said "Sorry. We are out of Beef."

It's not that funny, but the idea of the House of Beef being out of beef still cracks me up to this day.

In high school I was a busboy at an Italian restaurant. High class table-cloth joint. The youngest waitress and the manager were shacked up every afternoon and would have a late dinner. Sometimes the gal's mom had to stand at attention and serve the meal. The whole place was deep Italian, that was all the kitchen spoke (although somehow I knew what they were talking about sometimes, so they thought I knew some Italian).

One night this family of seven comes in. Five of them are under eight years of age. The kids are throwing pasta like it is spring training. Manager says "Let them eat in peace (the parents) so we ignored the action. When the family finally left, I was the one on my hands and knees cleaning up the carpeting, while the packed restaurant (with patrons waiting for the table) watched.

I used to be a bus boy in high school and one evening a table of Mom and Dad, Son and Son's wife were arguing over who was going to pay. This is not uncommon but as I was passing the table a short time later, the father reached across the table, grabbed the Son's shirt, and punched him in the face, twice!
Needless to say everyone around them was shocked... The father then jumped up shouting "I'm paying" and stormed up to the front to pay. Not sure I'd be that upset if someone else was paying for me...
Weird at the time, but definitely funny in retrospect.

Not funny, but shocking. Went to eat at Applebee's in college with a bunch of friends, probably 12 at the table to watch the VA Tech game. They never cleared the table the whole time. When the waiter brought the entrees he set them on top of our appetizer plates, 40 empty glasses on the table. Finally I got up found the manager and asked him to clear the table since the waiter was not. He grabbed one pile of plates and said next round of drinks are on him. No one ever cleared the table. There wasn't even room to sign our checks, we had to move to a different table to get surface area to sign on. The only time I've ever not tipped a waiter. I simply wrote on the tip line "Get another job." I wish I still had a picture of what the table looked like when I left.

I had a little hole in the wall Taqueria I liked going to, and I got to know the owner a little bit. I was telling him about my wife, who loves to give me shit, calling me a puss, etc. when it came to hot sauces. The hotter the better for her. He say's he make's his own, but keeps it behind the counter as it was VERY hot.

So, I take the wife there. I tell her about the sauce, of course she want's it. The owner tell's her "It's VERY VERY hot." She insists, talking about me being a lightweight, she likes hot sauces, blah blah blah. He whips out the sauce and she slathers it on her tacos.

Needless to say, as she is sitting there complaining in misery, I'm laughing my butt off. She swore I had set her up, but the owner assured her that was his regularly made sauce.

quote:

Originally posted by ChicagoSigMan:
I lived in Houston in the 1980s. There was a popular but mediocre BBQ place called House of Beef.

My friends and I went there after school one day and there was a sign on the door that said "Sorry. We are out of Beef."

It's not that funny, but the idea of the House of Beef being out of beef still cracks me up to this day.

The best BBQ joints run out of beef all the time - sometimes ribs, too. That is, cooked brisket. They barbeque what the smokers will hold the day and night before, and often sell out well before demand is met. Snows, Franklins, Truth, others - all sell out by the middle of the day on a weekend. They don't have the capacity to meet weekend demand.

Found half a broken hypodermic needle in a steak at a Western Sizzling' in Athens TN circa 1988 while there on an audit. Luckily with my knife not mouth.

The waitress called over a manager, and by the time he arrived me and the three guys with me had made it pretty funny. One offered that his brother was an attorney and had been waiting for this day.

Manager was a little surprised and in an effort of magnanimous customer service and concern picked up our check and said "Here, let me take care of that. Well, the entrees anyway."

Uh, say WHAT??

So we paid for teas at a meal I nearly shoved a needle in my pallet. Hilarious. No more $5 steaks for me.

I was at a new to me restaurant in KC MO with some family members. Had to visit the john. There was an anteroom common to both johns.

After doing my business I left the john then opened an anteroom door to return to the restaurant. But the door I opened was for a broom closet, rather than the exit door. I stood there a moment, slightly baffled.

Unfortunately for me, my SIL had just emerged from the ladies’ and saw my confusion. She laughed out loud. I was embarrassed!

But, yes, funny in retrospect.

quote:

Originally posted by BurtonRW:

She didn't know what oregano was. She wasn't sure they had any. She had to write it down when we told her to go ask in the kitchen and assured her that they would know what it was and produce some for us. Literally had no clue what oregano was... waiting tables at an Olive Garden.

That's actually not surprising at all that she didn't know what oregano was (since she likely never interacted with any in the restaurant) or even that the kitchen might not have any at all. Little to no food at Olive Garden is actually prepared on site with base ingredients. It's premade at corporate factories, packaged up (generally frozen in bags), and then shipped to the restaurants. Most of the "cooking" done in the kitchen is simply reheating the premade food by putting the frozen bag in a large pot of boiling water or by sticking the premade meal in a broiler.

It's not anything close to a real "Italian restaurant"... It's Chef Boyardee with higher prices and nice tablecloths.

Funny / Gross:
I was eating at a truck stop when some bikers arrived. One of them walked up to the large window that faced the dining room, plucked a June Bug off the glass and proceeded to to pop it into his mouth. He stood there grinning maniacally while he slowly chewed the bug.
Uhhhh.... Check please!
I used to frequent a pizza joint that had a large window that let you look into the kitchen and see your pizza being made. On one visit, the cooks were tossing pepperonis onto the glass. The pepperonis briefly stuck to the glass and then began to slowly slide down the window, leaving a greasy track behind them. The cooks thought that was hilarious. Me, not so much!

Many moons ago while on summer break from college, myself and a few buddies were hanging out at the bar of a neighborhood restaurant / tavern type place (in either Katonah or Pleasantville NY) having some beers and just shooting the breeze and catching up with each other.

A couple of barstools over a local lightweight was catching up on his sleep, with his head resting upon his folded arms as he merrily snoozed away right there at the bar. The hawt bartender did not seem to mind as she simply ignored him and kept on going about her business of serving her other customer’s.

About an hour or so later Mr. Sleepy-drunk-guy begins waking up, and as he nonchalantly lifts his head to look around to see what’s going on, as-if he’d been awake the entire time, he grabs hold of a nearby bottle of Heinz ketchup and begins hoisting to his mouth for a thirst quenching sip.

My friend who was closest to the fella says “Ketchup. Ketchup!! Ketchup!!!” directly to him, but to no avail. When he put his condiment up to his mouth and realized what had just happened, along with the college assholes laughing their asses off (we weren’t laughing at him, we were laughing with him. sure.), he high-tailed out of there.

Fun times!

Went to Hooters, ordered a beer and dinner. A coworker with me ordered sweet tea and dinner. Midway thru his tea I see him pull something out of his mouth. It's a plastic fake finger nail, that has obviously lost its glue.

The manager and waitress were very apologetic, offering to fix the situation with a free meal. Couldn't help but notice the waitress was missing 2 additional finger nails.

I had eaten at that Hooters 10 years earlier and had a waitress who was a full 8 months pregnant.

Early in my business(late 1980s), I had to line up meetings with various suppliers in a region of the country and pull them all off in a day and a half in order minimize my travel costs.

After getting up at 3am to make the long drive to the airport and fly to another part of the country, rent a car and make it in time for an 8:30am appointment, my day started earlier than normal.

The next appointment was about 3-4 hours away and required driving straight through, no lunch. I made that meeting on time and concluded it about 3pm or so. I was famished and about to drive another 2-3 hours to my overnight destination and a late dinner meeting, but there was time for a decent lunch.

I was able to pull into a Red Lobster about 3:30pm. It was open but with almost no one there, I was certain I could get quick service. After skipping breakfast and lunch, and operating on about 4 hours of sleep, I was ready to sit down to a good meal. Once I ordered, I decided to wash up and use the restroom.

This Red Lobster was set up exactly like the one at home, so I knew my way around. I headed straight to the bathroom.

I was in a bit of a fog, but I thought it was a bit curious that the men's room didn't have urinals. I was pondering this oddity as I washed my hands when I noticed in the mirror that there were some odd boxes mounted on the wall behind me. As I focused my gaze on the boxes, it began to dawn on me why there weren't any urinals in that men's room. The boxes were Kotex/tampon dispensers.

As I said earlier, this Red Lobster had the exact same floor plan as the one at home. Except, they had men's and women's restrooms reversed.

Luckily I was alone in that restroom and I practically ran out of there as I was drying my hands. As I walked back to my table, no one had seemed to notice my mistake. No heads were turned, no one was acting out of the ordinary and, fortunately, the police were not called. But I know my face was red and I was prepared to offer any and all apologies needed, plus a fully reasoned explanation as to why I wasn't a pervert.



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Not exactly a restaurant encounter but a cafeteria one...
When I was in college I worked in the women's cafeteria washing dishes and supplying food & beverages to the serving line to help pay for my room & board. (These were the ancient days of old when women had separate dorms and separate cafeterias lest the genders mix for nefarious reasons - yes, I'm that old!!). There were about 10-12 men who did this and we sat at a separate table from the women when we ate meals (I assume because they didn't want to associate with us )
One evening, a coed walked behind our table and somehow dropped her entire serving tray onto the terrazo floor, braking plates, dishes, and glassware, and making a very loud noise thus getting the attention of the entire coed population of several hundred. She was embarrassed and started to clean up the mess and one of the guys I worked with stood up from our table and loudly proclaimed "No, no, little lady, let me clean that up for you!" He got down on his hands and knees and started to pull all the debris into a pile so he could then clean it up. In the middle of the mess, he found a slice of tomato on the floor. He held it up in the air so all could see, cleaned off any glass that might have been on it and proceeded to eat it. The place erupted into gasps and more than a few screams as several women got up and left the room. He proceeded to clean up the mess, returned to our table and sat down beside me. He looked at me and said "You know, I've always really hated tomatoes."

I went into a diner in NE Pennsylvania for lunch and a waitress with a rather obnoxious sounding voice asked me: "Do you know what you want".

So, I asked her for a waitress with a better attitude.

I was asked to leave.

Wednesday I had the weirdest take out experience, ever. LOL I called ahead to make sure this Chinese restaurant was doing carry out, then went to pick up my date for the evening. Once I had ascertained that she did like Chinese, I called back and placed my order. The woman gave me my total and said "Call back when you get here."

So I pulled into the parking lot 10 minutes later and called.

"Hey, this is Allen. I ordered some take out?"
"You here?"
"Yes ma'am, I'm in the silver Jeep by the light pole."
"You see the table by the front door?"
"Uhhh…yes ma'am."
"You go to table, there is a bowl. Put your credit card or cash in the bowl, then get back in car. We come get payment, then bring you your food. Once we get inside, you get out of your car and get your food. You understand?"
"Yes ma'am."

I felt like I should have had a sniper team watching over me.