Shut Up and Bring Me My Food

It has been a long time since I wrote anything not political, so here's a post on my other favorite topic: complaining about "good" service at restaurants.

I understand that restaurant staff (waiters, waitresses, servers, whatevertheywantobecalled) are trained in obsequiousness, but I don't have to like it. They start with "My name is Ignatz, and I'll be taking care of you." No, you won't, unless you're my significant other or a hitman. Eventually you'll be taking my order and with any luck, bringing me what I asked for.

I'm in my sixties, and by this point I have learned to read a menu and decide what I want to eat, ALL BY MYSELF. Sometimes I've even gone online and seen the menu before I've arrived. Yes, I'd like to hear the specials, but I don't want you ask me if I'd like an appetizer, and before I can politely respond, "No, thanks," you begin to recite (as you've been trained) the litany of small plates from the menu, which I've already read. Shut up, and let me order.

Oh, Matthew, you say, you're such a curmudgeon. Damned right I am! As I said, I'm in my sixties, and not only can't I eat as much as I used to, I can't even eat any of the deep-fried, cheesy, sriracha-laced, yummy-sounding concoctions any more.

Don't get me started, Person-Taking-Care-Of-Me. Why would you tell me what your favorite dish is? Have we ever met? Maybe your favorite dish would give me hives. Maybe I'm not in the mood for peanut butter/banana/sushi dessert that is your best seller.

What prompted this rant today? I actually had a server who left me the hell alone, and it was a delight. I don't know her name; she told me, but had no name badge, so I forgot. She helped me choose a dish by asking what I liked. She refilled my beverages and asked me once how I liked my food after it was served. She asked me if I wanted dessert, and most importantly (pay attention here) she did not ask me "Are you sure?" when I politely declined. It's amazing how many servers rudley question me on my certainty of not wanting dessert.

To sum up: I go to restaurants to eat and socialize with the people I'm with. I do not want a relationship with the staff. Okay? Bring me my food.

We're all mad here!

I've always been a fan of Lewis Carroll's Alice books. First as a child, and even more as an adult after reading Martin Gardiner's brilliant "The Annotated Alice," I delighted in the cleverness, the zaniness, the INSANITY of it all. I never thought I'd find myself in a dystopian version of Wonderland, a world in which so much makes no sense that I want to get back to my own side of the looking glass.

If I hadn't seen, heard and lived through the lunacy of the last (almost) two years, I would have thought that a raven is indeed like a writing desk. Could anyone have dreamt these events possible in the 21st century?

• The Senate refused to hold a hearing to a Presidential nominee for the Supreme Court. 
• A wealthy man with no governing experience announces he is running for President of the United States. He loses the popular vote, but wins in the Electoral College, despite the fact that he (among other things):
• Insulted the Hispanic population of the U.S. by calling Mexican immigrants criminals and drug dealers;
• Refused to release his tax returns
• Was shown and heard on tape making disparaging remarks about women;
• Encouraged Russia to hack the Democrats;
• Had a campaign manager that attacked a reporter;
• Had a campaign advisor that is a blatant racist and anti-Semite;
• Had not one specific plan for implementing his ideas;
• Incited his supporters to harm and/or jail his opponent.
• Installed Cabinet Secretaries who by and large want to destroy the departments they head.
• Refused to separate himself from his businesses and brought his (also inexperienced) children in to the White House as advisors.
• The Republican-owned Congress is doing nothing to stop this man from destroying our country.
• Here's the big one:the people who voted for him still support him!

I keep hoping I'll wake up and this will have been some horrific nightmare. But it's real. And it feels like there's no way out.