Wow, this board gets some pretty good discussions going. I just joined, 'though I've been reading it for a few weeks now. Just to add my two cents - I watched every show, most of the way through. In general I found it pretty entertaining, but far from a docudrama. There were certainly some good (and some not so good) parallells to my experiences in starting and running restaurants. Hope you won't think it too naive of me to say, however, that in my experience the restaurant industry has become much more professional in recent years than what was depicted at Rocco's. (Anthony Bordain's Kitchen Confidential not withstanding - great book, but parts of it made me cringe. You just can't do some of that stuff anymore, thankfully.) Think that's what a lot of you other restaurant pros out there are complaining about - that too many people outside of the industry will take this over-characterization too seriously?. Definitely agree with the post that said this would make good tape for HR training in what not to do! A couple of comments: Going back to the pay issue - seems to me it wasn't necessarily for lack of funds, rather that the proper payroll procedures were not in place. Definitely not right to expect employees to wait for corporate glitches to be corrected, but it does happen. Opening under pressure, when not quite ready - in my experience this is often the case, especially with independents. At crunch time the decision has to be made whether to go ahead unfinished and start the cash flow, or to finish off the last detail while time's awasting. We did a major renovation a few years ago, and were literally setting tables, restocking the coolers and vacuuming up sawdust within hours before opening. I can relate. Rocco??? What were you thinking with those sexual inuendos and what some have interpreted sexist/racist remarks? You know we save those for after hours or at least off camera. Can't blame the editing for that - unless they scripted it for you. You should know better! I thought Mama raised a gentleman! Well, thanks for letting me have my say. This is fun. Love seeing everyone's reactions and comments!