We went out to a very well reviewed neighborhood place here in Seattle last night to celebrate our 2nd Anniversary. We had been seated, wine had been poured, we were looking forward to a great evening. My wife got up to go to the washroom, and when she came back, as she was sliding into the booth....disaster. A (previously) unseen splinter caught my wife's sweater and pulled a thread, effectively (according to my wife,) ruining it. My wife was devastated. We are scraping by on my income, she is shooting out resumes as fast as she can, but, well, in this job market....The sweater that she was wearing was the one nice sweater that she had for interviews, and it will be a real stretch to get another one. The server and the manager both came over and remarked how sorry they were, and not really anything else. We tried to put it behind us and enjoy our meal. (It was delicious, btw.) We were thinking that we would have wedding cake for dessert. The waitress came up and we said that we were not really interested in dessert, whereupon she said that the restauraunt wanted to buy us dessert. We (to be honest, somewhat stunned) had dessert and left. We did not really want to make a big deal about it at the time and ruin our evening, but it is now the next morning and I am kind of pissed. I talked to a friend of mine who is the manager at another place here in town and he said AT LEAST they should have comped her meal. Especially since her sweater was so expensive. So. Is there any kind of liability on the restaurants part, and /or would it be out of line to write them a letter asking to be reimbursed for the sweater?