Embarrassed or bugged by dinner companions

[Xanthippe]

Cell phones are banned in most Japanese restaurants, even the Denny's type ones!

They are also banned in trains and there are quite heavy fines if one is caught talking and driving!

As it should be . . .

And the louder one squawks, the bigger the fine!! Show no mercy.

[Suzanne F]

He Who Only Eats grew up on spaghetti with tomato juice and American cheese. But g-d bless him, he knew there had to be more to life. I fed him his first oyster :sniff sniff: and introduced him to a gustatory world he has grown to love. We have explored Thai and Sichuan and all sorts of great stuff together.

HOWEVER: he has trouble holding his liquor, wine actually, so by the time we were 2/3 through dinner at Jean Georges, he was trying to nibble me as much as the food. This is not really a complaint.

[Jaymes]

My problem is my dear sweet father. He is such a fine man and I adore him. He is a pillar of integrity - a WWII hero. He flew the Flying Fortress in the same unit as the Memphis Bell and has the battle scars and flack wounds and limp to prove it.

But he tips like it's still 1940. And if I say anything, he gets mad and tells me I don't know the value of a dollar.

I respect him too much to argue with him, especially in a public forum. And he's very proud and if he catches me "adding a little" it humilates him - like a direct affront to his manhood and ability to take care of his family (remember when men used to feel that way?).

So I've taken to saying I'm "going to the ladies" on toward the end of the meal and tracking down our server.

But yes, Papa, it doth buggeth me.

Edited April 15, 2003 by Jaymes (log)

[maggiethecat]

HOWEVER: he has trouble holding his liquor, wine actually, so by the time we were 2/3 through dinner at Jean Georges, he was trying to nibble me as much as the food.    This is not really a complaint. 

Suzanne:

This is pretty romantic, actually. I should jolly well hope it's not a complaint!

Ah...being badly behaved in restaurants for all the right reasons!

Another thread, perhaps?

[Bux]

My problem is my dear sweet father.  He is such a fine man ...

But he tips like it's still 1940.

Moments ago, I posted about my father's tipping practices in the France board. There were restaurants I would not go back to lest they remember us. He was a generous man, who always had a handout for every wino with a hand out, but his idea of a proper tip just fell behind the times and he was also a man who couldn't take advice, or anything that resembled help, from his offspring. I could not risk leaving an extra tip. If he ever noticed it, it would have killed him.

[smallworld]

Cell phones are banned in most Japanese restaurants, even the Denny's type ones!

They are also banned in trains and there are quite heavy fines if one is caught talking and driving!

Yeah, now if only this were actually enforced!

A few years ago, after saving for months, I took my husband out for a surprise anniversary dinner at the New York Grill (this place deserves a whole thread for itself, by the way!). It was great up until the beginning of the main course when a young couple was seated next to us. First thing they do after sitting was plunk their cellphones down on the table, followed by their cigarettes and lighters. The constant smoking through the meal was annoying enough but even worse was their loud phone calls. Thankfully they ordered the course without taking any time to read the menu and plowed through their meal, so they were gone by desert.

But they weren't my dining companions so that story doesn't count. My embarrassing moments are really similar to yours, Torakris- all in Japan, all involving non-Japanese, all involving complaining and picky questions in English. Amazing how many ignorant people there are!

For some reason, these people all seem to hate ice. Why is that??

[snowangel]

But he tips like it's still 1940.  And if I say anything, he gets mad and tells me I don't know the value of a dollar. 

It was, in our family, my grandmother. She always left a quarter. My tactic, however, was a bit different. I would always "forget" something at the table and search out the server and leave an appropriate tip.

We went out to eat with a group of people the other night, and someone at the table, as I ordered, questioned what I was ordering. "You should really order this instead of that, that sounds yucky, why would anyone order that?" I ordered just what I wanted, and finally said "BECAUSE I WANT TO EAT THIS FOOD. NOT THE FOOD YOU WANT ME TO EAT." It was an early evening.

[pariah_kerry]

My entire family are rabid sports fans. At my birthday dinner, my father brought a walkman and listened to a hockey game throughout dinner. Conversations were peppered with updates on who scored, etc... Love him, but I wanted to kill him.

[docsconz]

My most embarrassing moment at a restaurant was a few years ago when we brought my father to what was at that time my favorite local Italian restaurant. My father was a semblance of his former self. He could still walk and communicate, but had lost some inhibitions. I had come to know the chef/owner and asked him to prepare some specific dishes ahead of time to please my father. While the dishes were quite good, they did not precisely fit my father's specific mindset, a fact he made no bones about. The chef left with a "headache". While I apologized later to the chef, the restaurant was never quite the same for me.

[Fresser]

My ex-boyfriend (whose face, thank God, grows more and more dim with every passing day) claimed to be "allergic" or was seriously opposed to the following:

ALL fruits and ALL vegetables.  All .  No salads.  No juices.  No side of broccoli.  No haricots verts.  No ragouts.  No roasted vegetable pasta.  No fresh summer tomato with salt.  Nothing .  He said that fruits and vegetables made his throat swell up. 

He makes me, needless to say, want to puke.

Nothing will seem embarrassing or annoying after him.  No one.  Nothing.

EDIT: to say FritzBrenner, remember him?

Nero,

How long did it take you to dump this ding-dong?

Ooops...that's probably another food he wouldn't eat.

I, on the other hand, enjoy all types of food. Hint, hint...

[Lady T]

Nero --

I admit a momentary curiosity: what in Hell did he eat? And did he at least cook it himself, and make enough for you?

Glad for you that he's history, though.

[SobaAddict70]

heh.

I once had dated a guy who was allergic to GARLIC and ONIONS. No shallots. No scallions. No spicy food. Anything "ethnic" was out.

French was ok. Austrian was ok. English was ok. Anything European, north of the Alps and west of the Danube was generally ok. American? Give me a break. (Although he thinks that Larry Forgione had the right idea, just the wrong citizenship.)

Needless to say, he and I have parted ways a VERY LONG time ago.

Soba

[NeroW]

My ex-boyfriend (whose face, thank God, grows more and more dim with every passing day) claimed to be "allergic" or was seriously opposed to the following:

ALL fruits and ALL vegetables.  All .  No salads.  No juices.  No side of broccoli.  No haricots verts.  No ragouts.  No roasted vegetable pasta.  No fresh summer tomato with salt.  Nothing .  He said that fruits and vegetables made his throat swell up. 

He makes me, needless to say, want to puke.

Nothing will seem embarrassing or annoying after him.  No one.  Nothing.

EDIT: to say FritzBrenner, remember him?  

Nero,

How long did it take you to dump this ding-dong?

Ooops...that's probably another food he wouldn't eat.

I, on the other hand, enjoy all types of food. Hint, hint...

Too long, my friend. Too long.

EDIT: I didn't see you Lady T. The only thing he cooked for himself was grilled chicken breast, with white rice. He cooked this in advance each week. Then he coated the whole mess with that brown-colored El Paso taco sauce. He cooked some for me once when he thought I could stand to lose some weight. A whole week's worth. He told me I could mix it with salsa instead of taco sauce, if I wanted. This was his idea of generosity. I didn't eat it.

Edited April 15, 2003 by NeroW (log)

[Jaymes]

My problem is my dear sweet father.  He is such a fine man ...

But he tips like it's still 1940.

I could not risk leaving an extra tip. If he ever noticed it, it would have killed him.

Yes. I know. Which is why I try to track down the servers away from the table.

If I can't manage it, I just always hope that perhaps the server has a "father" too -

And understands.

[sparrowgrass]

The Evil One (the ex-husband) used to insist that I order the same meal that he did whenever we went out. Can you say "control freak", boys and girls?

[torakris]

The Evil One (the ex-husband) used to insist that I order the same meal that he did whenever we went out.  Can you say "control freak", boys and girls?

Wow! See why he is an ex!

My in-laws aren't quite that bad, they don't control what I eat, but they always go to the same 3 restaurants and they always order the exact same dish, when I order something different then the last time I was there my MIL comments but I though you liked such and such.

[JAZ]

The significant other of a friend of mine is so awful at restaurants that I won't go out with them anymore. I've only eaten out at restaurants with her three times, but each time, she sent at least one dish back. Here's what happened at the last dinner out:

She ordered a vegetable spring roll appetizer and an entree of halibut or salmon, but the fish was paired with with some kind of bean puree, which she didn't want. So she asked the waiter to substitute "some other vegetable" for the beans.

Anyway, the spring roll came and was beautiful (and good too). I'm not sure why she didn't like it, maybe because it was fried. She divided it among the rest of us and asked the waiter for a simple green salad.

So her salad arrived when the rest of us were practically done with our starter course. She ate about half of it.

The entrees arrived and hers came with some roasted root vegetables. Now, obviously, the vegetables were meant to go with a meat entree -- they seemed to be tossed in a demi-glace. Well, on the one hand, she doesn't eat chicken or red meat and the vegetables weren't particularly well suited to the entree, but on the other hand, she already requested one substitution and didn't specify what sort of vegetables she wanted. So, I don't know, if it had been me, I'd have just eaten the fish (which she said was excellent). Instead, she called the waiter over to check on what was on the vegetables. When she found out, she asked him to remove them and just bring the fish back with some lemon wedges. So then, apparently, the fish was past its prime, because then she bitched about that (to us, not to the waiter, merci a Dieu) and finally just asked for it to be put into a container to take home.

Now the problem is that her SO keeps asking me to meet them for dinner and I have to keep making excuses. But no way am I going to a restaurant again with her.

[sparrowgrass]

Girlfriend, that is the least of the reasons that he is an ex.

[awbrig]

Why did he want you to order the same thing? You would think he would want you to order something different so he could try something else in addition to his own dinner, at least I would...

[sparrowgrass]

Me, too, sugar, but he didn't share his food. (Or much of anything else, come to thing of it.)

[Adam Balic]

We went out to eat with a group of people the other night, and someone at the table, as I ordered, questioned what I was ordering.  "You should really order this instead of that, that sounds yucky, why would anyone order that?"  I ordered just what I wanted, and finally said "BECAUSE I WANT TO EAT THIS FOOD.  NOT THE FOOD YOU WANT ME TO EAT."  It was an early evening.

Weird. Last year I went out on a work dinner and ordered either duck or boudin noir. A scatty work college made a vary similar comment, but also when on a bit about how disgusting it X was how could anybody possibly eat X etc etc. Well it was the middle of winter and I was slightly depressed, so rather then being my normal polite self I replied "Actually, what is fucking disgusting is having to eat at the same table as somebody who doesn't have enough fucking clues to know how fucking rude they are by making ignorant comments about somebodies dinner". I wish I hadn't done that now, although the startled expression on her face, when I said "ignorant" almost made it worth while.

n.b. She had already pissed me off by ordering a rare steak and sending it back three times to be "cooked properly". When asked to expand on what she actually wanted she said "It doesn't matter if it is called rare or medium-rare or well done, I just want it cooked. Why wont they just the cook it?". Cretin.

[tissue]

My date and I were either at Le Cirque.

It was dessert course, he looked at my dessert and yelled: "What's that black shit in your ice cream?"

I stared at him. It's vanilla you idiot. Vanilla.

[Fresser]

n.b. She had already pissed me off by ordering a rare steak and sending it back three times to be "cooked properly". When asked to expand on what she actually wanted she said "It doesn't matter if it is called rare or medium-rare or well done, I just want it cooked. Why wont they just the cook it?". Cretin.

This buffoon should have been served a peanut-butter sandwich. On stale bread.

[coolranch]

Spent a weekend awhile ago out of town with another couple, and a single friend. Whenever we'd settle up our dinner bill, one guy designated himself as the accountant and tallied up the total (including tip) on his damn palm pilot.

We took him at his word, without looking at the check, and antied up.

I found out after two days of this, he was only including a 15% tip--no matter how the service was.

I wanted to go back to all the places we ate and hand them cash.

A college friend of my husband has this girlfriend who is delightful...until her second cocktail. Then she becomes loud, surly, rude to waitstaff, sassy. We only meet them for lunch now.

[NeroW]

Well it was the middle of winter and I was slightly depressed, so rather then being my normal polite self I replied "Actually, what is fucking disgusting is having to eat at the same table as somebody who doesn't have enough fucking clues to know how fucking rude they are by making ignorant comments about somebodies dinner". I wish I hadn't done that now, although the startled expression on her face, when I said "ignorant" almost made it worth while.

n.b. She had already pissed me off by ordering a rare steak and sending it back three times to be "cooked properly". When asked to expand on what she actually wanted she said "It doesn't matter if it is called rare or medium-rare or well done, I just want it cooked. Why wont they just the cook it?". Cretin.

Ha! That rules.