I think it's important for married people to date. Each other of course. Otherwise it just gets messy.
Some of my work friends asked us to meet up with them last night at this sushi place called Shiki.
It's not a very fancy looking place, Jacksonville doesn't really have fancy places to eat. 'Dress Code' in J-ville means you don't bring a concealed weapon or wear gang colours. It doesn't mean 'Jacket & Tie Required'.
But some of the best places I've ever eaten at were holes in the wall, and we really wanted to have dinner out, so we accepted the invitation.
The evening started off badly right off the bat. Most of you know that I live in a rural-ish area right next to a Marine Corps base. It took forever to even get out onto the highway from my area. Traffic was really backed up. We were setting out at a bad time, but even so...
Got up to the turnoff to the highway, and found out there was a big accident that was blocking 3 ways of traffic. Rush hour traffic. I was driving, and I was so angry. Nothing worse for me than just standing still in a car.
I'd rather take the long way round and just keep driving. But we were trapped in at this point, there was no other way out. Always awesome to start off an evening out with intense road rage.
We get to the place, and walk in and it IS a little hole in the wall, but it's packed. All of my friends were at seperate tables. My friend E said that they started pushing tables together when they got there and the server/bartender guy freaked out and said we couldn't because the fire marshall wouldn't allow tables being pushed together. Tables must be 3 feet apart.
Ok...
Well in that case, we just shoved ourselves around two tables instead of three, so that we were all closer together.
We finally settled in and took in the atmosphere. It was very busy, and the server looked very harried. I asked E what was up with that?
"He told us that the old woman that runs the place is cheap, and fired everyone else so it was just him working tonight."
Wow. This dude, lets call him Mumbles (because that's what he did when he talked) had to run around to every table, serve the drinks, take the orders, take payments...he was not a happy camper.
When Mumbles came back out to take the rest of our order sheets and saw us all sitting closer together, he was even less happy. Apparently the old woman would be angry with him for letting us seat 4 people to a table (even though they were 4 person tables, with one side shoved against the wall). We let him know that if she wanted our money, which we would be collectively spending a lot of, she couldn't be too angry. He looked at us like, 'Ok, it's your funeral.' Well, maybe he thought it was going to be his funeral.
I had a lot of fun talking with my friends. We talked. And talked. Talked some more....filling up the wait time with banter.
Hmm, more talking. Awkward silence. Some more talking.
Man, the food was taking a long time!!
Finally, some of my friends got their food. Some of us didn't.
More talking whilst watching them eat. Some more friends got their food. Three of us didn't, including Chuck and I.
Talking...
A few of my friends were already finished eating. I thought I'd slip off to the bathroom, because that always seems to be the time food will finally arrive.
The bathroom was a single person, hole in the wall-style bathroom. As expected. I went in to check my hair and make-up before I took a pee, because that's what ladies do.
Hm. No mirror over the sink. I looked towards the toilet, and oh. There was the mirror. Right above the toilet. And I'm talkin' right above. You'd have to be bending over or straddling the toilet backwards to see into it. I shook my head, and turned to sit down. Forget the hair and make-up.
Oh. There was the real mirror. A full-length one even. On the wall opposite the toilet. Right in front of the toilet. Why check your hair and make-up before or after you pee when you can do it at the same time??
I was so surprised at how absurd this was, I sat there and laughed the whole time. You pee faster when you're laughing, don't ya know? The one-person-at-a-time bathroom wasn't THAT small. There was plenty of alternative wall space to place a full length mirror.
After I watched myself pee (which I have never done before, I guess there's a first time for everything) I went to wash my hands, still laughing. I dried them on paper towel and threw the paper towel in the...
Wait. Where's the wastebasket? Is it on the other side of the cabinet? No. Is it hiding on the other side of the toilet? No. I open the door to the cabinet that holds the sink, maybe it's under there? Nope.
I had noticed a pile of wadded up paper towels sitting on the edge of the sink. Now I know why they're there. I thought it was because people were lazy. But it was because there was no freaking trash bin.
It's funny, you never realize what a regular routine using the bathroom is, until your regular routine is interrupted.
Anyway, I added my paper towels to the pile and I went out to find the food still not there. The friends that were finished were talking about what they were going to do afterwards, and then said 'Not that we're going to leave before you get to eat!'. How sad that they even felt they needed to say that. I don't know if I've ever waited for food so long. If Chuckles and I had been by ourselves, I'm sure we would have left.
Our food finally came when most of the place was empty except the gang of us. It was pretty good, but not spectacular enough to make up for the wait, and for how much the bill was. I'm really glad to have gone out and chatted with friends (if any of you are reading this, THAT was fun :)). But jeez.
This wasn't the worst restaurant experience we've ever had, but it was close.What was your worst restaurant experience ever, Dear Reader?
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