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03/02/2005: "I said salad, not soup..."

I think the fact that I opened a full-size box of tissues yesterday morning when I got up and I used the last one this morning as I was getting ready to go to work speaks volumes on the number of times I had to blow my nose over the last day.

Though this morning I’ve progressed from a runny nose and sneezing to a completely stuffed up head – to the point that I think my sinus cavities feel like they could explode outward because of all the pressure.

Then to top it all off – Moe brought Sharon over with him last night and by the evening I was feeling good enough (and I could hold off sneezing long enough) to go out and eat something, especially considering I hadn’t eaten all day. I didn’t really have any place in mind – but Sharon and Moe wanted the Olive Garden – no big deal. I’m not terribly fond of the place, but it isn’t bad and the service is usually quite good. Plus I could enjoy the salads and the breadsticks (their main redeeming quality in my book).

I should have figured it out when we sat down and it took a good five minutes for the waiter to show up and take our drink order. The light should have burned even brighter when the drinks showed up after he took our food orders. I really should have said something when he brought out the salad and Sharon’s soup and there were no breadsticks (an my coke was empty at that point). He was flabbergasted when I pointed out that I didn’t want soup (he had two bowls of soup), that I just wanted salad.

It took several minutes for a salad plate to come out and yet there was still no bread and no refill.

Moe and I quickly finished the salad and Sharon had wanted more soup – so after another few minutes I was able to grab his attention and I was like “more soup, more salad, we’d like the breadsticks we never got and now we need to coke refills.” I really didn’t think it was hard – and he only had about 4 tables to wait on.

The two coke refills came out.

Then I see him carrying out the dinners. Not being completely familiar with the dishes at the Olive Garden, he gave Sharon my dinner and I got hers. I don’t like shredded cheese on my meals, but she does, so she had him put the cheese on. After he left we quickly realized that the meals were switched and no mine was covered in grated cheese. That wasn’t his fault I’ll admit, but he should have known the difference in the plates.

Then the salad and the soup shows up, along finally with the first basket of breadsticks (alas, if you think they were baking, you would be wrong since all the other waiters and waitresses were serving their tables breadsticks). There were only 3 breadsticks in the basket so we each took one and before he could leave the table – I handed him the basket and I was asked for some more.

I didn’t even bother trying to get another coke refill after I finished my second one.

I just don’t understand how you can be so completely inattentive to your tables. I understand forgetting something or just messing up once and a while – hell, I know I wouldn’t be the perfect waiter – but come on – I would at least make sure I tried to follow through on everything. Keeps the sodas refilled, make sure there is enough bread and salad and in general, just keep tabs on the table.

The tip-o-meter definitely went down as the evening progressed and I even contemplated complaining, but it wouldn’t have been worth it.

The only highlight was getting to go to CVS and pick up copious amounts of sinus remedies to see what worked.

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