It must have been national Awful Service Day in restaurants across the county yesterday.
I met up with my friend Nicole for lunch yesterday in Neenah. We hadn't seen each other in a few weeks due to that whole holiday madness and we each had the afternoon off, so we decided to meet and grab a bite to eat. We went to Applebee's and were seated promptly by a not-so-very-friendly wait staff. Our waitress showed up and got our drink order and then disappeared into that place where waitresses go.
And we waited. We had only asked for a minute or two more to peruse the menu and make our decision. We should have asked for 30 seconds since that minute turned into 10. But she finally came back, took our order and disappeared again.
She brought our food, returned once with drink refills and eventually brought our check and change. The quality of her service wasn't too terrible (I've had much worse service at Applebee's in the 'burg), but I think the thing that annoyed me was her very soft voice. I mean, busy, loud restaurant and we could barely hear her. Not too good. But tolerable.
Then last night, my parents came down to see my Christmas tree and take me to dinner. We went to Fratello's, which I've heard is normally quite good.
Maybe the first problem was the time. We never even left my apartment until 7:30. And considering I usually eat dinner around 6, that's kind of late for a big meal for me. But anyway, we went, got seated, were told our waitress would be with us in a minute and once again, were left to peruse the menus.
Sure, our waitress came. About 15 minutes later. She took our drink order and disappeared into that black hole where waitresses go. It took her 20 minutes to come back with our drinks and to take our order. Then it was another 20 minutes before she came back with my mom's salad. Surprisingly, our food made it out to us in another 5 minutes.
The food? My parents said their meals were good. Me? It could have been better. My cheeseburger, which I had specifically said "charbroiled burger with cheese" initially came without the cheese. And then instead of being medium well like I had asked, it was essentially still mooing. Yeah, last time I checked, medium well meant the burger was brown inside, not pink. But fearing it would take another 20 minutes to fix the pinkness and that I would die of starvation, I sucked it up and ate the still-mooing burger.
We finished our food, dad left a fairly generous tip considering the service and I filled out the comment card. And we left.
But that still-mooing burger came back to haunt me. Not only did I attempt to go to sleep on a way too full stomach, sometime in the middle of the night I felt like I was going to throw up and I got super hot. Now, either this was a hot flash (and hello, I'm only 26, way too young to be getting hot flashes) or else this was the still-mooing burger trying to get revenge on me. The good news, I didn't throw up. The bad news, my stomach still feels a little queasy.
But yeah, really bad service at area restaurants I visited yesterday.
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