Hey, that was me.
Except for two things:
It was a cute little glass with a ‘Poupie’ character on it, and it was an outdoor café on the grounds of Versailles. I tipped extra, and have enjoyed an apertif from that glass for… forty years now.
And I’m not your dad (sorry to break it to you so abruptly…).
I knew someone who used to take the ceramic bowls…the small ones that had stuff like dipping sauces and such in them. I’m not sure he considered it stealing, but he used to take the bowls with the extra sauces or whatever in them when he would take home the appetizer or whatever went with the dipping sauce. I asked him about it once and he was surprised I asked…after all, what else was he supposed to keep the sauce in. I pointed out that they probably had plastic containers for just that eventuality, but he said why go to all that trouble?? He really didn’t seem to get that those weren’t for you to take home.
i have an uncle that lives in OC and he does security and he teases me every time he eats there (which is at least twice a week)…I will go to one of them one day …
My mom was a pothead for most of her life and would go to a&w in the 60s and 70s stoned with the “munchies” and just bring all the mugs home with her … and after the 5th time, the manager who knew my parents approached my dad and collected 10$ a month for years …when my mom passed we sold the ones that were collectible and passed out the others to family
When I mentally/physically disabled nephew was alive his favorite place was hometown buffet … Now when was in his wheelchair he had a tray that had a hole cut for drinking cups and for some reason he loved their cups … which were just plastic with a ridged diamond shape all over it well because going there always meant a trip to toys r us next door hed be in a hurry after a while and want his icecream to ==be in a coke glass so he could drink it
Well the first couple of times we didn’t notice but kept the glass since it was the biggest cup that could fit in his tray but he thought it was like getting away with murder if he brought one home
So one day I’m pushing him out of the door but right before we head out the door the manager whom everyone called “ox” because he was rather tall and extremely round came over and says " I got ya! so that’s the little monster whos been pilfering my cups" and my nephew got an “oh crap I’m in trouble” look on his face a manager guy goes on about how we’re gonna get charged 10 bucks a cup and we were banned from the dessert section (while motioning to me he’s teasing us) … and nephew gets all teary-eyed and gets his Lil lip trembling and then he sighed and says " Well I guess il let ya go this time but don’t let me catch you again" while smiling ,
Well from then on it was a game wed hide the cup somewhere … or just walk out with it when he was busy and occasionally wed get “caught” after we had about 2 dozen or so of these cups I asked him about it and he says "Oh don’t worry we don t care if the little guy takes a dozen of those cups because they all get melted down and reused twice a year and they get about 10 thousand of them as replacements every year and it averaged out to about 3 in a half cents per cup …
So WE now have about 5 dozen cups in a box that will never get thrown away except the one we buried with him … they even sent a card to us for the funeral …
Jesus, that explains a lot. 
Heh, when I was in high school, a bunch of us girls could not empty the pickle bowl. The busboy kept topping it off when it got anywhere near half full.
I can honestly say I’ve never taken anything from a restaurant that I didn’t pay for. In motels I’ve taken the tiny bottles of shampoo, but only if it had been partly used while I stayed.
I once absently nearly walked out of a restaurant with a cup in my hand. I was deeply embarrassed, and I didn’t even make it out the door before realizing I had forgotten to put it down.
I’m actually pretty taken aback by the casual attitude that’s displayed here toward petty theft.
I posted about my coworker who almost daily was nicking plastic cutlery from the cafeteria for years. When I challenged her about it, it seemed that most of my coworkers were on her side, or at least thought that I was making a huge deal out of something small. These are people who went absolutely ballistic when someone was stealing frozen dinners and sodas from the office fridge.
Every day for years seems a bit much. But I think the plastic cutlery in the office cafeteria is intended to be taken, unlike the metal cutlery at a restaurant or your co-workers’ personal soda.
That being said, my employer’s cafeteria must have had a problem with too much plastic cutlery being taken, as they switched from having it in open containers to tucking it into a machine that made you turn a crank for each item you took. Not a big deal if you want one fork and one spoon to go with the food you just bought, but maybe a little deterrent to taking 20.
That is pretty much what happened when we got a new cafeteria operator. They put one of those crank things out, so if you wanted to grab five forks, you had to stand there at the dispenser and turn that level five times and each time it made a scraping and clicking sound.
The utensils in the cafeteria I suppose are for people eating food purchased in the cafeteria. If someone was brown-bagging it, I suppose the operator might build that into their operating model as well. But this person had a desk drawer full of cutlery organized in ziploc bags. That is when I called her out on it.
When I was working, I ate at the company cafeteria every day. I would reuse the same fork for months until it would finally break. I’d just wipe it off after each meal. I hate waste.
I bought a set of metal cutlery in a little pouch to use instead of the plastic stuff.
It caused an issue when we had our monthly cake meeting. Someone used to go grab a handful for the group (between 12 and 15), but after the crackdown, our admin was given funds to purchase ones to keep with our “party” supplies (like the knive to cut the cake, paper plates, etc.).
There’s a podcast I listen to called “Dumb People Town.” One of the hosts, I forget which one, told a story once about whenever he runs out of Tabasco sauce, he just goes to a Chipotle and takes a bottle off of a table.
Apparently, and I’m sure I’m messing up the story, once he asked an employee if he could have some Tabasco to go, and the employee said something to the effect of, “Just take the whole bottle. It’s not like we refill them.” He also reasoned that if you bought food then sat there and used a whole bottle, nobody would care. That’s what it’s there for.
That logic checks out if you ask me. Next time I need some Tabasco, I’m totally going to Chipotle and just taking one.
But if you just take a bottle, by definition you’re not using it there for the food you bought there. It’s really not there for anyone who passes through to just take. And realistically, no one is going to use an entire bottle of Tabasco in one sitting. Technically you could, but unless they’re the micro-mini bottles like the ones in an MRE, they’re really not intended as single-use items.
And sure, a random minimum wage employee may not care if you take a whole bottle - it’s not their property. But that also means it’s not really their property to just give away. It’s theft. To be sure, it’s extremely petty theft, but it’s still theft.
At pretty much any restaurant I go to if they give me a free refill right before I leave and I’m not able to finish it I’ll ask if they have a cup so I can take the remaining drink to go and almost every time the server will be happy to bring me a to-go cup so I don’t waste the soda.
However one time I did this the server actually CHARGED me for an additional $5 drink on my tab and when I complained since this is the first time it ever happened the employee said “We’re charging for the cup not the soda”. At that point I should have just grabbed the pint glass my remaining soda was in because I had already paid for it at that point.
do you remember when cheap-ass McDonald’s rationed sugar, ketchup, salsa, etc when no other chain did? Don’t know if they still do
I believe only Burger King is the only chain that AGGRESSIVELY polices it’s condiments now.
Every other chain goes through the standard rigamarole of “How many ketchup packets do you want?” I say “Three” and they throw in 40 of them still, while Burger King I’ll say “Three” and they’ll literally give me 2.
My daughter worked at a Subway for a few weeks when she was in high school. The franchisee had trouble keeping employees because she had surveillance cameras watching everywhere, and she had strict rules about the sliced olives. Workers had to count the olive slices and she would freak out on anyone who placed too many on a sandwich.
I don’t know about aggressive but Popeye’s is pretty damn cheap when it comes to their dipping sauces. I’m lucky if I get one with an order of chicken strips, and half the time they “forget” to give me any at all. (Even though they ask me what kind I want twice, once when I order and again when I pay.) I have to check the bag before I pull away from the drive thru window to make sure I got some.