My all-time favorite was the Waffle House near Raleigh, NC. Late night/early morning on a Saturday after going to Rocky Horror Picture Show, we stopped for coffee and snacks. Our waitress was a twinkling-eyed grandmotherly type, super-friendly to us bunch of punks and goths and weird kids. I ordered pie.
“Oh, I just LOVE it when people get pie!” she said, and then leaned forward conspiratorially. “I get to lick the knife!”
I rolled into a Denny’s in Reading, PA late one Saturday afternoon. The place was like a wax museum. There were only about four customers present: an elderly couple and a couple of non-descript guys sitting by themselves. There were no signs of any actual employees: no waitresses, greeter or manager. The joint was completely silent. I sat down at the counter and waited. And waited some more. I could hear a couple of distant voices conversing, back in the kitchen somewhere.
I wasn’t in a rush, so decided to see how long it might be until one of the missing employees turned up. After ten minutes I said, in a voice loud enough to be heard “Hello? Anyone there?” The distant conversation stopped for a moment, then started again. At the fifteen-minute mark, I tried the same thing again, with the same result. At twenty minutes I gave up and hit the bricks. Meanwhile, as far as I could tell, none of the other customers seemed put out by the lack of service, or even were talking amongst themselves. For all I know they are still there, gradually turning to dust.
We were eating at a small inn for Thanksgiving. While serving our soup, the waiter tipped the tray and a bowl of soup slid off and spilled all over my sweater. The owner came over and offered to wash my sweater for me. Thinking she meant that she would pay the dry cleaning bill, I thanked her and told her I would forward the bill to her. I had misunderstood her, what she wanted me to do was go into the back with her, remove my sweater and put on a loaner shirt of hers. She would then wash my sweater and dry it while we were eating. I explained that was not acceptable, but she absolutely refused to pay to have my sweater dry cleaned.
We finished up our meal, which was delicious, and left. She didn’t even offer to take a percentage off our bill.
That little inn had been one of our favorite places, until that day, we’ve never been back. 
Eww.
I have another.
I was at a Mexican restaurant. I asked the waiter about the hot sauces on the table, and he warned me they were hot. Ok, fair enough, still I tried it.
It turned out to be some devil’s combination of pure pepper and Satan’s ass. I love spicy food, and I couldn’t handle it. I was coughing, and trying to drink water/eat bread, and my face was beet red.
Waiter comes over and sees my distress. With the most obnoxious laugh ever (think Nelson Muntz from Simpson’s “Haw HAW YOU TRIED THE HOT SAUCE! OMG LOOK AT YOUR FACE!”
We were so embarrassed we just kind of awkwardly laughed. People were turning to look at me. I have never forgotten that asshole waiter…but it *was *kind of funny. 
I was recently reminded of a family memory when I saw that our Friendly’s has shut down. <moment of silence>
My father is very frugal and when I was growing up, we rarely went out to eat. Also, he was very moody and could turn pissy on a dime. We went to Friendly’s and it was busy (and my father hates to wait) and once we were seated we had a harried and perhaps new waitress. I’m not sure we had even ordered yet when here she comes back to our table with a bright pink shake “WHO’S GOT THE FRIBBLE?!” The brght pink and the silly name contrasted nicely with the dark cloud emanating from Pop.
One of my father’s skills was looking at you like you were a piece of shit who can’t do anything right, and he leveled that at her. And then to hear someone pissed and grouchy having to say such a cartoony word: “No one. No one has the Fribble” became something of a catchphrase.
I forgot about the time when my now ex-husband and I went for a late dinner at a mid-priced restaurant around here. Their closing time was 10pm and we were seated at around 9:30. At 10pm were the only customers left in the restaurant, and they started their closing routine. They even had the nerve to start vacuuming, and asked us the lift our feet as they vacuumed under the table. We joked about that one for years afterward.
Okay, my story. This was about 40 years ago, in the smallish city where I lived on the outer fringes of the S. F. Bay Area.
Didja ever have one of those “Did I really just see that?” moments? I mean, REALLY “Did I REALLY just see that?”
I went to a local family-owned Mexican restaurant in town (where I ate rather often).
After I ate most of the salad, in between bites, a busboy came and took the plate, without asking if I was done with the salad. (I was almost done.) The fork was laying on the plate at the moment, and he took that too. I needed that fork for the next course. (I never bothered much about which fork I was supposed to use for which foodstuffs.)
A bit later, a busboy came (I think it was the other busboy) and I asked him to bring me another fork, and he agreed. He had a pitcher of ice water, by which he proceeded to refill my water glass.
I don’t know if he spaced out or what, but he didn’t pay proper attention to the very technical and complex process of refilling a water glass. When the glass was full, he didn’t stop pouring. The water overflowed onto the tablecloth and some into my lap. I made some remark like “Uh, you can stop pouring now.”
He looked aghast and apologized profusely, and grabbed one of the cloth napkins from the table and began sopping up the spilled water. (Being 40 years ago, I don’t know if I recall all the details exactly, but I think he tried sopping up some water from my lap too :eek: ) When he was done with all that, he wrung out the sopping napkin into the same glass of water – which, being already brim full, just overflowed onto the table again.
I didn’t make a big fuss at the moment, because I literally (yes, literally) couldn’t believe I had just seen what I had just seen. Did I just hallucinate that? I asked him to bring me a new glass of water, which he eventually did.
A bit later, when the waitress came by to ask if everything was okay, I politely requested that the busboys stay away from my table until after I left (without any further comment).
A bit later, one of the busboys came by and, standing at formal attention about a foot away from the table, asked me “May I refill your water, SIR?” And later, after I had finished the entree, one of the busboys (I don’t know if it was the same one or the other one) came by and, standing at formal attention about a foot away from the table, asked me “May I take your plate, SIR?”
I didn’t leave any tip that evening.
I’m picturing it going something like this:
Waitress (W) - You know that nice family that comes in every Thursday?
Momma D (MD) - Yes, they are wonderful and loyal customers… how is their sick daughter?
W - Well the dad was telling me she had a turn for the worst, but then some guy started screaming that they hadn’t been served.
MD - Oh gosh I hope the Franklin family didn’t notice.
W - They couldn’t help but notice… the guy got so irate he started flailing his arms around and even threw his silverware at me. I was just trying to find out when we could visit her. I’m really sorry, but by this time I was so upset I just couldn’t go over and serve him.
MD - Don’t worry, Mr. Franklin backed your story up 100%. I’ll make sure it never happens to you again dear. They won’t be welcome here again. We just don’t need customers like that.
W - Thanks Grandma.
The nerve to start vacuuming? They gotta do what they gotta do to close. People don’t work forever - they want to go home. Most restaurants don’t mind having people in there a bit past the official closing time, but that’s not going to stop them from closing when they close. Honestly, if you’re there more than ~15 minutes past closing time and not getting ready to leave* then the only one displaying nerve is you.
*Unless you literally came in within minutes of close, and trust me every restaurant worker hates That Guy.
Loving the bad/weird experiences. This is just weird. Ok there was this Mongolian restaurant that opened up in Vancouver about 30 years ago, the 2nd or 3rd Mongolian restaurant in town as far as I know. This one was kind of different, quite a bit different actually, from what I was used to.
Twenty-four hour menu, divided into four 6-hour quadrants. At 3 AM with no customers in sight, you couldn’t get anything from any other quadrant, not that there was very much difference anyway. I drop in once at 7 AM. The guy says “good morning, you want a beer?” Uh no, I’ll hold off a bit.
Ok but the first time I went there, one evening, I asked for a rum and coke. The guy gives me a triple rum and coke. A couple more later, same deal, ridiculously cheap. Cool waiter, maitre d’ really, a white maitre d’ in a Mongolian restaurant. There’s an austere lady at the front of the place seated at a card table counting money…a lot of it, even if it was small bills. She was at the front of the room, facing us, off to one side of the cash register, with a bored look on her face, counting away. Basically the staff are all Asian, which is why I point out the white people, because the white people are hilarious!
First there’s the maitre d’ with the triple rum and cokes, never saw him again. The next time I drop in, my waitress is a drunk white girl who explains that she’s not really my waitress, she’s a waitress at a different restaurant down the street, she just got off work and came to see her boyfriend, this white kid who’s playing piano, top 40…no more like top 100…in a Mongolian restaurant…and she’s filling in because they’re short staffed. Whenever her boyfriend would finish a tune he’d be met with complete silence by the entire crowd, who just had no use for 60’s and 70’s top 100. He’d say stuff like, “excuse me, I am here, I do exist…” or his gf would flounce out into the room, applauding loud and long and inviting the oblivious people busy at their tables to join in. Which they would finally do, grudgingly and perfunctorily.
Later she gives me her phone number (she’s drunk) and invites me over. I drop over the next day and well duh, she lives with her bf. What did I expect. He’s not home at the moment, she tells me how they’re semi - on the outs etc. We drink some instant coffee and I leave.
Last time I was there I chatted with her for a bit, and then the bf dedicated a song to her, "This one’s for Amarantha (not her real name): “…because I used to love her…”
Years back, I took my parents and son to an Olive Garden for Dad’s birthday. He loved the place. It’s a busy Friday night, and our waiter seemed overwhelmed with the dinner rush. No problem, we just chatted and sipped our water, waiting for our salads and drinks to show up.
25 minutes later, nothing is happening and we’re starting to hear grumbling emanating from nearby tables, no one is getting service it seems. A guy at the table next to us gets up and goes to look for a manager. We then observe all the waitstaff rushing back to the kitchen at once, then here comes a steady stream of food-bearing folks, with the manager in the lead. He starts calling out dishes “Who’s got Chicken Alfredo with linguine? Who’s waiting for lasagne?” and they pass out all the food that had been collecting in the kitchen for a half hour. Apparently overwhelmed waiter walked out and didn’t tell anyone, and no one noticed all the hungry people.
Manager comped everyone in the affected section with a free dessert, and the franchise closed down a few months later.
Ah, the treasured and time-honored Mid-shift Stealth Quit. It wouldn’t be a real restaurant if that didn’t happen at least a couple times a year!
What is a Fribble? Oh shit this is hilarious.
They can start all the pre close stuff they want, but vacuuming raises up a bunch of dust. Yes, the nerve. If they didn’t want to serve us without being rude, they shouldn’t have seated us at 9:30.
When a restaurant says they close at 10pm, that normally means they serve the last meal at 10pm. Not that they lock up and go home at 10pm. We were nearly done with our meal. They should have waited.
A Fribble is what Friendly’s calls their extra-thick milkshake.
No, it means they close at 10 pm. You should have been getting ready to leave already.
Usually it doesn’t. In most cases it means they’re still serving. The staff may hate it, but I’ve never been to or worked at a place that seated people late and expected them to leave at the listed time. I’m pretty sure there are a few threads about this.
If a restaurant closes at 10pm, I wouldn’t even go in as late as 9:30pm. Yes, technically, they’re required to serve you, but when it’s that close to the end of the shift, the employees aren’t at their best. They’ve probably already started to break down and clean the kitchen. They’re going to be out of many dishes and reluctant to cook anything complicated. If nothing else is open, I might still go, but I’d only order stuff that’s relatively easy to prepare.
We’ve gone in when there aren’t many options, but always ask the hostess or server, “What would be easy on the kitchen, this late?” and try to order those things. I’ve seen the appreciation.
Out in the boonies there aren’t many choices of restaurants. We did ask when we arrived if it was too late to eat. They told us it was no problem. I used to work in a restaurant and I know it’s nice to be able to start cleanup and get the hell out of there, but we never did anything that disturbed the remaining customers. It was a pretty large place, they could have at the very least started vacuuming on the other side of the restaurant.