Name a place you will never go into that's popular.

The BBQ Pit
161

It’s not really a boycott since I have no intention of ever going to these places again, but I’m avoiding the Cheesecake Factory and Chik-Filet.

Chik-Filet because the one I used to go to was run by incompetents who could never get my order right on the first try. Oddly, this has never happened to me at any other fast food place. Even the McD’s drive thru would get my order right. The stuff I’ve heard in this thread just serves to confirm it.

Cheesecake Factory is a recent addition. I went to one that opened up near here a week or two ago, and was completely underwhelmed. They seated our party of six pretty quickly, but it seemed like we never had the same server two in a row. We ordered drinks from one person, got them from another, got refills from a third person, food came from a fourth, etc. This wouldn’t have been a problem except that it meant a rather long lag between refills. My wife and a friend of hers shared their dinner since the portions are pretty huge. The fish wasn’t cooked all the way through, which meant it had to go back to the kitchen from where it only returned after everyone else was done eating. In their favor, they did take it off the bill, which was nice. The final straw was that someone ordered cheesecake, and it came our frozen!

Yes, they just opened, and are probably getting the bugs worked out, but there are so many other places around here that serve similar styles of food that I see no need to patronize a place that can’t get it right.

A third place I won’t go to is Cafe Asia in Rosslyn. A friend of mine got food poisoning there, and the health inspections which are online don’t seem to be to promising. Add in the fact that the restaurant has poor acoustics which force you to speak loudly if you want to talk to people at you table, and it becomes enough to make me never go back there.

162

IHOP - I got bad steak in a steak omelette once. Yuck.
Denny’s - Bad food, bad service, etc.
Molena’s - a local Mexican restaurant in Houston. AKA La Cucaracha. (The Cockroach for you Spanish-challenged folks.) I went there about 5 years ago and saw two large Gulf-sized tree roaches crawling on the wall. I tried it again recently. Stupid decision. Little Jose was eating crumbs off the floor, darting between tables. And as we were leaving, he climbed the wall and sped down the chair rail, to follow us home, I presumed. Needless to say, I won’t go back ever again.

163

I once took a client to a popular BOSTON restaurant, named The Durgin Park! Halfway through the drinks, I spotted an enormous cockroach climbing up the wall-I cancelled my order (totally lost my apetite), but the client happpiluy scarfed down his meal. I’d never set footin that place again

164

The party store closest to my house was selling weed pipes. I told the owner’s wife that I wouldn’t shop there any more, she said she didn’t know what those were.

I won’t shop in Marshall Field’s unless it’s a gift for someone else. I am invisible to salespeople in that store.

I won’t set foot in a K-mart. I don’t care if they’re giving things away.

165

Whoever was talking about IHOP is right. We got one this spring. I’ve been there 3 times and all 3 times received really bad service. And the food was overpriced, too, and not that great.