I just had lunch with a friend at the Paradise Pup. Paradise Pup is the hot dog joint near where i work. It is the kind of place that prepares your burger, sandwich, or dog after you order it. Since they do not make items ahead, you have to wait for your food, and the food is well worth waiting for. Still with the wait there are ppl lined up out the door waiting to order.
There are several tables surrounding the place and there was at least one free when we went in to order and another that looked like it was soon to be free. It was a lovely day so we ordered our burgers for there and not to go. When we finally got our food there was only one table without anyone eating at it. This table had a teenager, sans food, sitting on it.
We sat down opposite her (the tables sit 6) and began to eat. “This table is taken!” she said. We continued to eat and she complained that she was saving it so we would have to go elsewhere. She looked at her friend waiting near the door who said, “She was saving that table.” They had not ordered yet!! If you haven’t ordered, it is going to be a good 15 minutes before you will have anything to eat. We continued to eat and she stormed off. As we finished our burgers, another table opened up and she sat down there. When we had finished eating our pickles and picking at our fries, she still had no food. When whe had wiped the crumbs off the table and threw away the trash and returned the baskets, one of her friends came out with their drinks, but still their food was not ready.
Did we behave inappropriately or did she? Should we have just eaten standing up? We could not leave the place with their baskets, so that was the only viable option. There are generally enough tables for ppl who want to eat outside there, but if people start saving even before they order, there won’t be.
I was just thinking that I wish I had the nerve to sit down and start eating and just ignore people behaving badly. Yeah, I think you’re in the clear here. Especially since you were finished and gone before they got their food.
(Around these parts, during lunch rushes it is accepted practice for strangers to share tables anyway. I think your girlie there needs to get over herself.)
This is a huge annoyance at the cafeteria most of us eat at on campus. It’s in the graduate activity center, but it’s been choked with fuckin’ snotty-nosed undergraduates since they started accepting meal plans (bad fucking idea) so the line is LONG and SLOW–but that doesn’t stop cretinous litle pigs from leaving their bags on a table to save it while they spend twenty minutes waiting for their fucking sandwich and herbal-infused juice drink.
Somebody can eat at that table in the time it takes you to get through the line, you punk-ass punk! But that doesn’t mean anything compared to your God-given right to have a guaranteed seat when you’re through, does it?
Fuckin’ jerks. They’re always soooo shocked and upset when you move their bags, too. “Hey, that’s my bag!”
“Yeah. Pretty stupid to leave it unattended, isn’t it? Somebody could have stolen it. You’re lucky we came along.”
Um, I’m going to go against the grain and give you WWWD (what would Waverly do?). If someone was using the table (even by just sitting on it) I’d politely ask if the minded if I sat down. Perhaps her reaction might have been to offer to share the table, perhaps not, but it would have been the better first step IMHO.
I can’t imagine saving a table that seats six for two people (as I read the OP). If it’s a restaurant of that type (without waitresses and assigned tables), I’m glad to have strangers use the huge unused end of the table, especially if it’s a picnic-style table. I know how unpleasant it is to eat standing up. Nevertheless, I have been yelled at by people sitting at a picnic table (even one that could have easily sat 10 people!), because I dared to sit down. Hey, fuckwit, I’ve heard of personal space, but I’m 6 feet away from you and your GF way over there. STFU and eat your chili dog.
In Eastern Europe there is no such thing as “my” table and “your” table, unless you are in a fancy restaurant. If there is no ass in the chair, then it’s fair game - you politely ask if it is free, sit down, and your new dining companions will wish you good eating. Like Scott, I see no problem with it.
Some of my favorite lunch places downtown have explicit signs telling people not to save seats. It’s unfortunate that we’ve come to this.
To be more accurate, the little bitch who was guarding the table sneered at us as we approached the table and, before we even sat down, barked at us that the table was “taken”. (lee got that part a bit wrong in the OP; the little bitch fired the first volley.) She repeated this claim after we had sat down and started to eat; I responded something to the effect of “Your food isn’t ready yet and there are no other free tables.” That was the sum total of what we had to say to her, although I did glare for several seconds at her companion who shouted at us from her place in line (from where we, as frequent patrons at the Pup, knew that she would not be served for at least ten, and in all likelihood twenty, minutes).
There was no opportunity to be polite with respect to this fine specimen of humanity. Any obligation to be polite was seriously curtailed when she was rude to us first. I can’t think of any more appropriate response to such rudeness but to simply ignore the person(s) being rude.
Well this tells a different story than the OP. I’m afraid I’m going to have to give this rant a ‘C’ for missing, IMHO, the critical component that indicated the table saver was indeed rude before you had any opportunity to be polite.
Just goes to show that girls get anxious when they don’t get their wieners quickly enough.
lee was ahead of me at the table. I suspect that lee had surmised that the table was clear (the bitch was sitting at it more like someone who was waiting for someone to meet with her rather than someone who was holding a table; I think she even had her back to the table) and sat down before anything was said. I was behind lee coming out of the order area and thus heard the first volley before actually sitting down.
I don’t think it qualifies as “rude” to sit down at a table you believe is unoccupied, so either way the little wench was rude first.
Actually at the university I attended it was even worse… the trend at the time was for these little wallets with a key chain on them (mostly a female accessory). The cafeteria would be littered with tables with these little wallet/key chain combos on them… now how stupid is it to leave your wallet and room keys unattended.
Boy did people get uppity when you moved their wallet… Dumbasses
Dumbasses