Tales from the Trenches: The Case of the Vanishing Dinner
You gotta love Friday nights at the restaurant—where the waitlist stretches longer than the Mississippi and the chef mutters, “Who waits 90 minutes for a burger?!” as he angrily rips off tickets like he’s auditioning for a cooking-themed action movie.
What I’m about to tell you is a true story and I still laugh telling it.
So, picture this: Friday night. It’s a packed house. Huge wait. My section is slammed, but I’ve got just enough time to notice something developing in my neighbor’s section. A husband and wife are enjoying their meal. it’s halfway through, and the wife gets up for the bathroom. Two minutes later, the husband decides it’s his turn to follow suit. It felt a bit odd, but I assumed they were taking a break, so I let it go. You always help your neighbors, but it’s not my section, the server wasn’t around, and I had to deal with an angry lady at one of my triple-sat tables who swore she ordered a cosmopolitan when I know she ordered a dirty martini. I mean how do you even get that mixed up?
As I’m halfway across the floor, over comes our busser. He sees the empty table and, in his efficiency-obsessed glory, swoops in to clear it like a hawk spotting prey. Plates? Gone. Drinks? Vanished. Into the abyss. He leaves the table spotless, unaware that this was not an abandoned ship.
Now, in strides the hostess. She sees the freshly cleared table and, with a 1.5-hour wait staring her down, seats a family of four faster than you can say “Table 42 is ready!” The family slides in, happy as clams, and orders a round of drinks and our most popular app. Technically that should never have happened, because the table would need to be closed first, so it was still mystery to me how the order went in when the original server never showed up. Maybe another server helped out. Details, details, but now here is where it gets even worse – our kitchen is so fast with apps that before anyone can blink, they’ve got them ready. Sometimes we’d even drop apps knowing they’d sell on a busy night. Somehow, after the order goes through, the runner brings the app over and the new family digs in.
As I’m meandering my way back to my section, it dawns on me.
Uh-oh. This isn’t good.
Enter: the original owners of the table – aforementioned husband and wife.
They come strolling back from the bathroom, only to discover… their table. Their table! Their half-eaten dinner. Gone. In its place? The family of four munching on an app.
The husband turns around in confusion, but the wife definitely starts pointing at the table. The new dad of the table gets up, and now he’s mad too. Bother my family at my table? It’s two hungry beasts staring at each other, ready for confrontation.
And let me tell you, the look on their faces was… well I mean there was no adjective for it. Pure WTF. This whole time I’m seeing this all unfold in slow motion as I’m making my way over, and by this point the server who had that table has arrived, beyond confused. Total meltdown. Finally the manager came over, listening to everything. The look on his face was even better.
The couple had to be pulled aside so the family could eat, which only added fuel to the fire, and they sat at a small 2 top near the kitchen that I’d often use to count my tips or scream “CORNER” as I’m passing into the back. I saw many gift cards being pulled out, but it barely calmed them down. The husband was fuming, the wife was miserable, and the poor manager continued to apologize. The real kicker was it was so packed there were no tables even around to give them another meal; the kitchen was slammed, and the wait was insane.
Finally, after what looked like hundreds of dollars of gift cards they were calm and they left. It was the talk of the restaurant for weeks until the next meltdown, which I will save for another day.
People, if you’re eating at packed restaurant on a Friday night, never leave your table unguarded. At least tell your server! If not, you might just come back to find your dinner served to someone else.
Have a story of your own you’d like to share? Send it to tales@justthetips.com and we’ll publish it on the blog for all to enjoy a chuckle or relate to!