Red Lobster - If You Must Bring It Up, Stick It Here

(neither of the last two things happened but I learned from James Frey that it's ok to embellish)

https://2020coloringshirts.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/baby-yoda-face-mask-hug-i-can-t-stay-home-i-work-at-red-lobster-we-fight-when-others-can-t-anymore-covid-19-shirt-shirt.jpg

(btw the concept of singing birthday songs in chain restaurants is the utter pits, I hated doing it when I was a waiter, the recipients often don't even like it, why not just say happy birthday and dump a cupcake on their fuckin' lap)

My first serving job was at a Pappadeaux where they'd send you home if your shirt or apron wasn't properly dry-cleaned and pressed with heavy starch and everyone I worked with still has waitmares about that place but we still felt lucky compared to the neighboring Joe's Crab Shack where they had to dance like trained monkeys. (Also we made twice as much money on a given night.)

lol I showed up to my waiter job half the time with a soiled shirt, but I worked at a dump. never woulda survived at Pappadeaux's.

the dancing at Joe's was just what you'd expect - people moving awkwardly while squinting as if to say "ok this is good enough, right? Nobody I know sees me?"

wasn't it to distract people from how long it took to get their food half the time

Yeah, it was a chance to let the kitchen catch up supposedly.

I like the word waitmare, haven't seen it before

I’ve never been to a Joe’s it sounds horrible though.

Just came back to post these tweets re: “rubes” and the interpreted nonsense about classism that someone decided to carry over from the old RL thread:

“My parents would NEVER let me eat this garbage growing up.” Yeah? My parents worked 16 hour days and tried their best and sometimes generic brand pizza rolls were the damn move for dinner.

— Josh Scherer (@MythicalChef) August 9, 2020

And that’s fine. You can advocate for a better food system—check my lower back for proof that I do—while not denigrating the foods that bring poor folks convenience, joy, and sustenance.

— Josh Scherer (@MythicalChef) August 9, 2020

xp - Nothing like being in the weeds on a pitch black patio that’s two miles long and looking down to realize you’re not wearing pants, then waking up when you remember it’s been 15 years since you waited tables.

I got laid off by my restaurant (Chevy's Fresh Mex, which now has only one location in FL) in 2003. I have still had waitmares since I left that place. sometimes something as innocuous as being weeded, sometimes getting into a fistfight with the busboy who is also Henry Winkler, and sometimes at the same time as I work my current job, waiting tables on weekends.

then a few years ago, weirdly, I finally got "fired" from Chevy's in my dream, for mouthing off or something.

the dreams....stopped.

and then....

I started dreaming I was working at Best Buy now. on weekends, in the Media dept.

Best Buy is where I worked after I left Chevy's.

somehow I hate those dreams more. that job was boring as fuck and paid $7 an hour. and made you wear ugly blue and khakis.

I have some decent memories of Chevy's happy hour

and the lunchtime $5 fajitas!!!

I had to leave town for a few days for a family thing and didn’t have the guts to ask my manager for time off so I just never showed up at Corky’s Barbecue again.

Corky’s is pretty decent food though, get the pulled pork and save room for apple cobbler.

you're probably still on the schedule

Texas Roadhouse was a couple of stops after Pappadeaux, they made me work on New Year's Eve even though I was violently ill from food poisoning. I get why they didn't believe me to start with but I think they might have sent me home when I was running from trashcan (to puke) to table to bathroom (to try to not shit myself).

I worked a couple more shifts then decided that was really fucked up and never went back.

I even lasted at Chevy's through a rat infestation.

i'm talking mutant sized, Rat Fink rats, that kept coming down the pipes onto the soda fountain after hours.

well....and on one unfortunate occasion, during hours. and climbed up on the seat next to a customer.

she screamed "RAT! RAT!", and apparently a bunch of tables up and walked out (I wasn't there). the weirdest part of that story to me wasn't that part, but who in the fuck would STAY after that? apparently some people needed another margarita.

(I am very squeamish w/rats also)

I definitely grew up looking down on Red Lobster but that was more because in New Orleans you can get much better seafood for much cheaper. Just seemed like a white middle-class suburban status thing. Can see why landlocked people might like it. Y'all are making me want to track one down for the biscuits, tho.

hell there are a ton of better seafood places in FL - I found a great peel shrimp place in Ocala, FL (the only nice thing I'll ever say about Ocala)

If you live next to seawater there are always a billion places better than the chains discussed in this thread.

i eat my seafood straight out the ocean

I’m thinking way too hard about how I would deal with the rat situation described above. Yeah, walking right the fuck out is the correct move.

This thread is actually making me miss restaurants even though it’s basically all stories about systemic labor issues, food poisoning, and rodents

That’s how bad lockdown’s gotten for me I guess

cruising for new restaurants is one of the things I miss the most about dating.

I like to pretend once this is all over that a bunch of new places are going to take over all the spots that have permanently closed since March, and I’ll get to try them out. Ha ha, ha, ha ha.

Amazon Automats coast to coast

enjoy your "Amazon Ham 'n Cheese Classic" which will be thrown at Roger Clemens speed at your chest from the back of a truck

-Neanderthal's 1985

How have we gotten this far without

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVALgcE2JSI

Well! This thread blew up.

Two of my great aunts ate at Red Lobster in suburban Chicago every Thursday for more than twenty years. When they died, their favorite waitress was mad that she didn't get anything in the will.

I wouldn't eat a bug that crawled out from under my couch. I don't know why people eat the bugs that crawl around on the bottom of the ocean.

I used to think that way, but then I remember that shrimp are delicious.

I also have eaten plenty of bugs.

sea bugs are juicy (in an appetizing way)

land bugs are crunchy (in a mostly not good way)

Texas Roadhouse locations are all actual portals to hell, icymi

crunchy land bugs are the good ones

I draw the line at gooey land bugs and critters - my friend lived with a woman from Zimbabwe for a while and she tried to introduce us to these
https://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/eats/zimbabwe-favorite-snack-mopane-worms-article-1.1247669

good crunch: https://www.atlasobscura.com/foods/chapulines-grasshopper-tacos-oaxaca

i would eat that

although "salt and vinegar potato chips, but a bit wetter" gave me pause