Restaurant Anecdotes:
I am English and drink hot tea as opposed to coffee. My husband and I visited a fast food restaurant in America, and I asked a waitress if they had any hot tea.
* Me: "Do you have hot tea?"
<
* Her: "Well, it is not very warm...but...."
* Me: "No I mean do you have hot water and a tea bag?"
* Her: "Yes."
* Me: "So you can make me hot tea."
* Her: "Well I can put a cup of iced tea in the microwave for you."
* Me: "No, just give me a cup of hot water and a tea bag, and I will make my own."
* Her: "Do you want ice in the cup?"
Once when I went to McDonald's, I saw on the menu that you could have an order of 6, 9 or 12 Chicken McNuggets. I asked for a half dozen nuggets.
"We don't have half dozen nuggets," said the teenager at the counter.
"You don't?" I replied.
"We only have six, nine, or twelve," was the reply.
"So I can't order a half dozen nuggets, but I can order six?"
"That's right."
So I shook my head and ordered six McNuggets.
While ordering Chinese food to be delivered, I asked, as a joke, if the deep fried gizzards were beef or pork. The lady on the other end had me wait while she looked it up, but couldn't find it. She then asked several other employees, none of whom knew.
I overheard the following conversation at a Friendly's restaurant:
* Girl: "Boy, I'm really parched."
* Boy: "Yeah, I'm full too!"
A pizza-and-sub takeout recently opened near me. When I got the menu, I decided that I would try the hamburger sub that was listed, so I called.
* Me: "I'd like to place an order for pickup."
* Him: "Certainly, sir. What would you like to have?"
* Me: "I'd like the hamburger sub, please."
* Him: "Excuse me, the HAMburger sub?"
* Me: "Yes."
* Him: "I'm sorry, but we don't have HAMburger."
* Me: "It's right here on the menu."
* Him: "We don't have HAMburger."
This went on a few times, until finally I asked for a cheeseburger sub without the cheese. He was happy to sell me that.
I used to work at an Arby's. In the two years I worked there, the dumbest customer by far has been one that apparently never succeeded at first grade math.
* Me: "That will be $12.69, please."
* Him: "Ok. Here you go."
He handed me a $10 bill. Thinking that this was just a mistake, that maybe he meant to give me a $20, I said:
* Me: "This is a $10 bill."
* Him: "Yeah, I know."
* Me: "The total is $12.69."
* Him: "I gave you a 10. That's enough."
* Me: "I need $2.69 more. The total is $12.69."
* Him: (annoyed) "It's all there! I gave you a 10!"
* Me: "No. I need $2.69 more."
* Him: "I gave you a 10!"
* Me: "I know. The total is $12.69! I need another $2.69!"
This situation kept on going for a good four or five minutes, when something really wrong happened. I just had him on the verge of giving me a $50 bill, when a manager changed the price to make it less than $10. After I told the customer that, he said:
* Him: "Darn kids don't know how to do math these days."
I suppose the moral of the story is act dumb, even if you aren't, and rewards will follow.
One day, this lady brought in an Arby-Q sandwich because she didn't like it and she wanted her money back. That would be fine if it weren't for the fact that my Arby's stopped selling those a month ago, and that the sandwich was black and moldy. It was one of the grossest things I have ever seen in my life.
* Me: "I'd like a small coffee shake and nothing else."
* Clerk: "Anything else?"
* Me: "Uh...a cup?"
This happened at a local fried chicken shack.
* Customer: "I'll have a half dozen chicken nuggets."
* Waitress: "I'm sorry, we don't have a half dozen. You can only order six, nine, or twelve."
* Customer: "Well, ok, I'll have six then."
This has happened to me with two different people now.
I had a craving for french fries one day, so I pulled up to the drive-thru of McDonald's.
* Me: "I'd like a large french fries please."
* Clerk: "Would you like fries with that?"
I got sort of confused at this one and told him no. He told me to pull ahead, so I did, and then he asked me why I was sitting there.
* Clerk: "I thought you didn't want fries."
* Me: "No, I ordered a large french fries."
* Clerk: "Ok. Do you want fries with that?"
Since saying no the last time had gotten me nothing, I figured I'd better say yes this time.
He gave me two large fries.
