I like to eat alone. And not just in my kitchen in front of a TV show or DVD (of a TV show, usually) or radio program. I like to go into restaurants and sit down alone. I'm sure wait staff hates seeing me; a single person with a luncheon special...yeah -- that's a good $2 tip...but when I was a waiter, I actually liked having the table for one. As someone who likes to eat at one, I know that all I needed to do was get the patron his food and keep his water filled and it was an easy 18% without any hassles.
My family -- and many of my friends -- think dining alone is awkward. I, however, love it.
Aside from my three-step new-restaurant process, in which dining alone is step 2, I go to dine alone because there's no better place to people-watch than a restaurant.
(And since I know you're curious, the process: Step 1: takeout, because when you go to a restaurant, the ambiance has a tendency to cover mediocre food, or take away from great food, and takeout you can judge the food on its own merits; Step 2: dine alone, to watch the way the wait staff interacts with patrons, interacts with the space, interacts with superiors, as well as add the ambiance to the food; Step 3: Bring a date! (Or family, friends, etc.) With all three steps passed, I'll recommend that restaurant to people.)
Sure you can people watch at a table for two, but it's suspicious to just sit silently at a table to take in surroundings, whereas it's much easier to peer over or look through a book or newspaper, or better yet, a glass of water.
Perhaps this is a touch voyeuristic, but this is my vocational training into sociology and the human condition. I've learned to spot dates, job interviews, breakups, underaged-drinking, and just about any other restaurant situation you can think of just from my experience as a meta-situational people-watcher (ie, table for one) or a participating people-watcher (ie, part of the restaurant staff).
Sure it's more fun to people-watch with a budy, but restaurants aren't the best place for that. The best place for that is hotel lobbies!
But I still have 26 more days in this month, so that's a topic for another post.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I actually like eating alone too. I wouldn't want to do it all the time though. Interesting post.
ReplyDeleteFunny you mention dining alone-- Leanna and I were talking about it last night. Since I've got some restaurant reviews coming up, I think I'll be doing it a bit more. I used to love getting a table by myself when I could sneak away from the office at PSYOP, but it's been too busy at Nth to manage it.
ReplyDeleteSo you really only recommend a place after the ENTIRE 3-Step process? That's admirable.
I hate eating alone at restaurants. Maybe one day I'll like it. It's sad because it kind of ruined my solo trip to Paris because I didn't go to any restaurants. Oh well. C'est la vie.
ReplyDelete