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The Entree That Wasn't

A while back, I had one heck of a time ordering a beer. It wasn't anybody's fault, but it took far longer than expected to simply order a beverage. After a team lunch at work this week, I've learned that I should be happy I got my chosen beer at all.

I was in the first batch of people to arrive, so the waitress came to take our drink orders while we waited. The first thing I noticed that she addressed everyone as "love" or "honey." It was quaint, and made it feel a little more homey, but I didn't think much of it. She can talk however she likes so long as she's not being offensive. Luckily, they had plenty of lemonade, so I didn't have to endure a repeat of the beer incident.

Since we had to wait for others to arrive, I took advantage of the time to figure out what I was going to order. I didn't particularly feel like eating a lot, so I was thinking of lighter fare. After scanning the menu a few times, I settled on a roast beef panini. Essentially, a sandwich. It came with a side of fruit, so that seemed pretty reasonable given my appetite at the time. I had actually narrowed it down to that or the burger, but I figured if I was trying to keep it simple, fruit would be better than fries.

Well, when the waitress came back to take our entree orders, I had the following conversation:

Waitress: "What would you like, love?"
Me: "I'll have the roast beef panini, please"
Waitress: "Really?" (in hindsight, this should have set off alarms in my head)
Waitress: "Of all the things on the menu, that's the one you want?"
Me: "Yup"
Waitress: "It comes with a little side of fruit, you know"
Me: "Yeah, I know"
Waitress: "They just throw stuff together, stick it in the press, and go *thwp* to it. Before you ordered you figured you'd just get some bread?"
Me: "Well, I was thinking that roast beef sounded good right about now"
Waitress: "The burger comes with some really good fries, you know"
(at this point, I give up)
Me: "Uh, okay. Can I have that burger instead?"
Waitress: *smiling* "Okay, coming right up. Medium okay?"

By the time she suggested a default choice for how to cook the burger, I knew better than to argue. I just agreed to what she thought was best, and went with that. I think I may have met a real life variation of the Soup Nazi. Also, the people who ordered after I did were a little more cautious. One of them asked her what she thought of his order before he actually asked for it. Clever guy, that one.

We all had a good laugh about it, too. My boss summed up her side of the conversation pretty succinctly, "what do you want? No, you don't." Interestingly, she would later pull the same shtick when someone ordered the seasonal berries for dessert, to much additional laughter. Apparently, she had something against fruit.

In the end, the burger was fine, and I wasn't upset. Still, I couldn't help but wonder about the path not taken (e.g., the panini).
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