Sigh.

[kz_blogorambling]

All right, maybe I need to be more specific.

Tell me about a lousy restaurant meal you've had.

And/or: Tell me about your worst date ever.

Bonus if these happened at the same time, I guess.

Comments

[aries28.livejournal.com]

Worst date ever:

I was in 9th grade, dating a senior so I thought I was awesome.

We went out to dinner one afternoon at a local buffet type place. CLASSY.

I was planning on breaking things off at this point because there just wasn't attraction there any more and I had my eye on somebody else.

All through the meal he was nervous and fidgety because I think he knew it was coming. As we were leaving he told me he wasn't feeling so hot then he proceeded to throw up all in the parking lot.

I felt bad so I postponed the break up talk till I could do it over the phone.

I mean...I'm not heartless but I don't want to be puked on either.

Worst Date Ever

[missadroit.livejournal.com]

Also my first date ever. I met a guy via a local BBS, and we met up at the mall for our first "date." We saw Dumb and Dumber, and then headed towards Sbarros (another classy eating establishment). On our way we passed one of his friends who asked him who I was. His reply? "She's my cousin."

Re: Worst Date Ever

[troubleagain.livejournal.com]

Ouch.

[scout1222.livejournal.com]

Man. I don't really have any crappy date stories. I guess that's one benefit of never really going on too many dates.

I really got nothin' right now. Which is too bad. This morning I was super busy (which is why I wasn't posting) but I think I'm pretty well caught up for today, so I do have time to gab.

[crankyasanoldma.livejournal.com]

An alternate question is who among various dates and/or mates was your worst mismatch? That is, who was the worst fit in terms of personality, life goals, or whatever.

[jadis.livejournal.com]

I was coming in here to say that I've never had a good date or a bad meal, and I suspect those 2 things are related. ;)

[sauronwrap.livejournal.com]

The lousiest restaurant meal I've had, I didn't actually have. And it happened twice, both times at an Applebee's.

I stopped in for lunch, the waitress took my order, brought my sweet tea, and then completely disappeared. I never got my food. I didn't even see another server anywhere near the area (I was the only person sitting in the section). The first time it happened, I left enough money on the table to pay for the tea. The second time it happened (different location, about a year later) I just walked out. I've never gone back to an Applebee's since then.

Worst date ever ... hmm. The first thing that pops into my mind is when I took my high-school girlfriend to a low-rent steakhouse after my junior prom. I dropped a piece of steak down the front of her dress. She went into the bathroom to haul it out of her bosom.

That was also the same date we went with some other couples to Kroger's, to watch the lobsters fight in their tank. So it was a good date, as well.

[sarahpolk.livejournal.com]

We've given up on Applebee's. They just plain suck. Everywhere.

[unclebill35.livejournal.com]

Maybe not MY worst date, but it probably was HERS.

Blind date, set up by the girlfriend of a buddy who was a teacher, with a fellow teacher, while I was in Savannah, both of us were early 30's. We went to a quirky eclectic restaurant downtown, then afterwards to a blues bar a buddy of mine owned. At the blues place I asked if she'd like anything to drink, and she asked for a daquiri, I think. I had a beer. Pleasant enough, but not much sparky stuff. Took her home, gentlemanly and all.

Later my buddy's gf told me she said she "BROKE UP WITH ME" because I was a BAD BOY. This was because I

1) was divorced
2) rode a motorcycle
3) was a former Marine
4) took her to a place that had lingerie on the ceiling, and
5) drank alcohol

The last one stumped me, until I found out she was so nervous when I asked if she wanted anything, she said the first drink name she thought of. That was her first alcoholic drink in her life.

I had to laugh.

[crankyasanoldma.livejournal.com]

That is hilarious. In no small part because a number of those things make you MORE attractive to a lot of the women I know.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_likelife/]

I went out with a woman last year who obviously liked me more than I liked her. In fact, I spent most of the dinner eyeing the busker outside of the restaurant. I felt so bad about it I couldn't wait for the evening to end. I just didn't like the woman I was with, and I let her down as gently as possible, but I still felt crummy about it afterwards.

[sarahpolk.livejournal.com]

Yes. SO horrendously bad that I created a Yelp account just so I could write a review.

It's been a year and a half and we have vowed never to eat there again, even though we go there to visit our friends in Palo Alto regularly.

Here's my review:

Madison and Fifth
367 University Avenue
Palo Alto, CA 94301
(650) 323-3900

Categories: American (New), Italian

We had the opportunity to try this new restaurant when we visited our friends in Palo Alto. The decor is quite nice and we were impressed with what they'd done with the space. The food wasn't bad, although for their prices I would say it was mediocre. I had the "homemade" pesto linguini, and the pasta and sauce seemed way too starchy. One of us had the pumpkin risotto, which came in a little baked pumpkin--nice presentation. The salads and appetizers are good. I had the grilled ahi carpaccio, and it was quite good.

The main problem we had with the restaurant, and the reason we won't be going back, was the staff and service. In one word: Inattentive. We are by no means restaurant snobs, but the level of inattentiveness was way over the top even for us. The women crew were dressed inappropriately for a restaurant that charges as much as they do (the hostess wore a skirt so short that she was providing peeks when she bent over, one waitress had a shirt that kept creeping up her midriff so that every time she bent over to serve a table we could see her thong underwear)--perfectly fine for nightclub setting but not for a nice dinner restaurant.

The worst however, was our waiter, Walter. He asked if we wanted Pelligrino or flat water. We ordered Pelligrino. Never once did he come back to refill our drinks or offer more bottles of Pelligrino (that would have made the restaurant another $14 at least for two bottles we would've ordered). He did not offer a bread basket for us, even after we asked (other tables got one). We were not offered ground pepper--the food needed it, and there was no pepper shaker on our table. We had to ask one of the hostesses because after the food was served, Walter didn't come back to check on us until after we were done eating. We also had two pasta dishes but was not offered any parmesan (the parmesan dish was sitting on the hostess's counter at the front).

When we were done with our entrees, Walter came back and asked us if we were ready for our check, having forgotten that one of us had asked for the chocolate souffle at the start of the meal. We reminded him, at which point he started to turn around and leave. We had to ask him if perhaps the rest of us might like to see the dessert menu. He took our dessert orders then walked away, failing to pick up any dishes. When we got our check, we did not get the tray of little cookies that others got at their table.

In the time that we were there, we noticed that the patrons at Walter's other tables seemed to always be looking around for him, as well.

All this for $50 per person (not including alcohol)? No, thank you. We won't be returning. If you go, make sure you don't get Walter.

I tried to email them at their Web site as listed on their business card, but it turns out their Web site as of today is just a parked domain name!

[fairychatmom.livejournal.com]

I was a late bloomer when it came to dating - I was almost 20 before I broke thru the shy and learned to talk to guys. Unfortunately, I wasn't very good at weeding out the incompatibles.

I don't remember the guy's name, but I remember the event. We were stationed at NAS Millington, TN. He invited me to a picnic. Sounds fun and harmless, right? Well, I should have been suspicious when we climbed on a bus with a bunch of other people. We were deposited in a nice park-like area. I vaguely recall rowing a boat around a lake and walking among trees and enjoying a sunny afternoon.

Then we were herded into a large meeting room. Turns out it was a church picnic and they intended to convert us all. They didn't want to let us go back till the bus till we were saved. Yeah. Well, I won - didn't join their church, got back on the bus, went back to my barracks room, and never saw that guy again.

[gundy.livejournal.com]

I met a guy at the train station near my parents' house when I was actually on my way to a date with someone else, so I was all dolled up. We talked, it was pleasant enough, and went separate ways without exchanging information. I ran into the same guy again about a week later while I was with AJ, and we talked a bit more. The third time I ran into him we exchanged numbers and made plans to go out. This would be 1999, so I was 23/24. I think he was in his late 20s, early 30s, on the short side, but cute and in good shape.

For the evening, I got all -- how would you say? -- hoed out, wearing tight, low-slung pants, a midriff-baring halter, and a long white fitted shirt over the whole shebang. God. I thought I looked way hot, I'm sure. He came to pick me up wearing...brrr...jeans and a patterned silk shirt, with a yin-yang necklace, no I'm not making that up. We went to dinner at Reza's, a Persian place. The conversation was a little stilted, but we got around to talking about his work at a place that made the "learn anything via tape" tapes. Long name, like Remington Steele, only not. We talked about the language-teaching tapes a bit, and it came out that I had taken Latin in grammar school, at some point. I made some sarcastic comment about its usefulness, which made him laugh, and I immediately regretted it. He had the worst laugh I have ever heard. Worse than Fran Drescher. Worse than Phyllis Diller. It was sharp, high pitched and staccato, and all distinctive hee-hee-hees. I don't know what else we talked about that night but I know I tried to steer the conversation to the least funny things I could think of. Poverty. AIDS. Seinfeld. Which is how I found out that he was also "really spiritual" and believed his dead mother talked to him in his dreams. He proceeded to tell me that part of the reason he was interested in me was because he saw me with my son and therefore "knew" I was a good mother, and he was really looking for a good mother for his future children. HEE HEE HEE.

We retired to the Matchbox bar for a drink. He ordered a chocolate martini for me (WRONG on both counts) and he said in this way that was so obviously pre-planned, all heavy-lidded eyes and slightly open mouth, "Don't you just want to...take off all your clothes and pour it all over you?" Um, no, but I would like to snap off the glass stem and stab you in the throat. So I bailed. I had no cell phone to rescue me, at the time, so I excused myself to a pay phone to "check on AJ". I came back all sad and sorry about having to leave for reasons I never explained. He offered to drive me home but I snagged a cab as quick as a flash, and when I reached to give him a perfunctory, hips-far-apart "thanks" hug, he grabbed the back of my neck and plunged his tongue down my throat. Seriously plunged, hard enough to make me gag. I'm gagging right now thinking about it. I pushed him back and said, "WHOA. No thanks. Bye." jumped in the cab and told the cabbie to punch it.

Next morning, I went to get the mail and in my mailbox was a note and a package. The note was from him, thanking me for the "magical" evening and sort-of-but-not-really apologizing for the guerilla tongue, explaining it was just that he found me so sexy he couldn't help himself. YYYEAH. And the package? "Learn Advanced Latin in Four Easy Weeks" on tape.

He called a few more times; I avoided the first couple and then just told him I wasn't interested. Not long after I saw him on the street again, when I was with Tracy and her daughter Cici. I hurried to get in the car, but he spotted me. I gave him a weak wave and said to Tracy, "Get us OUT of here, dude's a freak." So of course, Cici stuck her head out the car window and said "MY AUNTIE SAID YOU'RE A FREAK!"

[crankyasanoldma.livejournal.com]

Heh. Now this is the kind of story that makes a long Friday afternoon better.

[blergeatkitty.livejournal.com]

My worst date ever was an internet date with a guy I met on the Nerve personals. We were supposed to meet at a coffee house in Brooklyn and play Scrabble. He didn't know Brooklyn at all but INSISTED this was a cool place to meet up. He got lost and was nearly 45 minutes late. While we were playing Scrabble, my nearly-new cell phone got stolen. I never determined whether or not he had anything to do with it - the way he insisted I call Sprint immediately and ask them to suspend my service rather than calling the police suggests that maybe he did.

And the worst restaurant I've ever been to? I actually didn't know it was the worst until much later. Newish Italian place up the street from Kip's. We went in, ordered food, got it, everything was fine. My dish was a pretty standard pasta with pesto, and it was fine. Kip pushed his ravioli around the plate and said he thought it tasted a little strange, but not inedible. Midway through the meal he got a slightly stricken look on his face, stopped eating, and was very quiet while I finished.

A few hours later he said he'd seen the largest cockroach he'd ever seen (keep in mind the boy was born and raised in NYC) crawling up the wall, but he didn't tell me because he didn't want me to freak out and/or ruin my meal.

That restaurant didn't last very long, and was later replaced by a vegetarian Indian place that is both delicious and vermin-free.

[jamespolk.livejournal.com]

I've only ever been on two dates and neither was bad.

Lani told what is a good contender for worst restaurant experience and dollar for dollar it was.

My other candidate is Buca di Beppo, also in Palo Alto. We ended up seated in the middle table of this small room that had about 4 tables too many in it. And the place was jam packed. So much so that any time a waitperson came by I had to leave forward over the table so that they could get by.

This happened about every minute for the hour we were there. It was such a miserable experience we've never given them (at any location) another chance even though our first time eating at one (in Sacramento) was pretty good.

[oxymoronnyc.livejournal.com]

I was going to say that I won't post any details, but I realized that (fortunately) there aren't any details to post.

I went on a date with young gentlemen - classic dinner-and-a-movie, after when we repaired to my apartment. All seemed to be going quite well until he suggested that we might progress to, uh....

scat

As soon as the smoke cleared from my brain I asked him to leave, and never saw him again. That was in 1993.

[gundy.livejournal.com]

WHOA. You win!

[delphica.livejournal.com]

Not at the same time ...

Worst restaurant meal: In Italy, if you can believe it! And it wasn't a bad meal, it was one of those things where it happened to be all foods I don't particularly care for. This was one of my very first development asks -- I was young (professionally), super nervous and had been sent out with the instructions to do whatever it takes to get this guy happy about the college (someday I will tell you the other weird thing it took to make him happy, but it's not related to the restaurant).

So we get to the restaurant, and it's the kind that doesn't have menus, because only people who know the chef are allowed to eat there. The guy made a big production out of insisting upon ordering for both of us -- which, to be honest, I would have needed help with anyway. Every thing he picked was something I'm not keen on eating, and you know me, I'm not even that picky of an eater. The worst was a well-done steak encrusted with peppercorns, which isn't too bad on its own but I had recently had dental work done and had a big hole in my mouth, into which went every other peppercorn until they piled up and eventually entered my brain. I think one is still there. Then there was dessert, and you figure at least dessert is going to go well ... it was vegetable cake in aspic. Like fruit cake, but with vegetables. It's a weird old Tuscan traditional thing that no one eats anymore because it's gross.

And I freakin' STILL upheld my membership in the clean plate club.

Of course, looking back on it now, I can think of a million strategies for how to have handled that in ways that would be both gracioius and not result in my eating vegetable cake in aspic, so please keep in mind I was VERY YOUNG.

Worst date:
It's not quite exactly a date, but kinda close, I hope.
It was the first time I was meeting my college boyfriend's father. The father was taking us out to dinner in a nice restaurant. Without preamble, the father turned to me and told me at length and in detail about the sexual position that he and boyfriend's mother had been participating in the night the boyfriend was conceived. He had some entire whack theory about how that determined the personality of a child.

[gundy.livejournal.com]

Despite the horror of the second story, all I'm coming away with is vegetable cake in aspic.

[billdo1.livejournal.com]

The worst meal I had was on a road trip in a Denny's off the Pennsylvania Turnpike Northeast Extension in a patch of cheap restauarants stacked just outside the city limits of Scranton. I'm not sure what more need be said.

The worst mismatch I had was a blind date with a woman who was the denim/jeans correspondent for Women's Wear Daily. We started out with my wondering why people needed fancy jeans beyond the basic Levis or Gap jeans I would buy. It didn't really improve.

[betawriter.livejournal.com]

Two of the worst dates (or rather, first time meeting them) were with my *(soon to be) ex-husband, Clay, and Mark. Yeah, I don't know either.

Clay and I met at the Rocky Horror Picture Show (SHUT UP) when we were both 16. He had just been released from the mental institution that day, and I had just been to one of my best friend's funerals that day (he had been driving recklessly and slid under a flatbed truck and got decapitated). So neither of us were...um...sane, I guess. In any case, one of the girls he met when he was in the nuthouse was also at Rocky. She introduced him to me because she thought that if he met a "preppy" (that would be me, in my Bugle Boy jeans and Body Glove t-shirt) then he would realize that she was really the one meant for him.

So we kissed and made out some - just first base. After the show ended, he took me and my friend with him to Dennys to get some food. My friend and I had no money at this point, or maybe just enough for coffee, and we were both hungry. But since he didn't know how long he would know me, he refused to pay for any food for us, ordered a huge order of biscuits and gravy and eggs for himself and refused to share. Ha!

The next day, I called my friend Linda to get his number because I was smitten. Eleven years later we got married. Go figure.

With Mark, I was set up by my friend Kristy at a comedy show. He didn't know it was a setup. Sparks flew, everyone in the group knew it, and I was totally smitten. I wanted to kiss him! I wanted to do more than that!

Around 2 a.m. we get ready to leave the bar. He walks me to the El, even though he's got his car right there, and says "bye". No kiss, no offer of a ride home, nothing. I think I'm chopped liver. So I ride the El home and some drunk frat boy pukes on the platform and I got splashback on my shoes.

Plus there's the time after we slept together for like only the second time and he told me what he wanted to name our kids, and also that he had a massive crush on [someone] and so would I live next door to them if he got to marry her? That was great. He's since apologized for being an idiot. And I do love Mark a lot.

[gundy.livejournal.com]

Please tell Mark that he's the luckiest motherfucker to walk this earth. Not just after reading that, either.

Late to the Party....

[politzania.livejournal.com]

and I guess I'm fortunate not to have had any extremely memorable bad meals or bad dates....

Senior year in high school - I did take off/sneak out (parents were gone for the weekend & I wasn't supposed to go anywhere) for a day with a guy I'd met at a dance the previous weekend - he & two of his buddies (one of whom was driving a beat-up classic Convertible) - after the dance - a friend and I went cruising with them


Anyways, on the sneak-out day, he drove us about 45 min away .. I don't quite remember what we did - maybe a movie? On a later date, I dumped him for getting too handsy; besides, I really was more interested in his friend.

His name was "Commodore" & he went by "Junior :eek: What *was* I thinking?

Re: Late to the Party....

[troubleagain.livejournal.com]

You huzzy.

[troubleagain.livejournal.com]

There was the guy that was going to seminary to be a minister who asked the most amazingly personal financial questions on a second date....I got the strong impression he was sizing me up to see if I'd be able to support him while he went to school. Ick.

[politzania.livejournal.com]

Ick indeed....

[slitterst.livejournal.com]

Worst date ever: 1994, Reba McEntire concert. My girlfriend was trying to decide if she was going to stay with me or go back to her ex. For months she'd been on the fence (I know, I was an idiot to let her walk all over me for that long) and not sleeping with either of us since that would just cloud her judgement.

We had lawn seats so we got there early to get a good location and just chat. During the chatting she casually mentioned that her ex had gotten something contagious "down there" from his ex. It slowly dawns on me that she's been sleeping with him all along.

I got up to get a beer. I started walking to my car, but just didn't have the heart to abandon her in the middle of Northern Virginia. Spent the rest of the concert (very good concert, incidentally) sitting as far away from her as I could on the blanket.

Oh, and three hours sitting on the side of a hill made my back scream in protest, so I ended the night almost unable to walk.

[magdalene1.livejournal.com]

Lousy Restaurant Meal: The details are fuzzy, but it involved spending a week eating gross Soviet food in Romania, and then finding a pizza delivery place, and getting overjoyed and ordering pizza, and discovering that their version of "pizza" was ketchup, corn, canned tuna, and some gross local cheese. Not edible. Ukrainian Chinese food was pretty dismal as well.

Worst Date: There is the classic "Guy Who Would Not Break Eye Contact" who kept staring at me even though I asked him to stop. "Am I making you uncomfortable?" (stare) I waited until he got up to go to the bathroom, put money on the table for my drink, and fled.

More recently, there was the time I invited a guy to a student screening at school and he proceeded to jabber loudly through the films about how bad the films were while we were sitting next to the filmmakers and I wanted to crawl into a hole and die.

[evaluna68.livejournal.com]

My worst date ever was memorialized in a Straight Dope thread. Lord help me if I ever have a worse one than that. Well, OK, there was also the near-date rape incident...

[suraktaarati.livejournal.com]

This isn't really an OT reply, but I just got the gift (finally!) from the Secret Santa exchange. I just wanted you to know the boys love the cow box, and pretty much everything else ment for them. Annnd I quite enjoy the giant gummys. haha

Oh, okay.. well..
I had a wad of gum at the bottom of a glass of soda once.
Or when the IHOP first opened a couple years ago I got an omlet that was half done and had eggshells in it, along with undercooked meat.
Or along the lines of the meat, I got raw chicken with a nice, cooked outer layer at the Renn Faire last year.

As for a date.. one kid took me to Arbys. I guess that isn't that bad, but it wasn't very romantic.
Another one took me out to an actual nice place, but then ignored me to stare at everyone else. Bah!


Anyway- Thanks!
I'm posting photos on the rat community tonight. :D