My family went out to dinner last week, which isn't something that we do very often. We decided to grace Buffalo Wild Wings with our presence because Rachael and Nathan had each received a free kids meal coupon from their school for a reading program and my mom had a $5 off coupon. So we arrived at the restaurant and were seated, but only after the hostess thought we wanted to order out because we were looking at the menu posted on the wall.
Now my family is good at a lot of things, but ordering food at restaurants is not one of them. For some reason, it is impossible for us to execute an order without some kind of hitch. We somehow manage to make it the most complicated task in the world. The waiter arrived and we all ordered waters (at this point he knows he's making a huge tip). We then attempted to complete our food order, which was about as difficult as the General Assembly making a unanimous vote. You can order wings in different quantities, such as 6, 20, or 32. So first, we had to decide how many wings we wanted. Done. Then we had to decide what sauces we wanted for the wings. There were about 10 to choose from, and you can have any many sauces as you want on as many of the wings as you want. We struggled with that decision for about 5 minutes. I could literally see our waiter's hair growing on his arms as he patiently held his order pad and counted the minutes that passed by.
My mom then proceeded to give the waiter Rachael and Nathan's free kids meal coupons, which he immediately pointed out were expired. WHAT??? Expired? But they had just received them. He said he would ask the manager if we could use them anyway. My mom then presented the $5 off coupon to the waiter, which he even more rapidly pointed out was not even for Buffalo Wild Wings, but was for another establishment called Wings and Things. At this point, I'm so embarrassed I want to crawl under the table. How do you make that mistake? The worst part of all is that it happens without fail every time we go out, at least in one variation or another.
I made a comment to my family about how ridiculous that process was and how we really need to start practicing our orders before we even get to the restaurant. It will save a lot of time and grief for all parties involved. My mom insisted that there wasn't anything abnormal about the situation, and that lots of families do the same thing. I vocally disagreed with her and insisted that nothing about our family is normal. However, once I got past the embarrassment of it all, I had to laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation. We ended up having a wonderful time (and even got to use the kids meal coupons). I definitely wouldn't call my family "normal," but then again, what is the norm, and who defines what that should be. I suppose our lives would be pretty boring if we fit into the so-called stereotypical "norm" that society has created.
