It Might Be Another Four Years Until We Go Back
It was hot this weekend. Very, very hot. Like, in the upper 90s with a heat index in the triple digits hot. It’s going to be a long summer.
On Saturday evening, Mr. Martini and I decided to treat ourselves and go to Olive Garden.
(Wait! Wait! To all of the foodie folks, I know, I know. Olive Garden is not high-end, Italian cuisine. I know it doesn’t replace local Mom & Pop Italian restaurants with the olive oil on the table and the rotating one-of-a-kind specials. I know. But let’s face it – they have pasta and cheese and sauce, and it can be yummy if not completely authentic.)
We actually managed not only to find a parking spot at Olive Garden, but we were even seated immediately. This was amazing, as I swear the Olive Garden hires seat fillers a la the Oscars, to ensure that it is always, always filled to capacity and necessitates a 40 minute wait on the uncomfortable lobby furniture, for no other reason than to keep the general public feeling like they’re getting away with something when they get seated sooner. I know that’s how I felt.
Our table was in a nook separated a bit from the rest of the dining room, which was perfect for us. As we were scanning the menu, I noticed that I wasn’t cooling down as I normally would indoors. I didn’t think much of it (it was 98 degrees outside, after all), and we went ahead and placed our order with our spunky waitress. When Spunky Waitress came back with our drinks, she informed us that it would be a few minutes for our salad and breadsticks. “The exhaust fans in the kitchen aren’t working,” she said. “It’s pretty hazy and hot in there, and I’m pregnant, so they won’t let me in there.”
Mr. M and I looked at each other, but figured we didn’t have anything to worry about, since we weren’t being told to leave or anything. It just meant we might be a little warm in the dining room, no big deal.
Our salads and breadsticks arrived, and then our dinners. We dug in happily. It was only after we started eating that we heard a waitress say to some other patrons in our section, “Yeah, we had to open the kitchen doors to air them out. Your lucky you’re back here, because the rest of the dining room is getting pretty hot.” That’s when I glanced at the rest of the dining room, and saw a grey haze hovering like smog over all of the other diners. “At this point, we’re not seating any more customers.”
The servers started moving in fast-forward, trying to get food out to the remaining diners a quickly as possible. Then, the power went out. It was still well-lit in the dining room thanks to the windows, but the sudden silence of the cheery Italian music was a little eerie. The power outage was the cue for the table next to us to request to-go boxes for their dinners – they were out of there. I didn’t see Spunky Pregnant Waitress for the rest of the meal, so she must have been sent home.
Mr. M and I stayed and finished our meal. We were almost done anyway, so it seemed silly to rush since we hadn’t been asked to. There were still diners being served meals, so it looked like business as usual in the rest of the restaurant. The power did come back on, but the haze in the dining room just got thicker, and eventually made it back to our section as well.
By that point, we were done with our plates. We paid for our meal and as a thank you for sticking around and not kicking up a fuss, the server gave us extra mints. I think I was more excited about the extra mints than I should have been. I love those things. I’m betting she was trying to get rid of them before they melted. I should have offered to take the whole lot of them with me.
That was our Olive Garden dinner on Saturday night. A little lasagna served with a touch of heatstroke. And I’m still happy about the mints.
