A Lunch of Butts
Saturday's are great days. We slept in. We had donuts for breakfast. We laid in bed and watched TV. Having the Pasta Pass is wonderful, because we don't have to worry about cooking, or even about where to go to eat. We will just go to Olive Garden and stuff ourselves full of bread and pasta.
As we drove into the Olive Garden parking lot, there was a woman crossing the road. We had to come to a stop, but she was one of those people who doesn't care about other humans, and continues to walk across the road at a meandering pace. Plus she was pretty fat, so maybs she couldn't speed up. We'll call her Grumpy Girl, or GG for short. So, GG was with an old man, like withered everywhere, cane using, skin sagging old man, but like the gentlemanly kind. A seemingly sweet old guy. We postulated that he might have been a scoundrel when he was younger, but now that he was old, GG had to take care of him, even though she still resented his past roughish lifestyle.
I ordered the Rigatoni with Alfredo and Crispy Chicken Fritta. I ordered this because I didn't think I'd tried the Rigatoni before. I had. It's just kind of a boring pasta, and I'd forgotten. It's not that there is anything wrong with it, but it's just nothing special. It's like big penne. Hehe, big penne.
Lunch on a Saturday ensures that our Leisure World Olive Garden is hopping with old people, or, I guess, shuffling with old people? They don't really hop. But there was this one specimen there, a woman wearing bright green pants. Her butt was hanging over the back of her chair, the way a man's gut will hang over his belt. Quite the unexpected delight.
GG and the old man were sitting pretty close by. We watched as he sat placidly and ate breadsticks and smiled off into the distance (he would take a small bite of the stick of bread, then set it back directly on the table, no plates for him.). GG ignored his contented old man demeanor and played with her phone. Maybe GG was his aide? Paid to take him out on errands, but not interested in a relationship with him at all?
Sprinkled among the vast tables of the living-almost-dead, were many families. One family had three small children, probably between ten and five years old. The three children were in wet suits. We live pretty close to the beach, and I'm sure they had either just come from, or were headed to the water, but my first thought was just that those were the easiest clothes for the kids to eat out in. If they get messy you can just hose them off before they go into the house. Like I said, of course this was not their plan, nor is it a good plan. I'm sure getting little kids into wet suits is not easy at all. But I liked that they were eating in their wetsuits.
Another old lady by us was not hanging her butt over the edge for all to see, no, she had a different strategy, the classic plumber's peek. I know that's what I want to see as I scarf down noodles.
By the time we left, GG had given up any pretense of dining with the old man, and appeared to be watching a movie on her phone. Sad for the old man, but maybe he shouldn't have been such a player when he was young, and then maybe his daughter would love him more.
Visit 8:
Monetary value: $35.58
Total: $228.06 (Took us five days to pass the $200 dollar mark, which is how much two individual Pasta Passes would cost. It's all just gravy from here)
A Bar of Flies
Tonight Olive Garden was packed. Ariel brought up the point that Pasta Pass holders should get special seating priority. I couldn't agree more. Because it was so busy, a 40 minute wait, we swarmed over to the full service bar, not unlike the fruit flies that dotted the bar overhang.
The bartenders too, looked like flies, dressed all in black, rushing all around, pausing for a moment here, a moment there, before buzzing off again. They were busy, and so we did quite a bit of waiting.
One of the bartenders was a young, very skinny guy, with long straight, brown hair that he had pulled back into a ponytail. He either had very dark eyelashes, or was wearing eyeliner, I favor the latter idea. He was very Legolasesque, but like if Legolas was a vampire, instead of an elf. He was also wearing like seven rings, definitely from Middle Earth.
Vampolas, when he finally did get to us, was gracious and charming, like any good vampire-elf is. He took the notes of our order on his phone, I don't know why that still surprised me in 2015, but it did. He then turned to put our order into the computer and pulled a Charles Xavier mind control pose, which really freaked me out after thinking of him as a vamp-elf. I don't want my bartenders to have that kind of power.
I ordered the Angel Hair with Marinara and Chicken Meatballs. The Chicken Meatballs were not on the menu last year, and I've been dreading eating them. I know we already eat chicken in weird forms, dino nuggets, fingers, popcorn, and the like, but a ball of chicken meat did not seem like a good idea to me. I was pleasantly surprised. They were pretty good, probably better than normal meatballs. And they had a little spice to them, which I think helped the Marinara. Last year I only had the Marinara, like, one time, because it was pretty gross. But, they either changed something, or the Chicken Meatballs really made it taste much better. Ariel tried a bite, and did not like them at all.
Sitting at the bar, we heard some women complaining to one of the managers that their server did something and said, "You should fire him right now!" What a jerk. Whatever their waiter did, from what I heard I think he was slow and maybe forgot the breadsticks, or brought the wrong food, or something. Fine, leave him a smaller tip, I get that. Bad service equals small tip. OK. But whatever mistake he made, I'm sure it was not a fireable offense. I think everyone should have to work some form of customer service in their life. If that woman had ever had to be a server, work retail, or even at a call center, I'm sure it could have taught her to treat servers like people, and to have a little freakin patience. The manager handled the situation very well, explained the server was new, and the ladies left laughing, but I reserve a hatred for them.
I took a panoramic picture of the bar right as one of the bartenders was putting down a plate, so I got a dismembered hand in the picture, perfect for this time of year.
With the bartenders buzzing around, filling drink orders, getting more glasses, changing whatever supplied the taps, we waited a little while before we got our check and could leave. The Never Ending Pasta Bowl really seems to have made our Leisure World Olive Garden get much more busy.
Visit 9:
Weight Fluctuation today: +0.4 lbs
Total: +2.6 lbs
Monetary value: $31.81
Total: $259.87
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