If You Don't First Suceed, Try, Try Again.
When Valentines, a first anniversary, or some big change in your life rolls round, you want to celebrate with some kind of perfect date. You imagine your first valentines with the man you are going to marry with romantic reservations at some fine restaurant with a good wine menu. Your first anniversary you expect to be something beyond an ordinary day of literally doing nothing. And you definitely don't expect to puke your guts out after the meal celebrating a big move and new venture in your life. I don't know who has it out for us, but we seem to be followed by bad luck when it comes to these big nights.
Despite all our preparation and anticipation for our first valentines, the night turned into what you might go ahead and call a disaster. There is a fine local restaurant that serves good wines and gourmet foods that we chose to make reservations at for our special night. We figured we'd have ourselves a good bottle of wine with some tasty appetizers - this place made a macaroni and cheese worth dying for. A week or so before February 14th rolled round, Paden went by the restaurant and happened to speak with the manager himself. He made the reservation, took home a wine list and a food menu and we did our research on the wines so we'd known which bottle to pick for our splurge.
February 14th dawned. We got all dressed up and felt all lovely dovey as we walked arm in arm into the restaurant. Everything was going splendidly until they brought the menu. Now if we had been more savvy perhaps we would have predicted this, but we were new to the whole Valentines date thing and were rather perturbed to see a small one sided menu placed in front of us that bore no resemblance to the menu we had been given the week before. When we asked for the wine menu, we were informed the three choices of at the bottom were all they were serving that night. Not only that, but they were only offering them by the glass at the same price that would have gotten you an entire bottle the other 364 days of the years. To top it all off, there was no ordering a couple appetizers to go with the wine. No, you had to order a 5 course meal (of which you had only 2 choices which, if I remember correctly, did NOT include that macorni dish.). At first we talked about splitting the meal, but the waitress was quick to inform us with a sneer that that was not done. The rude waitress was the cherry on top.
All of a sudden our bottle of wine and appetizer for under fifty bucks was turning into a meal well over a hundred dollars. To top it all off, neither of us were that hungry since we had not intended to order an entire meal. To order those two meals would have been to waste enough food to feed half an African village. Paden had a tortured look on his face, so when he suggested we leave, I was already grabbing my purse to follow. I don't think I'd ever walked out of a restaurant like that before. Perhaps I would have felt bad if I hadn't felt duped and lied to by being given incorrect menu's while making reservations for the 14th or even if the waitress had been a little nicer.
That story does have a happy ending, however, with a candlelight dinner at the Corleone with a bottle of wine, some hard aged cheddar, lox, and cheese bagels from Safeway. Oh, and a beautiful string of pearls too. :)
I won't bore you with all our other date night catastrophes, except this last weekend was our first anniversary. We'd planned to try out the new restaurant in town, Gnosh. But the day dawned and of course Paden was laid out sick - the smell of food sending him back to the refuge of bed. But we weren't deterred. No, if you don't first succeed, you try, try again. So this weekend we went down to Gnosh to celebrate our 370 day anniversary. This new restaurant Gnosh has excellent friendly waiters, a great classy ambience, and a very interesting menu. We had oxtail, wild mushrooms, and peppers stuffed with goat cheese helped down with a few exotic drinks. Definitely a winner anniversary date.
And all's well that ends well. :)
Despite all our preparation and anticipation for our first valentines, the night turned into what you might go ahead and call a disaster. There is a fine local restaurant that serves good wines and gourmet foods that we chose to make reservations at for our special night. We figured we'd have ourselves a good bottle of wine with some tasty appetizers - this place made a macaroni and cheese worth dying for. A week or so before February 14th rolled round, Paden went by the restaurant and happened to speak with the manager himself. He made the reservation, took home a wine list and a food menu and we did our research on the wines so we'd known which bottle to pick for our splurge.
February 14th dawned. We got all dressed up and felt all lovely dovey as we walked arm in arm into the restaurant. Everything was going splendidly until they brought the menu. Now if we had been more savvy perhaps we would have predicted this, but we were new to the whole Valentines date thing and were rather perturbed to see a small one sided menu placed in front of us that bore no resemblance to the menu we had been given the week before. When we asked for the wine menu, we were informed the three choices of at the bottom were all they were serving that night. Not only that, but they were only offering them by the glass at the same price that would have gotten you an entire bottle the other 364 days of the years. To top it all off, there was no ordering a couple appetizers to go with the wine. No, you had to order a 5 course meal (of which you had only 2 choices which, if I remember correctly, did NOT include that macorni dish.). At first we talked about splitting the meal, but the waitress was quick to inform us with a sneer that that was not done. The rude waitress was the cherry on top.
All of a sudden our bottle of wine and appetizer for under fifty bucks was turning into a meal well over a hundred dollars. To top it all off, neither of us were that hungry since we had not intended to order an entire meal. To order those two meals would have been to waste enough food to feed half an African village. Paden had a tortured look on his face, so when he suggested we leave, I was already grabbing my purse to follow. I don't think I'd ever walked out of a restaurant like that before. Perhaps I would have felt bad if I hadn't felt duped and lied to by being given incorrect menu's while making reservations for the 14th or even if the waitress had been a little nicer.
That story does have a happy ending, however, with a candlelight dinner at the Corleone with a bottle of wine, some hard aged cheddar, lox, and cheese bagels from Safeway. Oh, and a beautiful string of pearls too. :)
I won't bore you with all our other date night catastrophes, except this last weekend was our first anniversary. We'd planned to try out the new restaurant in town, Gnosh. But the day dawned and of course Paden was laid out sick - the smell of food sending him back to the refuge of bed. But we weren't deterred. No, if you don't first succeed, you try, try again. So this weekend we went down to Gnosh to celebrate our 370 day anniversary. This new restaurant Gnosh has excellent friendly waiters, a great classy ambience, and a very interesting menu. We had oxtail, wild mushrooms, and peppers stuffed with goat cheese helped down with a few exotic drinks. Definitely a winner anniversary date.
And all's well that ends well. :)
Isn't Gnosh great? :) Glad you could make it work out. Happy anniversary!
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