Friday, March 16, 2007

Go me! It's my birthday!

Or it was, at least. Yes, on Saturday your favourite fake internet Doctor turned a whopping 28 years old. Was it a crazy day, full of debauchery and alcohols? No. Was it moderately interesting? Possibly. YOU be the judge!

In the morning, The Peach and I went to Denny's, because a) we love the pancakes at Denny's, and b) you eat free if it's your birthday. What, you think I'm off to a pretty lame start? Well, maybe. But I really like pancakes, and it's my birthday, not yours. The afternoon was a little slow: chores, nap, Joy of Painting, a little reading. Yeah, I know, a mile a minute. But the big part of my birthday was only coming up: I was going to The Keg and get me a nice steak dinner. Never been to The Keg before, but I heard it was a decent enough place for a steak. I got dressed up moderately nicely (I thought about wearing my appropriate t-shirt, but abandoned the idea as The Peach would probably have slapped me around a little), and headed out to the local Keg to have dinner at about 7:30. Three blocks later, we arrive at the door, and ask how long we'd have to wait until we get a seat.

"Two and a half hours."

TWO AND A HALF HOURS?!?!? We turned around and left quickly, and after stopping at the local tobbaconist's for my birthday cigar, came back home to call around and see how long the waits at other restaurants would be. It didn't look very promising (one and a half hours?), but the one in the south end of town said the wait would only be half an hour or forty-five minutes, and that they started clearing out at about 8:30. Right, so, a quick drive to the south side, not a bad idea, although it'd mean I'd only be able to have a single beer with dinner. Not a huge problem, though, so off we went.

We got there at 8:40, and were told that there would be a forty-five minute wait. HOWEVER, the waiting area was blasting rock music so loud that after five minutes, The Peach was getting a headache, which would only have gotten worse if we'd actually gotten a table (it didn't seem that much quieter in the restaurant proper). So, we left that restaurant too. Where to go now? Well, what's in the area. Another steakhouse? Probably just as busy and annoying. East Side Mario's? Meh. Swiss Chalet? Hey, now there's an idea! I've always had a soft spot for Swiss Chalet; it was my favourite restaurant when I was a kid. I thought it was a super-fancy restaurant, because the waitstaff brought you the food and
you didn't have to wait in line, and they had real silverware, not plastic ones! (It was a more innocent time.)

So, off to Swiss Chalet for a delicious meal of rotisserie'd chicken. We were just about to walk in the front door of the restaurant, and I held open the door for a couple who were just walking out. As they passed us, the woman said the following to her date:

"That was the worst meal I've ever had."

Well, crap. I mean, maybe it'd be okay; after all, how can you mess up Swiss Chalet? Then again, after a glowing recommendation like that, maybe it wasn't the place to go after all. We decided we'd had enough trying to get around and would postpone my dinner out to a night where we'd actually get in and out at reasonable hour. We picked up some beer and ordered some pizza instead. At 10:30, the pizza still hadn't arrived, and I said to The Peach, "You know something? If we'd stayed at or around the first restaurant? We'd be eating right now."

But that was okay. For my birthday meal I had beer, pizza, cigars, and homemade black forest cake, and we watched NewsRadio and laughed about how silly the whole fiasco was. Oh yeah, and my birthday present from The Peach: tickets to THE POLICE. It was a pretty good day after all.

5 comments:

Mrs. Loquacious said...

Man, Doc, sorry to hear that your b-day was such a run-around adventure! The good news are twofold, however; 1) you get to tell this very interesting story over and over again for years to come, and 2) you get to extend your birthday festivities beyond a day (or even a week, depending on when you next decide to hit up the Keg).

Happy Belated 28th!

Foofa said...

Happy b-Day. Mrs L is right, it makes for a great story. May I suggest reservations for next year? The Police tickets are awesome and I think beer, pizza, black forest cake and cigars makes for a fantastic celebration

Anonymous said...

The Police! I'll be there too!

And Happy Birthday. Too bad about the Keg.

Karen said...

Happy Birthday!

(mmm...steak...mmm...pizza...shoot! Now I'm hungry!)

The Doc said...

Mrs. L., thanks for the wishes, and I think we're going to have to postpone The Keg for a bit...details forthcoming.

Natalie, we would have made reservations if they took them. They don't take reservations on Fridays or Saturdays, because they know they're going to be holding a table empty for a period of time and not getting that sweet, sweet tip. So, the only days you really NEED reservations are the only days you can't GET them...

Megan, I hope to see you there, and if not Ihope you have good seats!

Karen, nothing like Irish ale and a Dominican cigar after a meal of goat-cheese and roasted vegetable pizza. Geez, that sounds moderately decadent!