This is the tale of an opportunity missed; a long-awaited chance at redemption squandered, and a restaurant that will apparently just hire any breathing soul to wait its tables. This, my friends, is the story of Erin, who - bless her heart - was making a quarter of a third of a half-hearted attempt to serve we weary and hungry patrons of the Carrollton Applebees last night, but who apparently forgot the "serve" part of "server" and just decided to wing it in a "what the heck, who needs a job" kind of scenario.
You see, tonight was the first time my wife and I had set foot in an Applebees in almost a decade. We were dreadfully tired of the other places we eat out, despite them being fantastic ( Here's to you Irish Pub, Shuckers, and Thai Basel ) - and so we decided to go to the one place we hadn't been in 9 or 10 years - good 'ole Applebees.
Maybe they were better? Maybe the food was better? Maybe the prices were better? Maybe, just maybe - the service was better?
We walked in with high hopes, but soon found ourselves living our last experience at an Applebees and we almost left before we ordered drinks. That said, it was late - probably 9pm and we were hungry. And so, the rest of this horrible story:
Erin took our drink orders. Two diet Co... hey, where is she going?
I managed to say "TWO diet cokes" as she wisked away, no doubt wanting to provide us with the very best service. Or not. No? Read on...
Shortly, we received our drinks. So far, so good except for the near miss on the communication that both of us wanted our own drinks, but crisis averted.
Erin took our order. Check. Good job, Erin. She was apparently fairly proficient with a pencil and paper.
Then, no Erin. No food. We waited.
Approximately 30 minutes later, here comes the food, which let me tell you was absolutely mediocre at best. I mean, I hate to say everything was bad, but the truth is the truth is it not? The ravoli was dry inside. Imagine that!? And the "smoky sauce" was more like thousand island dressing warmed over with some bell pepper pieces from a frozen veggie bag that... I'm sorry - I digress.
So the food was brought out by someone who was not Erin. Also, we had no silverware. After asking for something to eat our orange pepper nugget sauced cardboard pasta, again someone else brought us forks. Sadly, we then had to ask for napkins since there were none with the forks. Again, someone else brought us the napkins. You see where this is going? No? Just a bit further...
After we ate about half of our meals ( each ), we decided it would be better dinner for our two dogs and we caught Erin between one of her many drive by's of our table and asked for the check and a box. To her credit, she did then ask us one time if we would like more diet coke.
Also sadly, "the check" is now done via one of those stupid table top idiot box things and so I proceeded to play the "let's see if this one works" game with it - and paid the check. I gave Erin, who actually did almost nothing for us, a generous 10% tip. I think it was $3.65 cents or something close to that. It was about $3.60 cents more than her "service" was worth, but as my wife scowled at me, I said " I'm a nice guy and I feel generous."
Apparently Erin didn't think my tip was generous at all, because by God she probably deserved more than that just for showing up to work and clocking in? Who knows. She came over to our table one more time because she had to since we old folks requested a paper receipt and bluntly asked if I was "figuring that thing out?" Yes, Erin... I figured that thing out and left you a pretty darn nice tip despite not seeing you for most of the hour and a half we were there. I didn't say that of course because - well, I'm a nice guy generally speaking and I kept my mouth shut so that I wouldn't offend her more than I was about to offend her when the receipt printed and she saw she only received a 10% tip.
Fast forward 15 minutes later.
The wife and I really didn't have anything better to do, so we thought we'd wait her out for our box for our leftover pasta mush. Surprise, surprise, she passed our table a half dozen times, flitting about left and right like a drunken hummingbird on acid, until my wife was finally ready to leave and said " Can we have our box, please?"
Well, Ms. Erin did not like that one bit after the horrible tip we left her and she pretended to go and get our box. She waited on other tables, she talked to other employees and generally stayed far away from us, finally sashaying into the kitchen, never to be seen again. A few minutes later, however, someone with a box who again was not Erin, handed it to us without comment.
Honestly, the food wasn't that bad I guess for what it is - I mean, it's not Chick-fil-A for pete's sake -
But the "service" we got from Erin will ensure that it will be another 10 (or 20?) years before we try Applebees again. Good hire, management. read more