You Can’t Blame This On the Wine
Posted by limpetfan | Posted in Wine Trails, life | Posted on 07-12-2009-05-2008
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I suspect most writers will be able to relate to this statement: sometimes material just PRESENTS itself to you. You’re not looking for it, and then BAM! there it is, staring you in the face, begging you to write something, lest the material disappear forever.
Well, last night material presented itself to me in a rather… projectile… manner.
I spent all day yesterday with Alex, Nicole, Jay and some of Jay and Nicole’s friends on the Shawangunk wine trail. We were participating in the Wreath Fineries wine trail event, which was wonderful and fabulous and people should go if they can still find tickets. Our little group started at Palaia Vineyards, where the general consensus among us was that it’s a really cute place to spend time when the weather gets warmer. We then went to Brotherhood Winery, which was in my top 2 out of the 8 wineries we visited, and then to Applewood Winery, which was the other member of my top 2. Applewood was giving out this really delicious blue cheese potato au gratin dish, which was hands-down the best food we received all day (the other stuff was good, too, this was just INSANELY delicious). We also visited Warwick Valley Winery, Baldwin Vineyards, Whitecliff Vineyards – a very cool place to go sit and drink a bottle when the weather is nice, – Benmarl Vineyards, and Stoutridge Vineyards (another cool place because they use science to make their wine!). There were a few we didn’t make it to… but that’s not really the point of this post.
You see, I was originally planning to share our experience on the wine trail, but then I forgot my camera. Figuring the post would be a bit dull without pictures to show what I was talking about, I axed the idea. But like I said, sometimes material presents itself….
After we did the wine trail, we dropped off Nicole and Jay’s friends at the train station, then the four of us went to dinner at Chili’s. Alex and I were pretty psyched about this, because it has been a long time since we’ve been to a Chili’s. Plus, they have one of those 2 people eat for $20 deals, which meant going out would be affordable for once. We get a table, and are sitting and talking and relaxing after a long, hard day of drinking wine.
And that’s when the material presented itself.
Alex tends to have things happen to him. If someone is going to drop something, or spill something, or otherwise do something undesirable, it tends to be him, or someone does it TO him. Last night was no exception. We were at a high-top table, and it worked out that Alex had me on one side of him and Nicole on the other side. There was a row of tables behind him. At one table behind him, there was a young kid. And the young kid suddenly didn’t feel so good. His mother was trying to hustle him to the bathroom, but there just wasn’t time. The kid threw up. Not just a little bit, or on his own shoes, but the kind of chunky, disgusting, projectile vomit that goes everywhere. Sorry to be gross, but I know everyone reading knows what I mean right now!
Oh, and by everywhere, I mean on the floor – and on Alex.
At first we didn’t know it was on Alex. He had his fleece jacket on his chair, and he was wearing a sweater over his shirt, so his skin was all covered. He didn’t FEEL it. We were all quite busy staring at the chunks of red and pink puke all over the floor behind Nicole and Alex, so we didn’t even think to look at his back. But then a man at a table behind us pointed to Alex and said,
“It’s ON you!”
I couldn’t see anything, so I had no idea what he was talking about. But Nicole had a great angle and she looked and said,
“It’s all over your jacket – it’s in the sleeve and everything. And it’s on your back.”
And so Alex did what no one wants to ever have to do when they’re eating a relaxing meal. He turned to look at the vomit on his clothing.
It really was all over his jacket. There was no way around it. And he also had to remove his sweater, which really sucked because it was about 28 degrees (Fahrenheit) outside last night. A manager came over and helped Alex put the jacket in a plastic bag, and told us that if he wanted it professionally cleaned Chili’s would certainly pay for it. She also promised to do something for us on our bill.
Well, the bill came and guess how much getting thrown up on is worth at Chili’s? $5. They took $5 off – in the form of removing JAY’S BEER from the bill!! They didn’t even take off something ALEX was consuming! The waiter commented on this, because he wasn’t sure why it had worked out that way, and of course Alex being who he is didn’t complain about it while we were there, but I did hear about it when we were going home – how is being thrown up on only worth $5? Granted, it’s not Chili’s FAULT that he got thrown up on. And it’s not as if Jay and Nicole were all, HAHA we got money off, nannie nannie, sticking their tongues out. Obviously it got passed along to Alex. It’s just the point of it all!
Oh, and then there’s this other little tidbit: the parent of the child who threw up? Said NOT A WORD to our table, or to Alex. No apology, no sorry about that, no “oh that was my fault for taking my sick kid out to a restaurant.” Nothing. That part actually bugs me more than the $5 off part. I know if E did that to someone when Alex and I were out, we would have been apologizing profusely to the person E threw up all over!
Does anyone else find this rude?? Perhaps the parents were embarrassed… perhaps. Anyone reading have any ideas about this?
© 2009, The Table Has Shoes (and Other Ambiguities). All rights reserved.
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Oh God that is awful. And yes, I would have been pissed at the parent for not saying anything to Alex. They should have offered to have everything cleaned for him, not Chili’s.
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I sincerely hope that the parents of the little exorcist child were just embarrassed beyond all measure and not just horribly rude. At least he wasn’t vomited on by one of the drunken crazies on the wine trail.
As for the $5 off thing, i have theory. we both ordered from the 2 for $20 menu. This is a corporate dealy thingy so it probably had to go into the computers as just 1 item for $20. To take money off would have screwed up their books. It was probably just easier for them to comp the individual item (the beer). BTW- not an excuse, only a theory for why Chili’s values vomit at $5.
And I wasn’t pointing out the vomit on the back and jacket to be all ‘Ha ha. You’re covered in vom!’ I just really didn’t want him to move around and further spread the partly digested slop on himself.
I wondered about the deal screwing up the $$ off, too. But, they could have not charged us for ANY drinks!
PS: Nicole, I knew you weren’t pointing it out to make fun – I hope I didn’t make it sound like that in this post!
I have to say that because I having a child of my own, I can empathize with this kid’s parents. They were probably too embarrassed and aren’t socially strong enough to say anything. But I am sure the child was most embarrassed of all: he was clucking his hands to his mouth desperately scurrying to the bathroom with his mother anxiously pushing him along.
When I first heard the vomit hit the floor, I wasn’t really worried that it may have landed on me. The child was literally a few feet away from me. But after seeing the reaction of the gentleman sitting behind us and the further validation from Nicole, I realized I am going to have to visually inspect the disgusting damage.
At one point in my life, I probably would have vomited after such an incident. But I have become quite tolerant to vomit. I have actually had similar situations with my own child; catching his vomit in my hand, or worse yet, I have had him throw up in all over me, covering most of my upper torso and face.
In the end, this is reality and shit happens; we can harp on the insensitivity of the parents or the reluctance of the manger to give us more of a discount. But there are more many more important things in life to focus on, like the enjoyment of sharing a great day with great people. And while this incident seems utterly gross, it will probably become a story that we reminisce over the years, every time we make our annual wine tasting tour.
I think that probably the mother was too mortified to say anything…and I think you should totally take up the offer for Chili’s to pay to get your stuff professionally cleaned!
I am glad you had a nice time on the Shawangunk Wine Trail. All those wineries are wonderful to sit and sip when the weather is nice.
I am sorry for your unfortunate experience at Chili’s. Being a parent, I would have mean mortified if my child threw up like that. If I was in your spot, I most likely would have had to run and puke myself after watching and smelling that.
I am continually amazed at the rudeness of people and how they don’t give a hoot.
I might be inclined to think that it’s possible that A) the parents were too embarrassed to say anything and/or B) the parents were too concerned about their kid getting sick everywhere to even think twice about the fact that he might have thrown up all over someone in the restaurant. Maybe they didn’t realize that it went all over Alex….
Though I’m a bit amazed that it’s only worth $5 to Chili’s to have a patron thrown up on. I’d have thought that was at least worth a free dessert or something….
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