Ah, Mickey Mouse. He's an American treasure. As a kid I watched him as often as I could. I would race to the TV, glue myself to the sofa, and sing all the songs. Oh, how I longed to be a member of the Mickey Mouse Club, but my mother never got around to doing whatever the hell it was she had to do to sign me up. Drug addicts have much more important things to do, you know. Even to this day, I love Mickey Mouse just as much as the next person. I just don't like to see him when I'm eating, especially when I'm eating in an establishment where I am paying for the pleasure.
Hubby and I were at Shucker's Restaurant in Fells Point celebrating my friend's birthday. This is supposedly one of the many awesome seafood restaurants for which Maryland is known. To their credit, before I saw the mouse, I was enjoying my seafood quesadilla. It was fucking delicious; lump crab meat, grilled shrimp, and bay scallops encased in two warm tortillas smothered in melted cheese with sour cream and salsa on the side. Sweet mother of buddha that shit was good!
There we were about eight of us in total, laughing, talking, drinking, and enjoying food that we presumed was safe to eat, when this little gray mouse peeked his head out from behind one of the tables nearby. You could have chopped my ass up and served me for dinner, 'cause I was done. For the next ten minutes or so, while we tried to locate our waitress, Mickey continued to scurry playfully throughout the dining room without a care in the world.
When "Heather" finally reappeared (I don't know if that was her name, she just looked like a Heather. Don't get all fucking snotty, you know what Heathers look like. I apologize to any Heather who is not young, skinny, and super perky. I'm old, fat, and bitchy, ergo, I don't like those bitches.), she explained to us that there was nothing she could do. The exterminator came every week, but because the restaurant is on the water, the mice keep coming back. But she assured us that there were no mice in the kitchen. What the fuck? Do the mice live in the water and just pop up to the restaurant to place their order every night? When she realized her "it happens all the time" excuse wasn't exactly instilling us with confidence, she brought the manager over. He said the exact same thing. It was like they were reading from a script. Then he asked, "What do you want me to do?" What do I want you to do you ask? Oh, that's easy. I want you to take this delicious quesadilla, wrap the little mousey inside, and stick it up your saggy, nonchalant ass. That's not too much to ask is it?
I tried to stick it out for my friend. She was still waiting for others to show up to her celebration and, wonderful friend that I am, I didn't want to bail on her. However, when Minnie showed up to find out why the fuck Mickey hadn't come home yet, I took that as a sign that it was time to go.
Here's my question: were we making a big fuss over nothing? Is that something that should be expected at restaurants on the waterfront? I ask because while our whole party (all black and/or mixed race people) was upset and disgusted, the rest of the patrons (all white as far as I could tell) didn't seem bothered at all. This is a real question. I'm not trying to be controversial or any shit like that. I am really curious. Is this a racial thing? Cultural? Rich vs. middle class (Fells Point is where "people with money" live)? What do you think?
Just to let you know, any racist comments that are made will not even see the light of day. As soon as I read the first racist word, I will delete it without bothering to read the rest. So don't even waste your time, you dumb, cowardly anonymous fuck.
That is all.
I don't think it's a race thing; I think it's a location thing. I live in Calvert County and it's pretty rural. I consider myself very clean, don't leave food out, wipe up spills, etc., even a bit OCD if you want to know the truth. HOWEVER...if you were to look in my closets, under my basement couch, in my attic, or other dark, warm places, I can guarantee you would find "evidence" of "Mickey Mouses," as one of our exterminators used to call them. We have dozens of baits outside our house, some inside, traps, etc., and they still get in. I hear their little "scritch, scritch" in my walls and want to pull my gray hair out! If I ever found their nasty little shit in my pantry, you can be sure I'd toss all the food out faster than a pothead would flush his stash
ReplyDeleteat a narc raid! The manager was an idiot and should have comped you the meal. But at least they were mice and not wharf rats!
my guess is that the other people there were regulars to the establishment and just happened to be the selection of people who knew about the mice and didn't care. if i had a favorite resturant, a mouse problem probably wouldn't keep me from continuing to go there, but if i were visiting a new place that i expected to be classy and saw random pests frolicking about, i'd be inclined to be rather disgusted and leave.
ReplyDeleteI'm white and I would have tipped over the table on my hurry to get out of there. That's filthy. And since when does being on a waterfront mean you get more mice? Sounds like an excuse to me. I don't know of any mice that live in the water.
ReplyDeleteWould be really freaked to see a mouse in a food place. A blog I read the other day was talking about a cat in a restaraunt, which would have to be 100 times better. Cant comment on the race thing.
ReplyDeleteA blog award for you my friend. Come see :)
ReplyDelete@Lolamouse- you make a good point and if my friend who is a clean person has a mouse in her house, I would have no problem eating there. But that is my friend and I trust that she won't serve me contaminated food. I don't know those restaurant people from Adam and they want my money, so I don't know what they would feed me just to make sure they stay in the black.
ReplyDelete@Vencora- I see your point and you're probably right about the regulars. I didn't even consider that, so thank you. My favorite restaurant is a place called Kobe. They have the best salmon you will ever taste in your life. But if I see a mouse running around the dining room, I will never spend another dime in there.
@Holly- that's the same thing I said! Mice don't live in water; that's a ridiculous excuse.
@Mynx- cats are only better because we love them and have them as pets. I still don't want one roaming around while I'm eating though. When I eat a meal, I put my cat in the basement (where he lives basically) to have his meal, too. I love the cat, but not that crazy about the cat hair.
@Empress- I do believe the plague DID come from rodents. I realize it's probably hard to keep pests at bay in a place that has tons of food, but it can obviously be done.
I'm the least germaphobic person I know. I think anyone that gets upset about a thing like that is justified, it's just not something that bothers me.
ReplyDeleteHaving worked as a waitress/bartender for about 7 years, I will say that in general black people are much more vocal than white people when something bothers them or is below expectations. I've gotten the impression that because they're paying to eat at a restaurant they expect things to always run smoothly. Which is somewhat understandable, but on the other hand I feel like they're more disgruntled when any problems come up. And less likely to be understanding when it comes to human error.
I really work to understand racial differences and not just jump to the different=wrong conclusion that is so easy to fall back on, especially here in the midwest. But there was a trend among black tables that I waited on that really frustrated me. Not just the low tips, but there were a lot of times where I felt disrespected and treated as a servant instead of a server. Not to say that this didn't happen with people of other races, but that it was more prevalent with black tables.
I don't want this to come off as a racist rant; just an observation of someone who worked in the service industry for a long time.
You're right, no apologies necessary. I just worked with so many people who would jump into a racist rant the second they saw a table of black people sit in their section. I wanted to acknowledge the differences that were clear to me without coming off as that type of jerk.
ReplyDeleteI will say though that you may be wrong about the last point. I also worked as a bartender with predominately black patrons in a predominately black part of town. There were more than a few people who talked down to me and were more aggressive with me because I was white. I got called white bitch more times than I can count (most often in a joking fashion, but nonetheless).
For the most part the people were great and I didn't feel treated poorly. You're right, some people are just assholes and that doesn't mean anything in relation to their race. But there were a couple of times that I was on the receiving end of racism. Which was frustrating, but a good experience for me because I strive to understand racial and gender divides. It was interesting to get a minority perspective.