Some more scraps ‘n’ crap
Last weekend I cleaned my home office again, aka the Surf Report Bunker. It is, quite literally, a walk-in closet. In fact, the bar is still in there. I’d say it’s roughly 8 ft x 10 ft, and painted babyshit green. And it attracts mountains of crap like a mountain of crap magnet.
Yeah, and when I say I cleaned it, I mean it looks great inside the office itself. It’s all dusted and vacuumed and lookin’ spiffy. Check it out. But all the excess stuff has only been moved to the fambly room. The problem hasn’t really been dealt with, just shifted to a new location.
And Toney has informed me I’ll be working on the knee-high mound over the coming weekend, and doing something with it. Will somebody please hold me?
One of the items in the pile is a large box of regular old light bulbs, like we used in 1975. I have two lamps in the bunker, and it seems like one of the bulbs blow on a monthly basis. And when I go to the shelf where the replacements should be, all I find are those pussified eco-twists, shaped like a Dairy Queen novelty treat.
So, a few days ago I flew off the handle and went in search of normal-people light bulbs. Those pork rind deals are fine for the rest of the house, but I’m not having them inside my sanctuary. This is 2009 — we should no longer have to wait for things to “warm up.” Know what I’m saying?
A few months ago I told you about a pair of New Balance shoes I’d purchased, for the ridiculous price of $75. Well, I’ve just started wearing them. I put off the debut, because the whole world was covered in road salt, meant to melt snow. And that stuff is like acid, it’ll eat the soles clean off your shoes if you’re not careful.
But now I’m wearing them, and apparently my feet aren’t accustomed to quality. ‘Cause it feels like the little bones are all rubbing together, and the big ones too. Also, my toe knuckles feel inflamed.
I was in Wendy’s a few days ago (I can make that statement at any time whatsoever), and there was a long hair on my hamburger. After I took a bite, and pulled the food away from my face, something remained attached. It wasn’t moving as easily as it should’ve; there was a bit of resistance.
Turns out there was a long blond hair mixed in amongst the condiments. I removed it, tossed it aside, and continued eating.
For some reason hair in my food doesn’t disgust me as much as it probably should. Lots of things set me off, and cause me to lose my mind, but that’s not really one of them. I saw the girl making the burgers, and she looked like a well-scrubbed high schooler. How nasty could her hair be?
Now if she’d put a pickle slice on there, it would’ve been a different story…
I know a lot of people almost vomit when something like that happens to them. Are you one of them? Oh, I’d probably have a different reaction if the burger-maker had been some homemade-tattoo lazy-eye home-arrest loser, but under the circumstances it was no big deal. How would you have reacted?
Also, what’s the most unusual or nastiest thing you’ve ever found in restaurant food? I was at a Cajun place in Atlanta years ago, and found a big ol’ boll weevil (or somesuch) in my jambalaya. I showed it to the waitress, and she acted like I was trying to scam them, like I walk around with a pocketful of bugs getting free meals from restaurateurs.
Do you have anything on this subject? If so, please tell us about it.
And I’m going to cut this one a little short. I overslept this morning, then spent several hours trying to figure out what happened to the long-sleeve shirts I mailed on March 14. Three people emailed and said they haven’t received them. It was making my right hand rocket through my hair.
I checked my detailed notes and they showed all shirts had shipped, but the cities didn’t appear on the long-ass receipt from the post office. WTS??
I drove over to Olyphant and checked the PO Box. And there were NINE returned packages. Nine! All had apparently gotten through with no postage whatsoever, and came back. I’d handed-off everything to postal people, they processed them, and told me the total at the end. So THEY missed the nine packages, not me.
In any case, mystery solved. I’ll re-mail the shirts tomorrow, and we’ll try it again. Sorry about that. I had no idea there was a problem until yesterday. I appreciate your patience.
And that’s gonna do it for the week.
I’ll see you guys on Monday.
Filed under: Daily
oh, I’ve been waiting for this moment…
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That’s cool you have your own space.
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Am I really under a Foot Whore?
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I found half a toothpick in my soup at Olive Garden once. I was sick about the whole thing. And I’ve found hair before. It doesn’t cause me to have a seizure, but I don’t finish eating the hairy food.
Nice bunker. What’s with the ladel hanging on the wall?
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The ladle is autographed by the guy who played the Soup Nazi. It says NO SOUP FOR YOU! Steve gave it to me, for Christmas or something.
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Top 10. Whoo Hoo!
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What did you decide to do with the boxes of cds?
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Jeff, remember the McDonald’s down the road from Peaches near Jamestown?
I went there with Allyson for lunch one hot summer afternoon. We went inside to eat. I ordered a 9 piece McNuggets (beaks & feet as you called them) and a cheeseburger with ketchup only.
Since I’m paranoid about finding pickles and onions on my Mickey D burgers, I opened that mother up and there was a smashed housefly.
It was no big deal. I didn’t think anyone was out to get me because the joint had lots of flies zipping around. I just thought one of them got caught taking a landing on an open cheeseburger.
Allyson started gagging and acting like she was going to hurl. I told her to chill because it was no big deal. I took it to the counter and informed the counter girl that I needed to speak to the manager. She asked what the problem was and I said, “Don’t freak out. I’m trying to keep this quiet… I found this on my cheeseburger.”
I thought the chick was going to faint as she held her mouth to stifle her digust.
The manager personally fixed me another and hooked me up with a dozen Big Macs even though I don’t like ‘em.
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Good Afternoon Surf Reporters……..
Two contributions to nasties that are found in food. One was at lunch with a few bankers/lenders(their treat) at a local restaurant.
As I’m about to dive into my steak salad, I notice one piece of lettuce has decided to leave the plate by crawling off. Turns out it was a katydid that had escaped the kitchen.
I trapped the creeping crawly under an empty salad dressing cup and when the waitress came over to see if everything was OK, I told her the kitchen mascot had escaped, revealing the prize underneath.
Her response? “Uh, well, it’s summer and we have the back door open, he must have come in that way.”
After a very impregnated pause, she asked “So, um, like, do you want another salad?”
Yes folks, I said no, that’s OK. I was hungry, it had taken 45 minutes to get the first salad served and it was only a little katydid. It’s not like I had already bit into it.
The other was again lunch with bankers. The one lender Melissa( a smokin’ hottie!! ) took a bite of her salad and spit out a chunk of glass the size of a dime. I told her to knick her lip a little bit and bleed and we’d be owning the restaurant in no time. She wasn’t keen on that. Called the manager over and all he did was comp our drinks and appetizers.
Man, if that would have been me, I would have had no reservations in sacrificing a little flesh and blood for the cause. That would have paid me big bucks.
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Just made it!!
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Us Melissa’s usually are smoking hotties, JCIII. (Ahem)
My food nightmare was actually a drink nightmare. Ordered water from Claim Jumper Restaurant here in CA, took a swig and some of the ice slipped in while I drank. As I bit down on the ice, searing pain split through my face & blood was soon tasted (making me want to hurl). Turns out the ‘ice’ that I thought had slipped in was glass from a cup that had broken. Apparently they had the stacks of glasses OVER the soda dispensers, one fell, broke and the jerk who did it simply tried picking up the large pieces, leaving the small bits behind in the ice.
I was compensated with an offer for the hospital (no thanks), a big ass cake (?) & free food for all 6 guests. Now when we return there for dinner (hey, they’re good), my mother still checks her glass suspiciously and we have noticed that the glasses are far from the soda dispensers. Ha.
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I can handle just about anything BUT hair in my food. If there’s even an eyelash anywhere near it I’m done. I don’t even bother ordering something else. My appetite is destroyed as soon as I see it or…((((shudder))))…feel it.
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Jeff-
I used to manage restaurants and I KNOW your type does INDEED walk around with a pocketfull of bugs and twist ties and glass shards and different kinds of hair and sand and staples and…
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I wondered about the spoon too.
And chalk me up in the don’t really care about hair club. I mean, I don’t prefer it, but I’ll suffer through it.
We were eating at a restaurant once, though, and a fly kamikazed into our open bottle of wine on the table. I’ve drank plenty of fruit flies in my time, and I would hav elet that go, but they offered me another bottle of wine. Why the hell not?
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@Melissa –
Were you ever a credit analyst for AmeriCredit? Because, if yes, you are hot!!
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Nothing to contribute really, got a fly in ice before, some mold on Hamburger Buns, A hair in Spaghetti, the only thing that ever pissed me off was a sliver of metal that cut my sons mouth when he was three. Hes eating away and then there was blood. I thought he’d bit his tongue, but he pulled the metal out of his mouth and the server and manager acted like he’d picked it up off the floor. We left right then, didn’t pay didn’t finish, will never go back. That was fun.
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Beavis and Butt Head dolls….heh…heh.heh.heh…
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Bennigan’s in Houston. The cook apparently wadded up his gum in a piece of paper and deep fried it. (an accident I hope ) Came out with my fries. and yeah, I had eaten some of the fries before I saw it. Absolutely disgusting.
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Jeff – do you like your iPod docking station thing? I’ve been meaning to buy one. Anyone have any suggestions for a good one? I have the 3rd generation iPod nano.
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My husband once bit into a “raw” burger from BK. He likes everything cooked “til it starts to burn” so you can imagine how his jaw retracted.
It was a bit rare is all.
If SmileeSeger aka Kelly hears you found a hair, pulled it out, and went on about your business she may lose repspect for you. This is one of her “things” that she just cannot tolerate.
I am with you. Remove the hair and keep on with the agenda…and I like extra “bucket” pickles.
(FYI: Jeff mentioned he stopped ordering pickles when he saw the bucket they came in.)
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So during one the more delicious meals of my life I found some hair in the best tasting cornbread I have ever eaten. The hair was not on top of the cornbread or anything of that nature, it was actually baked right into the cornbread to contribute its unique flavor into the cornbread. As I said, this was the tastiest cornbread I’d ever eaten, and I wasn’t close to half way done. I kept eating my meal and enjoying everything as much as I could when I found another one right in the bread waving hello to me. So I picked it out and kept eating it (the restaurant changes their menu everyday so chances were I would never taste it again). I decided that because this restaurant was pretty pricey, if I found another I would tell one of the two waiters and see what couldn’t be done.
About 85% of the way done with my cornbread I found the third hair, and felt that I should tell them just in case someone else took offense to hair in the product. The manager gave me 50% off and a free slice of delicious cheesecake.
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I have had the occasional run in with hairs. I’m one of those pick it off and keep on. I shed like a cat myself and figure most people shampoo often enough.
My mom found a packing staple in her spaghetti at Wiggin’s in Huntington. (she was the type that if we even said, “ha….”, she’d start gagging). But, she didn’t fuss about the packing staple.
Most recently, I found something that resembled a bandage baked into a loaf of store bought bread. Upon closer inspection and further thought, I’m inclined to think it was a corner from a bag of flour or something like that. The company was very nice – when I called the 800 number – and sent me a mailer to return the questionable matter in and also 3 coupons for free bread.
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The damn USPS lost a package of mine recently.
They want you to use the more expensive shipping so they suck at anything less. Also, the postmaster general is saying that they are going bankrupt.
Screw em. All I get is junk mail and magazines.
They’re bankrupt because they suck.
On a lighter much more enjoyable note:
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/03/signs_of_spring.html
and more specifically photo #25:
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/03/signs_of_spring.html#photo25
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Long sleeve shirt rec’d; makes a great nightshirt (I bought size 3XXX with that in mind). Beautiful job!
Local legend has it that a dead mouse was served up in a Big Mac. I dunno. That one * can’t * be true.
But ya never know.
I didn’t eat a McD’s for two years after I heard the story though.
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You came to Olyphant and didn’t even call?
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I worked in the biz for a very long time and I am shocked to say I have nothing really disgusting to share. However, there was lady here in my town that found a lizard in her salad at Crapplebees’s. That caused quite the ruccus in the local paper.
I agree on the hair thing. If the source of said hair looks well kempt, I ain’t gonna sweat it.
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For a week long stretch over the holidays I kept finding a hair floating on top of my beer (different beers, different bars). My husband insists “There’s a Hair In My Beer” is a name of a country music song.
A few months back I ordered steamed vegetable dumplings wrapped in lettuce from a local Chinese restaurant. When I got to dumpling number 6 the lettuce fell away to reveal a cockroach neatly pressed into the dough of the dumpling. UGH!
I didn’t hurl or anything, but the rest of the meal went in the trash. I didn’t bother contacting the restaurant as English is probably their fourth language. But I did call the health department on them. Apparently the place was found to be positively teeming with cockroaches, yet they were not shut down. The health inspector sounded like Droopy Dog, so I’m not terribly surprised. Needless to say, we have found a different Chinese restaurant to frequent.
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My dad once found what he described as a toenail in a pancake. It was in some little greasy spoon he ate in way up north. I’m pretty sure that was the end of the meal for him. I could barely type the words without gagging.
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Not a restaurant problem, but I once bought Clodhoppers from the Bulk Barn. I was munching on them all weekend. I dumped the last of them into a candy dish, but spilled some of the crumbs on the kitchen counter. One of the crumbs started walking around. It was some kind of hard shelled bug. I didn’t shop at Bulk Barn, or eat Clodhoppers, for years after that.
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I purposely don’t think about nasty things in my food and ignore it on the rare occasions when it happens. Back in the 90’s I managed a micro brewery, so I had occasion to visit a lot of restaurant kitchens. Let’s just say that ignorance is bliss. Unless I block out what I know about most restaurants, I’d always be forced to eat at home.
Some highlights include:
-seeing a prep chef drop a Cesar salad on a filthy greasy floor and scrape it back up and serve it.
-a waiter horking a massive luggie into a bowl of soup
-a walk-in cooler with backed-up sewage on the walls and floor
-pre-cooked food sitting at room temperature in a cellar of an old Victorian building next to an open sewer.
On a related note, when I was younger (~late teens), my friends and I had an unsavory habit of visiting all-you-can-eat buffet restaurants and deliberating contaminating the food. We didn’t do anything too over the top (no feces, road kill, or human remains), but would slip coins, pens, keys, etc. into the food. I once put a spark-plug in the wonton soup at a place called Mings. At the time it never occurred to us that someone could have been seriously hurt, we just enjoyed watching the expression on someone’s face when they found a D-cell battery in their lemon chicken.
Looking back I really feel bad about doing this, which I suppose is why I’m confessing it here: consider it an act of catharsis. I suppose I could go back and apologize to the restaurants in question, but they all seem to be out of business.
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Years ago when I was a teenager my mother brought home some sort of herbal teabags, packed in an unmarked box. It was odd looking tea, as the bags were mostly filled, along with the tea leaves, with big seeds of some kind. I boiled some up and gave it a try, and found it oddly tasteless. I inspected the bags more closely, and tore one open to examine the contents. Turns out the teabags were filled with dozens of tiny beetles.
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I have found things in my food, most recent was in a Meximacan Restaurant here in Samammish WA who shall remain nameless (but the name rhymes with Rancho Grande). I had ordered beef enchiladas, but what i got was an extra filling known as a metal shaving. It was about six inches long and razor sharp, and looked like someone had used an old fashioned can opener that created this thin sliver of metal and it fell into MY enchiladas. Bastards could have cared less. We have never been back.
As a kid in MD i worked at a Restaurant called Farrell’s Ice Cream Parlour. We deep fried roaches, mice, and assorted other kitchen livestock. We put flies in the ice, served food that had fallen on the floor, and when an order was sent back, we naturally fixed it by hand (that is re-arranged it with our fingers), and sent it right back out.
Now i feel sick.
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I have a friend who found a Diamond Ring right on top of a Big Mac…we didn’t know what to think, but she gave it back and ended up getting another burger (ya now “just in case”)…I have come across the usual hair…most of the time it doesn’t bother me, but I always tell the server/manager…I don’t care if I get anything free I just don’t want myself or others to get sick…check your hair nets folks. I have seen someone hock a spit ball in a bowl of salsa..which nearly made me sick when I saw the person eat it, but to his defense that person was an A**Hole and deserved it.
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Found a wire bread tie in a bowl of soup, but I saw it before it made it into my mouth.
I washed dishes at an upscale dinner club at age 16/17. The “chef” would get really pissed when someone would send back a steak overdone or underdone because, of course, he was an expert and knew the exact time to the second how long a steak should be cooked for medium rare, etc.
Occasionally, he would have a full-on tantrum and wipe the steak on the bottom of his shoe or spit on it before burning it to a charred ember, or send one out to the dining room barely warmed up if someone complained that it was not rare enough.
Did I mention this guy grew up in a trailer with about 15 siblings and 15 huntin’ dogs, and had rotten baked-bean looking teeth?
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I ordered baked spagetti and meatballs at Macaroni Grill. Everything was fine until I bit down on a piece of foil buried in the meal. Not as bad as a hair or bug, but the metal on filling sensation ruined the meal. I couldn’t get that metal on metal feeling out of my head for the rest of the evening.
They refunded my meal even though I had finished 3/4 of it and took all our drinks off the bill too.
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I once got a crab eye in my gumbo. It actually enhanced the flavor. It was gross when I chewed it and it popped though. I found a grub (some kind of larvae) on a sticky bun I was eating once. That stopped me. Once my grandma made wilted greens, but she took the vinegar and mixed it with flour or some such thickening agent. It looked like male ejaculate. I had to stop there. She was like “why aren’t you eating the wilted greens?” Sorry i’m not in to jizz sprayed vegtables grandma. She’s not with us anymore so I hope in death she gained knowledge and figured it out and forgave me for not eating her wilted greens. I am using greens cause I can’t figure out how to spell lettice.
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A vendor once brought my company 10# of pistachios for Christmas. Within 24 hours of opening the bag, people in my office started to ‘get the flu’.
We were halfway through the bag before we found that the bag was INFESTED WITH WORMS.
I still tease the vendor about it.
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Oh, for those of you who have never worked in a restaurant, I highly recommend the movie ‘Waiting’ if you have never seen it. The best line of the movie, “Don’t fuck with the people who handle your food!”
**Disclaimer- I promise I havenever worked in a place that ever did anything even remotely that gross!**
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Ordered a Wendy’s single cheeseburger at the Danville, PA
store a few years ago and returned it.
I told the lady that I didn’t order a BLT.
Bug, lettuce and tomato.
If it had been a hair, my head would have exploded.
That just creeps me the eff out.
I once bought a Kit-kat that was infested with some type of swarming insects.
I got my money back on both counts.
I’m a germ-a-phobe, what of it.
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That is an awesome little bunker. The color works since you have all those pictures on the wall. My little office is about 8 1/2 X 8 1/2, but sadly, my wife insisted on some wallpaper and stuff that would make someone’s great-grandmother think I was a lawyer or a dentist or something.
My life sucks. And not a Yuengling for 900 miles.
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When I was a young lad in the Navy, a bunch of us were out partying in the Mayport/Jacksonville area one night and took a break from drinking to go in a local Mexican restaurant. We ordered up a bunch of tacos that came out on a big platter. It wasn’t until we were down to the last of the tacos that we uncovered the dead cockroach. He looked like he drowned in the grease. We called over the waitress and asked if we had to pay extra for the cockroach. She was horrified and they comp’ed our ‘snack’.
After a couple of more hours of drinking (aaah, to be young again) we went back to the same restaurant (those tacos were good). When we ordered we told the waitress to ‘hold the cockroach’. She couldn’t believe we came back for more.
But hey, I once saw a buddy (from the same ship) eat a cockroach that was scurrying across a bar in Charleston. The bartender didn’t believe he really ate it until he stuck out his tongue and showed her all the little pieces.
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“Crapplebees” lmao. I hate that place.
I also used to be a restaurant manager (Bob Evan’s) and no one ever did anything remotely that disgusting. If I had seen it, I would have fired the offender on the spot.
But I have seen and heard my share of nasties elsewhere. A friend of mine found a short and curly in her milkshake…. No one with that sort of hair on their HEAD in sight. What scared us even more is she went up to the halfwit at the counter (it was McDonald’s) and she said, “hey – whose pube is in my shake?” and the guy turned around and yelled at someone in back. I still shudder whenever I think about it.
15 years later and I have still never eaten there again, even though Skippy the flogger has probably drowned in his own vomit long ago. I just can’t bring myself to do it.
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One of my best friends likes to fuck with the waitresses. Nothing real crazy, he just likes to get “cute” with them. Make them read the entire beer selection to him and ask if he can have crazy combinations. He used to waste a good 5 minutes of their time. I’d get furious. I’m a good tipper and if you’re a cute plumpish brunette you’re getting PAID. But I digress.
I’d get pissed because I know they didn’t enjoy his little “comedy” routine. And I just KNEW they were fucking with our food. I’d go out of my way to let them know that I wasn’t the dick, but I don’t know if it helped. Finally, I refused to eat with him several times in a row and said it was because he was ignert with the waitresses. Now he’s a gent and I’m sure we enjoy some of the cleanest food possible.
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My wife almost drank coffee that had roaches in the cup at Huey’s on Peachtree St., next to R. Thomas (great food there), anyway the waitress, nice as she was actually asked my wife if she’d like another cup, but didn’t take it off the check. They’re gone. Too bad though, they had excellent beignets.
A runaway hair can happen to the best of Cheeseburger assemblers; purveyors of love that they are.
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Once, while having lunch with a co-worker, he discovered a cockroach frozen in an ice cube in his drink. After having his drink replaced, he discovered another cockroach in the chili dog he was eating.
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I once found a bread tie in a slice of pizza from the High School cafeteria. They gave me another slice.
I’ve found occasional hairs. No big deal.
My wife has found little grubs a few times. The last one was in some edamame at a nearby high end sushi place. We brought it to the waiters attention and the manager came by and was a little defensive. We were being really cool about it and he comp’d our drinks but that was all.
When she lived in Ecuador she used to just eat the bugs because it was such a pain in the ass to get them all out.
Roaches are a deal breaker for me. If I ever find one in my house I’ll burn it to the ground and start over.
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Jesus Christ there’s a lot of stories about finding roaches. I don’t think I’d ever stop puking if I found a roach in my half eaten food / drink. Blech!
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Here is a pic of my office/bunker…
http://www.brianf.us/2009/03/05/my-desk/
Finding a hair in food is no big deal. Remove it and move on.
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I can overlook a single strand of hair, but I won’t go near a hotel ice machine since I found not only a fly frozen in an ice cube, but also a few long hairs and a lint ball that looked like it came straight from the dryer screen. Now, I would NEVER actually use the ice in a drink, but was only planning to cool off my can of Diet Coke in the bucket. However, since a family member recently confessed to doing something heinous with a hotel ice bucket, I won’t even touch that either. Come to find out, this family member once had a boyfriend who preferred the totally shaven, pre-pubescent look for his woman, and thus convinced the aforementioned family member to let him shave her nether regions. To assist in their little game, they employed his shaving cream and the hotel ice bucket..
Years ago, I found a complete cockroach belly up in my chimichanga. I was trying to be discrete about telling the server, but the woman at the next table caught on and vomited for me. My mother was unfazed and continued eating – couldn’t understand why I didn’t just ask for a replacement meal instead of sitting there watching her eat. I could never go back to that restaurant again, even if it had been my favorite local mom & pop Mexican joint.
Also found what appeared to be a pube in a margarita at one of those large chain Mexican restaurants that shall remain nameless. I was too afraid to check out what kind of hairstyle the bartender had, so I just left. I kept thinking about those “caught on camera” shows that show cctv footage of disgruntled workers doing disgusting things — specifically the bartender who was so irritated by a customer that he unzipped behind the bar and used his willy to stir her drink.
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Jeff,
Which tupperware under the desk has the hand me down underware in it?
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One year in college I lived in housing that had a convenience store right around the corner. A few slices into a loaf of bread I got there, I noticed a small hole in a piece of the bread. The next slice had a slightly larger hole, the next a slightly larger hole and so on for five or so pieces. After the last piece with a hole in it, there was a small note with the words “Damn mice!” scrawled on it.
I’ve also had a few cockroaches in ice cubes, a piece of hard plastic and assorted hairs, which I definitely do not care for. The last hair incident was in a Mexican place a few weeks ago, only the hair was clearly my own, and there were two or three. Eww, gross, but I could live with it because it was my own. When my husband and I left I mentioned it to him, and he said, “Yeah, your hair was in my food too.” WTF?
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I was once served a burger with a turkey patty in it. Shudder.
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Was at a bar/restaurant in Berlin last year, waiting for our food. Went to take a sip of wine and found FOUR flies having a great time swimming around in the glass! I was given another glass on the house. When our food arrive, my friend’s lamb chops also contained quite a bit broken glass! Obviously, she didn’t have to pay.
When I was a kid, I was happily eating a jam doughnut. Halfway through, I checked what I was eating to find a wasp’s head in the jammy section. Never did work out if I’d eaten the rest of it …
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I just got queasy reading about the Wendy’s hair. I think I threw up in my mouth a little bit.
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Knock on wood…nuttin but a few stray hairs. Although, it depends where they’re found…ie: on the side of the plate – tolerable; in the middle of the plate while eating – get the waiter; pulling it out of my mouth after feeling it OR (the most fearsome) yanking it out of my mouth with a “food ornament” still attached and dangling in the wind- get the barf bag…**UGHHH**.
My father was the food service director at major university when I was a little girl. So, naturally, he was a self-proclaimed food critic no matter where we went to eat. He always insisted that truck stops or “greasy-spoons” as he called them, had the best home-made food…UNTIL…while waiting for our meal during a family turnpike adventure, he witnessed the cook reach around and dig in his ass, two knuckles deep, like he just missed the tail of the gerbil……and then went about his food orders. Thought my dad was gonna have a split-down- the-middle-conniption. Dad went straight to the manager informing him that he did not appreciate the added flavor of “ass” on his food and walked out without paying a cent. That was the last “greasy-spoon” he ever went to.
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while eating take out chinese food, I chomped down on a large cockroach or palmetto bug or some godawful thing, spit it out and puke and cried and puke and cried. It takes years to recover from that but you never really get over that kind of trauma. not really.
a few years later, I made a big ol’ bowl of potato salad for a potluck at work. While dishing out a portion, the hot man i always flirted with (and would marry one day) pulled out a long hair -obviously MINE – that had chunks of potato, eggs and onions, etc. strung along it like a weird necklace. One guy gagged and ran out. My man just laughed. So many jokes flying around about wanting my recipe.
After reading these posts folks, IF I EVER EAT AT A RESTAURANT AGAIN, I’ll inspect the hell out of it.
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The Peanut once puked while she was on my lap as I was eating chicken fried rice. She was less than a year old and it felt like I was holding an untied waterballoon in my hand.
She mostly puked on the counter but a few tiny drops splashed on the edge of my plate.
I ate around the splashed bits after we cleaned her up.
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Bunker paint color – middle-of-a-pickle green
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I found a soft contact lens on my quarter pounder at McDonald’s one time. Just sitting there on top. I returned it to the counter and there were three employees on their hands and knees on the floor looking around. I just said “here ya go”. Money refunded by the manager.
Oh, and this is totally gross, but a co-worker and myself went to Wendy’s for lunch yesterday and a kid, who appeared to be around 10 years old, was sitting in a boof straight across from me just a-minin’ for gold. I mean he was knuckles deep in his nasal cavity, pulled out a good-un, observed it for a couple seconds, and then dined on the thing. I ’bout shit the condiment stand. F’n gross !!
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These stories are why I hardly ever ‘eat out.’ Well, these storeis and the fact that I worked in restaurants for years and know darned good and well the horror shows that are being put on in the kitchen. The most memorable was the practice of our line cooks at Mickey D’s spitting on ‘cop burgers’ before lovingly placing that top bun…special sauce, indeed.
Hair in my food makes me want to shave every food service worked bald-headed. It’s utterly disgusting.
Rounding out this novel, the oddest thing I’ve ever found in my food is the metal ‘hanging ring’ from a ladle in a bowl of chili. Most unpleasant to bite down on. The lovely folks behind the counter at our company’s cafeteria (from whence the offending meal was purchased) simply thanked me for returning it. No apology, no nothing. I would have boycotted them, but theirs was perhaps the best chili I’ve ever eaten.
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Just about anything is acceptable as breakfast food as long as you put the word “breakfast” in front of it. For example: breakfast burrito, breakfast pizza, breakfast pie……and in my case this morning: breakfast fried chicken and breakfast chocolate cake.
Just thought I’d share. Carryon.
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About 30 years ago, I found a tampon in a ketchup bottle!
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Just remembered a recent incident…. Shortly before Christmas, my mother and I were visiting grandma’s house, hiding out in the kitchen late one night and gorging ourselves on homemade holiday treats. My mother made a crack about the “mouse-eaten” Ziplock bag that the goodies came from and I just laughed, knowing that grandma washes and re-uses them until they disintegrate. (Hey, the woman raised 2 kids in post-war Germany. Waste not, want not, ya’ know) Anyway, as I was sugar- drunk and giggling, I looked down at the rum ball in my hand and noticed little groove marks on the outside, much too small to be from my own teeth. The look on my face must have said it all because my mother added, “Oh, you thought I was kidding about the mouse-eaten part,” just as she pops another rum ball in her mouth. My mother with the iron gut, unafraid of a few mouse germs, as I sit there wondering about bubonic plague. Never a moment of sympathy from that woman. I’m still walking the Earth, so let’s hear it for the hygiene hypothesis.
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Breakfast beer.
Yep, Jason is right…perfectly acceptable.
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Holy crap! I’ve never found anything in my food at a restaurant but these stories have got me wondering what in the hell I’ve ingested in the past.
The closest I’ve come is eating at a Chinese restaurant and seeing a roach come crawling up on the table. My wife screams like a banshee. The waitress says not to worry, it’s because we were sitting so close to the kitchen. WTH?
I also had a seriously screwed-up, penny-pinching co-worker who would eat spoiled food for lunch that he would get free or half-price (green KFC chicken anyone? ). He ate a bowl of instant oatmeal one time that had little live worms crawling in it. He said they were just protein. He then brought in all manner of paperwork showing how much our common food items that we buy from the grocery store have acceptable levels of insect parts, animal feces, etc. Bon apetit!
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Years ago I was in the office of a co-worker and she offered me a peach from a tree in her yard. I accepted it and started to eat it while we chatted. I was just eating away, talking not paying any attention to the very good piece of fruit I was enjoying. When it was almost gone, for one reason or another I looked at it and much to my disgust, found hundreds of tiny worms crawling from the pit. I dropped the peach and promptly threw up in my co-workers wastebasket. Once I had purged every bit of my stomach contents, I went to the restaurant next door and threw back 3 shots of Cuervo 1800 for good measure and to kill anything that may be left.
I now cut all my fruit into pieces before eating it.
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I’m getting ready to order out for lunch as I finish reading the comments. I might put it off for a bit now…
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Hair, floss, what’s the difference?
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I found a quarter in my french fries at Red Robin a few years ago. And the manager thought I was trying to scam him. Interesting enough we were just pointing out the interesting situaton. The fries are endless at Red Robin so I could as many as I wanted; so we were surprised he would even consider us scammers? I did keep the quarter.
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I got a toenail and a bandaid in the same plate of spaghetti a year ago and I told my wife that if she didn’t start taking more care about making dinner we were going to start eating out all the time!
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@ Oral – LMFAO !!
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I have two good food stories:
We were out with another couple having a fantastic meal when I stopped a chunk of ice with my teeth as I was draining my second beer. It dawned on me that the glass wasn’t frosted, and I know damn well that ice doesn’t belong in beer! Turns out that they had stacked the glasses, and the bottom of another had remained in mine – one big clear disk. They comp’d our entire table, including drinks and dessert – we gave the waitress a fat tip based on the original bill – it wasn’t her fault. We have been back, and the food was just as good even though we had to pay.
The other story is a classic – a bunch of us from work would eat out for lunch every thursday, doing the rounds of various local spots. We were eating at our regular chinese restaraunt – which has delicious chicken wings and General Gau’s Chicken, with huge portions. A few of us noticed that the GG Chicken wasn’t up to the usual quality, some chunks seemed chewy and overcooked. Later that afternoon, the news went around the company that this restaraunt had called in the water and sewer department to complain about drainage issues, and the guy that came in to take care of them is related to the health inspector (go figure). Right away the inspector showed up and promptly shut them down for open buckets of “sauce” on the floor next to the stoves, and for “re-using” food!
Whattaya gonna do?
The standing joke after that was:
“What you want eat?”
“I’ll have what ever it is that he’s having over there – it looks delicious”
“Hokay, you wait. He be done soon.”
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I once opened a box of “Jiffy” brand corn-meal mix to make some cornbread muffins, and it was infested with living larvae-like little white wormy creatures, all squirming around in the corn-meal. I nearly puked, and have never purchased that brand of muffin mix ever again.
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My .22 feel out of my pants one evening while busing tables at a restuarant I worked at when I was a teenager. Long story, no time for that part. It scared the shit out of 60 year old woman. Luckly the safety was still on. The manager payed me in cash for my time and told me he would not need me any more. He didn’t say fired, he just said he didn’t need me anymore. He gave me a ride home and when I got out of the car, a plain clothes police officer came up to me and asked where I had come from. I told him my manager had just dropped me off and I was headed home. He sent his partner after the manager who pulled him over a block away. The officer told me to place my hands on the hood of the vehicle and spread em’. I complied now even more scared shitless. He patted me down but didn’t detect the .22 in the front of my pants. He told me that someone guys had just robbed a bank and the get away car matched the description of the vehicle I had just got out of. He called his partner and told him I was clear and his partner said clear here too. He sad “You can go now!” and I took off running. I never carried that gun with me again. Now I have a Glock!!!
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Feel = Fell, dam you fat fingers…
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I once found pine cones, grass, leaves , dandelions and bark in my lunch……oh wait……..that was my lunch.
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As a kid in MD i worked at a Restaurant called Farrell’s Ice Cream Parlour. We deep fried roaches, mice, and assorted other kitchen livestock. We put flies in the ice, served food that had fallen on the floor, and when an order was sent back, we naturally fixed it by hand (that is re-arranged it with our fingers), and sent it right back out.
Farrells, as in Home of the Pig Trough, the huge sundae they would bring out on a stretcher? In other words, the site of many of my birthday parties in the mid-70s? And now I find out you all were serving us fried cockroaches?? Ugh! Too funny.
I worked for many years in the restaurant biz and have seen many things that are better left undiscussed. Probably the worst was the cook at a nursing home where I worked in high school, who took a leak in the Chicken Noodle that was the soup du jour.
Totally in agreement about the moving on if I find a hair thing especially if I can see the source is a reasonably clean person. However, the black and curlies make me stop dead in my tracks.
I have a co-worker who prides herself an excellent cook (if making brownies from a box makes you a gourmet, then have at it), and every single thing she brings into my office has dog hair in it.
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You should have seen what I found in Father Bob’s popcorn once.
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@ Oral Roberts…. A Good-n-Plenty??
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That story about the tampon in the ketchup bottle is probably just urban legend.
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Soon after I moved to Atlanta, I and a couple of friends stopped at the Boston Market on Powers Ferry Rd to grab dinner before going downtown to a concert. Three things wrong with the place that night:
1. The ants marching down the cafeteria-style tray railing.
2. The cloud of gnats that flew out of the silverware basket when I got my fork.
3. The hair that my friend pulled out of his mashed potatoes.
We never went back again, and that restaurant closed down soon after. Thank God!!
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Did you all check out twitter?
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Twitter? What’s that? Check it out for what?
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mountie – I’ve checked out a few of them. What do you need to know?
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Insert, remove, repeat often.
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Mockable?
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Have a Great Weekend Surf Reporters!!!!!! !!!!! !!!!!
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Yeah mockable. Was there a secret update I wasn’t privy to? I remember Jeff mentioning the project but didn’t think he said anything else about it. I don’t know, perhaps I missed something.
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Ahhhha. Here it be.
http://www.mockable.org/
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@ mountie9wv, Sign up at the top of the page, and you’ll never be out of the loop again! Become a Surf Report VIP!
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I’m like you – if the place isn’t too nasty and the counter help is reasonably clean, a hair is no big deal to me. My husband would have been unable to eat that burger (or anything else for the rest of the evening) and Wendy’s would have officially been dead to him forever. Seriously.
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Yeah, I got the super secret update about 15 minutes after the Twitter post.
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Does anyone remember Alaskaland?
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I think Forrest was right when he said, “stupid is a box of chocolates.” or whatever.
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I hope my shirt was one of the nine returned. I hadn’t even realized they had shipped yet…
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Ummm…Hi guys – just got back from my trip – couldn’t wait to get here after swearing off the internets for 2 weeks (didja miss me?).
Read through the comments. I need to go vomit now. I guess I’ll catch up wit yous on Monday.
I gots fish sightings to send, Jeff!
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Jeff,
Is that a Soupy Sales autograph on your bunker wall?
-Poops
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Back about seventeen years ago, I bought a big tub of potato salad at a deli across from where I worked at the time. It was enough potato salad to last for a whole week’s worth of lunches.
I pried off the lid, shoved a nice big fork full in my mouth, and stopped. Something felt odd, so I reached in to pluck it out. This girl sitting across the table said something about a hair in my potato salad…then I pulled out somewhat more than a hair and she started yelling OH GOD IT’S A WHOLE CLUMP OH THAT IS SOOO GROSS YUCK! I threw away the entire tub of potato salad.
A brief examination of the offending clump revealed it to be white hair. The only white haired employee at the deli was this nice little old lady. I would have complained about anyone else there but her. I let it go, and just stopped buying any of their freshly made goo salads.
There is only one long-term scar that I bear from the incident. My employer was one of the large chain bookstores, and when the first Harry Potter book came out, all I could think was “Hairy Potato Salad”. I still think that when I see or hear the name Harry Potter.
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I was intending on commenting on the reason for the ladle on the wall, but when I saw it was autographed from the Soup Nazi the comment changed to “that’s an effing rad piece of memorabilia”
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