I’m not quite sure how we managed to pull it off, but it seems like my birthday event succeeded last night without any problems. The restaurant, Old Man Rafferty’s, doesn’t take reservations for Saturday nights, so I was anticipating some issues. Last week I called the restaurant to find out what I could do to ensure that a party of 17 people could be seated as close to 7:00 pm as possible. I spoke to the manager — he said his name was Durg, and even spelled it so there was no misunderstanding — and he said everything should be fine if someone shows up at about 6:00 to put the name in and if the whole party shows up before 7:00. Last night proved to be a little more difficult.
Amy and I arrived at the restaurant at 5:30 pm — a little early just in case — to find out there is no Durg. The host seemed less than confident that we would be able to be seated at 7:00, and we almost definitely wouldn’t be seated together.
Time passed as we wandered around the seediest parts of New Brunswick, New Jersey.
When we came back, we checked with the host again, and returned to the bar, hoping at some point soon, Durg would emerge, apologize, and assure us our entire party would be seated at 7. We had a few drinks and waited for the first guests to arrive.
By about 6:45, about four others had made it. The current hostess took me aside and informed me that two large adjacent tables had just opened up, but they could only hold it until 7:00. After that, it’s likely we wouldn’t be be able to be seated at the same time or close to each other. It would be required to have 15 of the 17 guests present in order to be seated. (I guessed that number would have been able to be negotiated a bit if need be.)
By 6:55, we had 15 of the 17 there. We were seated with no problem. The food was pretty good, the dessert was awesome, and those staying for Part Two of the evening made it to the comedy show in time to get a good seat together.
It was great to see my friends. I’ve been so busy lately — as have been a lot of us — and it was great to be able to get everyone together at the same time. (Thanks for coming and thanks for the goods!)
By the way, for those who requested, photographs should be online whenever I can get a hold of Amy’s camera.
It was a great night! I think everyone had a great time. I’m so glad it all worked out. I’ll bring my camera this weekend, if I’m visiting you, just remind me on Thursday night.
We would have been at the restaurant sooner if we didn’t walk out the wrong parking garage exit. We went two blocks in the opposite direction before we realized something was amiss. D’oh!
Everything worked out at the restaurant, so it’s cool.
it was tons of fun! thanks for having a birthday we could celebrate. 🙂
Still man, a party that size should have allowed you a little more leeway. Thirteen of seventeen people present and they wouldn’t hold the seats for you because of four late people? That’s saying you have the same pull as one couple trying to reserve a table for six, swearing that two more couples would be joining them shortly.
In retrospect, it’s a good thing Debbie’s mom came over early to babysit Saturday night (5:30 PM instead of the original 6 PM) so that we could get there by 6:45. I can only imagine what would have happened if we weren’t able to make it until a little after 7 and they yanked the tables.
“Hello, can I talk to Durg?”
“I’m sorry, sir, there is no ‘Durg’ here”.
“Yes, so I’ve been told. Apparently you guys can’t get someone competent enough to man the phones for when someone makes an attempt to make a reservation that will bring in hundreds of dollars to your company in one fell swoop. No matter, I’m not here to discuss that. I’d like to talk to you about your policy for not being able to hold tables for a 17-person party when two couples are running late.”
“Yes sir, what about it?”
“Well, let me explain the predicament we’re in, and what’s probably going to happen. First of all, it’s 7:15 and we have over three hours to kill before the comedy show around the corner begins at 10:30. Second, we’ve got people in our party from all parts of NY and NJ, so we can’t easily disseminate elsewhere. There’s a Starbucks around the corner and we’re going to stuff ourselves with their overpriced snacks so that we don’t starve. While we’re there, we’re also more than likely to gorge ourselves with ridiculous amounts of coffee since we’re already at a coffee shop and we have three hours to kill. I figure it’ll probably be around 8:00-8:30 when we get out of Starbucks. Did you ever see an angry party of seventeen disenfranchised people…and there will be seventeen people…filled with caffeine? It’s not pretty sight. Everyone acts goofy and all rational thought goes out the window. Coffee’s like alcohol, but more expensive. Now, this is a college town, right?”
“Yes sir?”
“Well, if this is college town, there’s also got to be a Kinko’s or other type of copy shop around here. Since we’ll be completely aggravated at this time…and stoked by the presence of multiple caramel macchiatos in our systems…*AND* will have over two more hours to kill in a town we’re not familiar with, what’s to stop us from organizing a nice little mini rally right outside of your nice little restaurant? Hell, they’ve probably got all the materials we need to make placards right at Kinko’s. We were probably going to spend $30 a piece for dinner, so why not splurge the unspent cash on something fun?…Oh!…I also forgot how much college kids love protests. We’ll probably be able to recruit another dozen or so people on the trip from here and back. I figure we’ll probably have about thirty people by then…possibly another two couples who might be arriving late…do you think your sidewalk can fit all these people out here?”
“Would you like smoking or non-smoking, sir?”