Restaurant Escapades

"We're not the luckiest people in the world." This was my response to the manager of a local restaurant this evening following quite the adventure. When it comes to purchasing, locating, or stumbling upon those things which are broken before they're ever used, I am my own worst enemy. Last week we purchased new cordless phones for the home, only to discover that there was an "issue" which required a new phone system to be sent from the factory. I'm the guy, yes, THE guy who makes the last payment on a car and the "check engine" light comes on in the bank drive-thru lane. So, why should restaurants be any different?

The appetizer was great. Once completed, we were anxiously awaiting the arrival of our main dishes (a greatly anticipated event in any case, made all the more intense with the presence of a four-year-old who wants his chicken and fries). And wait we did. After waiting, we waited. After this waiting period, we waited some more. The waiter comes by and says, "Your food isn't here yet?" Surprised he returns to the kitchen to discover that, due to a reoccurring printer error, our order was not submitted to the cooks. The manager comes out, a sweet little girl who says it will be seven minutes. How she arrived at this figure for two steak dishes and the aforementioned chicken and fries I cannot say. But, in the neighborhood of seven minutes or so, out comes the food.

My son decides to cut his own magma-hot chicken tenders himself, and after doing a good job on two of them, mom decides to help. As she cuts, I glance over and realize that the chicken looks less than healthy, at least for cooked chicken. Why? Well, because the chicken tenders were very well cooked on the top 1/16^th of an inch. The rest was raw. So, after about 45 minutes or so of waiting, we now had raw chicken for the toddler.

After this is resolved, the waiter comes back and says, "You didn't get your side of shrimp." Had he not said anything, I would never have remembered. I said, "Don't worry about it. I probably couldn't hold it anyway." He says he will take it off the bill. Actually the one thing we seemed to have in abundance tonight was apologies. The manager returns and says, "You're going to love me…" and proceeds to tell me that she's refunded the price of the appetizer, the chicken tenders, and the shrimp, but is giving me the shrimp to take home with me anyway. After several more apologies, I told her, "We're not the luckiest people in the world." And so we return to the subject. (Let it be known that at that same restaurant about a year ago, a mug of soft drink spontaneously split apart, akin to the parting-of-the-Red-Sea scene from The Ten Commandments; not so lucky.)

So, I come home, grab my trusty notebook computer to create a blog entry, and suddenly it comes into focus. The fault (or faults) at dinner tonight had nothing to do with the waiter, nor the manager, nor the cooking staff; it had nothing to do with us or what we ordered or that big comet thing that got brighter last week. Nay, it didn't even concern that pesky printer situation. It just happened.

This got me thinking. The Lord does so much for us, has desires for the lives of each and every person, especially His children. And what does He do? He places His order and we say, "We'll get right on that." And we might do a little appetizer-esque thing, you know, doing or being good in some area or another. But then the Lord waits…and waits…and waits some more. Finally He calls our attention to it and we apologize. "I'm so sorry. I'll straighten up and get things taken care of." And even then we sometimes mess things up, not living up to what He, or even we, expected from us.

The key to good customer service is making sure the product is right and the customer is pleased. When it comes to the spiritual aspect of our lives, things are right when our service and fruit are what they need to be, as well as the customer (in this case, the beneficiary of our efforts: the Lord God Almighty) being pleased. Are we doing our very best to offer Him our very best? Is He well-pleased with our desire and efforts, or does He sit, waiting, frustrated that we have not yet completed what He has asked of us?

Something to think about. Now, if you will excuse me, there are five shrimp which are begging to be sampled. See you next week, Lord willing.

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