Bernie just got out. A condition of his parole is that he live with Linklater (who apparently was very active in getting Bernie out of prison) and that he have a job which, naturally, will be working with Linklater.

How does Black Friday serve as a reminder of the divide between rich and poor? I'm genuinely curious, because I am not rich and refuse to shop on Black Friday. Plenty of rich people shop Black Friday, and plenty of poor people do, too. Also, people can be horrible to each other when they are sleep deprived and…

Yeah, really great research methodology there, guy! What a douchecanoe.

I once saw a woman order plain hot water for her kids, then proceed to pull out packets of instant cocoa at a restaurant that served homemade hot chocolate. They tipped precisely 10% to the penny and left their stupid instant cocoa detritus everywhere.

Yes! The ugliest fish tend to be the tastiest.

Exactly! And all the stuff about booze is just ridiculous. We ALL know it's marked up like crazy. Every restaurant I have ever worked in charges per class/shot what they pay per bottle wholesale. Guess what? I still order a bottle of wine with a nice dinner and often order pre-dinner cocktails. Sometimes going out to…

I refuse to believe that anyone who has spent a lifetime in food service would advocate making your own tea/lemonade at the table. When I worked in restaurants we HATED those people! They made a huge mess and rarely tipped well. No one I know who has worked in restaurants would ever do this.

Ha, right? The only time I actually had cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory was when a friend and I planned in advance and just ordered an appetizer to share and a side salad (which, I have to say, was about the size of a normal entree salad anywhere else) so we would have room for dessert. The cheesecake was pretty…

The ridiculous portion sizes are a big part of the problem. It's hard to quit eating when food is sitting in front of you, and I hate asking for a to-go box before I've even started eating. I tend to avoid places like Cheesecake Factory all together because I always eat too much there and am uncomfortably full after.…

Yeah, FWIW i agree with you. I've never understood why, since Spring comes every year, the place I'm talking about couldn't just put a couple extra people on staff. I mean, WTF? It's just the way it was, though. Everyone knows about it and either people warn you off trying to eat there or you do it once and never do…

I agree, but if it's a small restaurant in a small town, they probably weren't at all prepared or ready for the volume of tourists. There's a similar place not far from Austin. This itty bitty teeny tiny town with lots of pretty scenery and wineries scattered around. For most of the year, it's a very sleepy, maybe…

I am actually shocked that they ordered tea and soda and not the ubiquitous "water with extra lemon." We used to have these long skirt wearing weirdos come into our place and we'd do the same draw straw thing to see who had to wait on them. They always ordered water with extra lemon, no ice, one entree for every three…

Ha. I was working at an extremely popular home-style meat and three place one year as a waitress. This place was really popular with families after church and on holidays we were slammed. One Mother's Day, we had two cooks call out, a hostess just never show, and three waiters not show. It was a shit show. People were…

Ugghh Texas Roadhouse rolls... Those damn things, man. I always want to ask them not to put them on the table until the salad comes, but my husband always vetoes me and I literally have to sit on my hands to keep from ruining my meal with those fucking rolls of evil pillowy deliciousness.

Oh yeah, I ditched plenty of dudes who were picky eaters. What's worse is that since I went to culinary school and was working as a chef at the time I was dating, so many of them would pretend to be adventurous foodies. Then when faced with something as standard as sushi or Indian food or something that cost more than…

And funny enough, every successful writer is a big time reader. I've never known a published writer who didn't read. Most writers, when asked advice, will simply say, "read." I really don't understand people who think they can be a writer without reading.

One of us! One of us! gooble gobble gooble gobble! One of us! One of us!

I think for most people, it's less that she's an attention seeker and more that she is somewhat of an unreliable narrator. Not that it excuses victim bashing/blaming, but reactions I am seeing around are like, "Yeah... but can you trust anything that comes out of Janice Dickinson's mouth?" I feel for her. I can't…

Dominos in Manila. Same fast food chain, though. To this day I can not eat Dominos.

Not a food historian, but I am pretty sure chipped beef on toast came about because people didn't have sausage for gravy or lard to make biscuits. Absolutely depression-era make-do food.