Graziano Graziussi, a 43-year-old lawyer from Naples, is a regular at Smith & Wollensky....The restaurant is getting some horrible press, but I'm sure people rip off restaurants all the time with the old forgot-my-wallet routine. If you let the guy leave, 9 times out of 10, you never see him again. I made up that statistic for rhetorical purposes. What do you think the statistic is? How much money do you think restaurants lose every year? They'll have to compensate by charging more to the people who do pay. But now they're stuck with the bad PR, because they called the cops on a photogenic lawyer, which means: 1. Focused outrage, 2. Ability to contact and talk to the press, 3. Big newspaper willing to run the story.
“I was going to leave my iPhone,” he said. “I suggested they bring a bus boy with me... It would have been an easy trip.”
One police veteran told the Daily News he wasn’t surprised to hear that the restaurant wouldn’t take the phone as collateral.
“How do they know that iPhone was his? It could have come from anywhere,” the cop said.
***
Readers of this blog might be thinking: Smith & Wollensky, where were we just talking about Smith & Wollensky? Was it in "The Great Gatsby"? It sounds like the name of the place that's been around long enough to have figured in "Gatsby," which takes place in 1922, but it opened in 1977. It adopted an old-fashioned image way back then. It was founded by Alan Stillman, the man who invented T.G.I. Friday's.
According to Stillman, there was never a Mr. Smith or a Mr. Wollensky involved. He opened the Manhattan phone book twice and randomly pulled out two names, Smith and Wollensky. The announcements for the opening, however, carried the names Charlie Smith and Ralph Wollensky. Stillman later admitted that Charlie and Ralph were the names of his dogs.What's the deal with Stillman and Friday's? T.G.I. Friday's started back in 1965. Stillman — Wikipedia says — was a "bachelor perfume salesman [who] lived in a neighborhood with many airline stewardesses, fashion models, secretaries, and other single people on the East Side of Manhattan near the Queensboro Bridge, and hoped that opening a bar would help him meet women."
At the time, Stillman's choices for socializing were non-public cocktail parties, or "guys' beer-drinking hangout" bars that women usually did not visit; he recalled that "there was no public place for people between, say, twenty-three to thirty-seven years old, to meet." He sought to recreate the comfortable cocktail-party atmosphere in public despite having no experience in the restaurant business.So he kind of invented the singles bar?
With $5,000 of his own money and $5,000 borrowed from his mother, Stillman purchased a bar he often visited, The Good Tavern at the corner of 63rd Street and First Avenue, and renamed it T.G.I. Friday's after the expression "Thank God! It's Friday!" from his years at Bucknell University....Aw. I'm rooting for this guy, who made his mom happy, by facilitating a million fucks, some of which were his. Ah! Here's a whole interview with him, complete with photos:
NCR: Did your strategy work? Did you meet good-looking girls?Ha ha. But, Althouse, get back to where you were going: that time we were talking about Smith & Wollensky on this blog. Yes. It was 9 days ago, and the story was about some job applicant who was presented in the press as a young guy who used what I called "the old honesty-modesty routine." Posting, I accepted the media cue that he was a gutsy, charming underdog, but — using Smith & Wollensky as my clue — I got suspicious in the comments:
Stillman: Have you seen the movie Cocktail? Tom Cruise played me! I was lucky enough to do it for three years — he only did it to make a movie. Even today, the advantage of being the guy behind the bar is huge. Why do girls want to date the bartender? To this day, I’m not sure that I get it.
A key line in the letter, as reprinted in the Daily Mail is: "I met you the summer before last at Smith & Wollensky's in New York when I was touring the east coast with my uncle, ***** ******"
Why put the name of your uncle in the letter unless it's intended to influence the hiring? Perhaps this person's seemingly refreshing attitude is just the cheeky confidence of a young person from a privileged background.
Would a guy working his way up from a working-class background ever write a letter like this?
पोस्ट्स
८९ टिप्पण्या:
Wow. S&W is fake. Damn.
Ha! Dude had it right. Women are complete skanks for bartenders (amongst other professions). But bartendering is within easy reach for all men, even simple-minded or blue-collar ones.
Well, women are complete skanks all around--they just hide it pretty well from guys, except in certain situations (i.e. at concerts, with bartenders, with celebrities, when drinking, etc.)
We used to understand this. Nowadays, we pretend women are perfect little angels preyed upon by white male rapists/ free to be skanky fat sluts and we can't judge!
lol. Enjoy the decline, slut lovers!
Alan Stillman didn't invent the singles bar.
Butch McGuire did.
and in today's WSJ, S&W has a full-age ad based on the honest-modest internship-seeker's email. curiouser and curiouser.
OK. "Fake". Like "Phineas Q. Butterfat's". But their bone-in rib-eye is still damned tasty.
I was worried this happened at Keens on 36th. That would've been worse. As it is, it's like it happened at an Applebees with more expensive food.
As an avid reader of Henry Miller's work, I am always amazed when people take credit for inventing sexual behavior that people have engaged in since human life originated on the planet.
Every generation imagines it invented debauchery. I have no clue why this fantasy persists.
Read Miller. People were doing the same damn things this S&W takes credit for inventing back in Miller's day, and that began in the early 20th century. Miller was born in 1891.
No, this guy didn't S&W didn't invent whoring by opening a restaurant.
He is, apparently, good at PR!
Hardcastle & McCormick.
Starsky & Hutch.
Tenspeed & Brownshoe.
Smith & Wollensky.
Jake & the Fat Man.
Henry Miller also wrote quite a bit about the realities of abortion back in the day, too.
An abortion doctor was apparently pretty easy to find in the 1920s and 30s.
So, any phony political myth is based on bullshit.
Go figure.
For some strange reason, I always assumed the proper etiquette is to pay inexpensive prostitutes up front but expensive prostitutes afterwards, with some sort of subtlety.
If somebody were so inclined, I'd bet a pretty good book could be written on the history of the rediscovery of debauchery as a PR gimmick in New York City.
That rediscovery seems to happen at pretty regular intervals.
Probably got that idea from watching television, same as all the others.
That is a very bizarre 'straunt behavior. Especially for a higher end chain used to serving pretty good steaks at a premium price.
When I worked in food service people dined and dashed all the time. It was expected, it sucked, and mostly the waitperson got stiffed for the tab.
But if they "took the check" then it was the 'straunt who ate the bill.
I believe that is pretty standard across the industry.
-XC
See, I always rely on my vast knowledge of early TV situation comedies to get out of jams like this.
Once they force you to the kitchen to wash dishes because you can't pay the check, you cause some heavy object to fall on the restaurant manager's head so that he gets amnesia and forgets you didn't pay your bill. (Be sure not to hit him over the head a second time, however, because his full memory will come back.)
Semester didn't begin yet, hunh?
Yes, read Henry Miller, whose two "Tropics" and Rosy Crucifixion trilogy are tops, (far preferable to any of the sentences quoted daily so far from Fitzgerald), but also read A MAN AND A MAID and THE PEARL, reprints of pornographic "literature" from the 19th century. They're quite erotic, and they also demonstrate the timelessness of human sexual activity, where there is certainly nothing new under the sun.
by facilitating a million fucks
Many happy returns on his investment, then!
I don't understand why this is a criminal law issue instead of an ordinary civil law issue. The guy's not trying (so he claims) to steal anything, he's just defaulting on his contract and making an offer of restitution. Why is this a matter for the police?
Another question, if the guy's got his iPhone with him, why can't he use Paypal to settle the debt? Or access his checking account information and do an electronic check.
He's European which means that he has a debit card which, when used, requires a pin. Why can't he access his bank records, supply the debit card number and the pin and pay that way?
The attraction of Smith & Wollensky isn't as a singles bar, although it might serve that purpose, too.
The attraction of S&W, for the girls, is that you might meet a deep pockets businessman. It's a pricey joint, but the food is plain old steak and potatoes, which means it is frequented by macho men.
And, it's in the epicenter of the Midtown law and financial scene, which means that the male customers will likely have lucrative careers.
So, the attraction of S&W is that it is a place for high class hookers to fish for a john, and a place where the more legit working girls can fish for a rich husband.
Here's the thing about an iPhone: You can use it to call people to help you out.
I have zero sympathy for the guy. This is a non-story, and I'm sorry for the Restaurant Manager. A little.
SMITH & WOLLENSKY should be ashamed for calling the cops on this guy. I have worked in restaurants, (my dad was a restaurant manager for most of his working life), and people skipping out on their check was a real--although infrequent--problem.
However, if a diner came forth and honestly stated he had left his means of payment at home, and offered a watch or smartphone or other valuable personal item as collateral while he went to get his payment, my father--and any manager who is not an asshole or crazy person--would have happily cooperated.
I've had drinks at S & W, but have never dined there. I certainly never will, now.
Would a guy working his way up from a working-class background ever write a letter like this?
???
Dividing my time between the office and the field, I always enjoyed the field more, since I generally met a better class of people there.
"I'm sorry for the Restaurant Manager."
Nope. He should be fired.
I like CacchoroQuente's iPhone iDeas better.
My phone is dumb.
I wonder why the waitstaff didn't think of that.
I don't understand why this is a criminal law issue instead of an ordinary civil law issue. The guy's not trying (so he claims) to steal anything, he's just defaulting on his contract and making an offer of restitution. Why is this a matter for the police?
Good question. I guess it would be akin to shoplifting. It's no excuse if you accidentally walk out of a store with merchandise without paying, so it's no excuse if you accidentally eat a meal when you don't have the money to pay for it.
I guess the contractual dispute would be if you order a meal and you refuse to eat it because you believe it's not up to par and the restaurant insists that you pay for what you order.
I will now state an obvious fact.
People relocate to New York City from the hinterlands for jobs, and for the opportunity to conduct their hedonist sex lives in anonymity!
This is true of straights and gays.
This has been going on for a couple of centuries.
If the issue is what counts as a singles bar and when did the singles bar begin, it's not enough to say there were, going back into the 19th century (or whenever), bars that had women who could be picked up in them. We're not talking about prostitutes and low-class women. We're talking about basically wholesome middle-class young American women like Diane Keaton in "Looking for Mr. Goodbar" who changed their behavior and became amenable to the idea of walking into a bar alone on a weekend night with the idea of finding a man and having sex with him that night.
This was a cultural shift that took place, for the general run of American women, in the 1970s, after my time. I was born in 1951, and I scorned the singles bar type women who emerged into adulthood after the cultural revolution of the 1960s.
I lived in Manhattan from 1973 to 1984, and I'm very familiar with the attitude of disrespecting the "singles bar" scene, especially around Friday's. It was considered square. Secretaries coming in from Queens.
"How much money do you think restaurants lose every year? They'll have to compensate by charging more to the people who do pay."
I suggest the Affordable Meal Act of 2013. I can't propose any ideas about what should be in it because we'll obviously have to pass it first.
Kinda interesting story about TGIF. Ruby Tuesday started in Knoxville when I was in college. The day it first opened, a friend mentioned he knew a guy who was opening a new restaurant and they were having the grand opening that night. We went and ended up eating at the first Ruby Tuesday on the first night it was open. It's still based in the area, just outside of Knoxville, in Maryville, TN. (Pronounce "Maryville" wrong and we immediately know you're a "furiner.")
No, Althouse, this is your vanity speaking.
Birth control made things easier.
Other than that, no difference.
"Another question, if the guy's got his iPhone with him, why can't he use Paypal to settle the debt? Or access his checking account information and do an electronic check.
"He's European which means that he has a debit card which, when used, requires a pin. Why can't he access his bank records, supply the debit card number and the pin and pay that way?"
How do you know he has a PayPal account? How do you know he's set up to do electronic checking? How do you know he has a debit card?
I have none of those things and don't want them. (I did sign up with PayPay several years ago for some reason and made one purchase with it. I never felt a need to do so again and let me account lapse.)
And, Althouse, your conversations with other women are irrelevant.
Women lie to each other about what they do sexually. Including you.
I waited tables for years, and only had a handful of people tell me they forgot their wallet - and they all returned to pay their tab. If they weren't going to pay, they'd just dine and dash. That's over 20 years ago, but I doubt it's changed much.
@Gimpy:
People relocate to New York City from the hinterlands for jobs, and for the opportunity to conduct their hedonist sex lives in anonymity!
This is true of straights and gays.
This has been going on for a couple of centuries.
--There's a reason, in historical imagination, that cities are dens of iniquity and the pastoral scene is pure.
I knew a New York slut who wondered why so many misanthropic people lived there. Why not move to the country to avoid people? I pointed out that in the country, you're not anonymous, everyone knows you, but in the city no one knows you, you're anonymous. I asked her to try sleeping around in a small country community and see how she could get away with it v. in the city.
She then realized her error and continued sucking my dick.
Inga, you really need to teach your daughter a better technique.
That's funny, Bruce Willis says the place where HE worked as a bartender was the model for "Cocktail".
I wonder how many people have made that claim since the movie came out?
@Gimpy
I appreciate the nickname. I consider it a sign of affection!
@Althouse, next time add a "none of the above." In my mind they all suck.
The business itself doesn't lose money from customers not paying, they dock the waiters pay. At least that's according to a waitress we had at red lobster. She said she had two walk-outs in one week. The servers get together and pool their money to cover the tab.
A few years back a waitress got ran over and killed trying to stop a customer from leaving, I think it was at an Applebee's in Dallas. I think after that Applebee's changed their policy on docking servers.
@Lucien:
Bruce Willis is a fucking genius. Short, balding very young, ugly little face, with only minor comedic talents to get him jobs, yet somehow made himself into a major action star, respected actor, banged well above his weight class, and survived this long as a player.
He used to tell women, when he was a bartender, that he had a two-inch penis (said with extreme suave confidence). Just to see how many would still go home with him.
They all did.
And not a single anonymous person stepped forward to pay this man's check?
Damn, go figure.
It's an upscale steakhouse and I doubt it will be hurt at all by the publicity, possibly helped, as there is little sympathy for scofflaws in the anti-Obama crowd that chows down there.
Th article says he was a regular at the restaurant when he travels to New York. They should've been willing to trust a regular, I'd think. All they'd have been out is 200 bucks, anyway.
Also, the cops could've solved the issue by helping him get his wallet. Instead they act like pigs,telling him they're not his taxi service. Cops acting like pigs is becoming more and more common in cities across America. And then he had to spend two nights in jail, at considerable cost to taxpayers. And America's jails are often very dangerous places, too.
Well, I'm becoming convinced that soon America will be such a police state that people won't wanna visit here. Or live here. Put everyone in jail seems to be the trend.
I had a steak at S&W with a friend's friend one evening in the Fall of 1998, after interviewing for a job with Bear Stearns.
Why do New York steak houses always have creamed spinach on the menu? It's one of the weirder things that could be put on a plate.
Women lie to each other about what they do sexually. Including you.
This statement goes both ways.
In eras in which women pretend to be prim and proper, they lie to each other in order to conceal the extent of their sexual activity.
In eras in which it is fashionable to whore, women lie to each other in order to exaggerate their sexual activity.
Women are herd animals.
"The attraction of Smith & Wollensky isn't as a singles bar, although it might serve that purpose, too."
I love the way you bully me about the things you think I don't know and you don't even bother to keep the facts straight. S&W was not the singles bar. Friday's was. They are completely different restaurant concepts. One is an old-fashioned steakhouse, nothing new in the concept at all. The other was an influential new model designed to change female behavior to create a new "scene" in NYC.
Bruce Willis has the germanic tough guy thing going for him. Can't be faked. That's what the ladies like.
I suggest Graziussi try Maysville in Manhattan, a new Bourbon bar named after the little town across the river from me, Maysville, KY which happens to be the birthplace of bourbon. Reportedly they have good steaks.
I love the way you call me a bully when I win an argument with you, Althouse.
It's charming.
You like to argue. So do I. We'd get along very well.
You're nostalgic belief that the 60s and 70s, which was the time when you were young, changed everything in the world...
Well, every generation thinks the same thing about the time when they were an adolescent.
Watch Portlandia. It's a hilarious satire of the same type of nostalgia for people who were adolescents in the 90s.
Scott- you're not supposed to care about the veggies in a top notch steakhouse. They're a formality. Next time munch on some celery sticks if you want a palate cleanser. They always put them out in a small bowl or even a glass on the table. With some olives. The issue is the steak and Smith & Wollensky doesn't disappoint.
Stuffed potato skins changes female behavior?
No, wait. Maybe they do.
I don't know about TGIF. It's a very bad restaurant, that's for sure.
TGIF's food is so heavily loaded with sugar and salt that it is preposterous.
As for singles bars, I tend to think of places like the Coffee Gallery in North Beach in San Francisco as a singles bar.
Those were places where everybody went with the sole intention of getting drunk on your ass and getting laid.
I've got some good stories if you're interested, because I used to play there. It was where the Jefferson Airplane started out, too.
I guarantee you that all (as in 100%) of the women who hang out at S&W looking for rich men have (or, more precisely, don't have) something in common.
You all know what that is.
Peter
As I remember it, in the sixties and seventies, the east side of Manhattan was known as the girl ghetto. This was the only neighborhood in NYC where a girl could walk her dog at night with a fifty fifty chance of survival. The east side was laden with young, single women. Stillman's act of genius was in opening his bar in such a neighborhood. It wouldn't have worked in Queens.... A lot of the singles' bars like Barney Google's had more of a local crowd than a bridge and tunnel clientele, at least during the week. I thought Maxwell's Plum was the supreme high singles' bar. It certainly looked luxurious. There was a bar up First Avenue that was owned by some ex Met. The place was nothing special, but a fair number of professional athletes frequented the place. If you think women are oestrus in the presence of bartenders, you should see them when they hang out with professional ballplayers.
Why didn't he call his friend and ask him to bring the wallet?
LoafingOaf said...
Th article says he was a regular at the restaurant when he travels to New York. They should've been willing to trust a regular, I'd think. All they'd have been out is 200 bucks, anyway.
The article said that he said he was a regular, that doesn't mean he was.
Skipped the poll as it sounds more like a chick thing.
Ann Althouse said...
I'm rooting for this guy, who made his mom happy, by facilitating a million fucks, some of which were his.
No romances, just fucks?
You were beating up on F Scott and his crowded hams and harlequin salad and sumptuousness, but you continue to use the verbal variant of the Latin noun, fornix.
I know I'll get yelled at, but you, of all people (see, I didn't say it), have a better command of the language than that (and, yes, I hate that whole Ms Magazine thing of women, especially ladies, talking like merchant seamen).
Now you can yell at me.
whoresoftheinternet said...
@Lucien:
Bruce Willis is a fucking genius. Short, balding very young, ugly little face, with only minor comedic talents to get him jobs, yet somehow made himself into a major action star, respected actor, banged well above his weight class, and survived this long as a player.
He used to tell women, when he was a bartender, that he had a two-inch penis (said with extreme suave confidence). Just to see how many would still go home with him.
They all did.
Know why, because most women don't have unlimited room down there and don't want some jerk trying to prove how macho he is "injuring" them.
As in all other endeavors, the little guys do fine because women know they won't get hurt.
PS Don't forget
The Lone Ranger & Tonto
Bret & Bart
Abbot & Costello
Stan & Ollie
"The business itself doesn't lose money from customers not paying, they dock the waiters pay. At least that's according to a waitress we had at red lobster."
This is true in my experience, too. The rationale is that the servers are responsible to keep an eye on their tables to insure their diners do not leave without paying.
As for the question about creamed spinach...why not put it out? Why is it a weird thing to put on a plate? Creamed spinach is good.
Love and Commerce, ah....smart guy gets the girl
Haha, Ann, this stream of consciousness post offers us such a smorgasbord of delicious subject matter, I am charmed. But as a commenter, Where shall I begin? Shall I be disciplined and restrained, or load my plate like my old boyfriend used to do, embarrasing me, carefully building a high architectural structure that sampled every single Delight.
Ah, Hell, I'll just graze:
(First plate) My first job out of college was working for a sexy boutique advertising agency in Texas run by four terrific guys. They named it Ed Yardang & Asso., after the imaginary friend one of them had as a kid. It was perfect. It was funny. It set aside ego attachments and they honestly concentrated on doing great work. Best start a girl could get.
(a little plate for some seconds) You would not believe the tight margins for profit restaurants have to work under. Anyone in the business has to have some big love. I pity the manager that night.
(third plate) I missed the post about the Job applicant (really, the increase of daily posts since the New Year are a challenge to keep up with!), so I was glad to get back to it. Thanks!
(fourth plate) uh, burp. Check please.
@Althouse, regarding my comment at 9:01. Please add the word "please" between the words "time" and "add." I hadn't had enough coffee yet when I wrote that. My apologies.
I do think the cops went a little overboard tossing him in the clink. Verify the place where he says the wallet is and give him 24 hours to settle up.
Then come after him if no show.
If a customer runs out on a bill everybody else has to pay more-- Kinda like the Free Sh*t Army needing everyone else to pay more and get less. Thanks Obama!
I don't own a restaurant, but once a young lady with two children ran out of gas in front of my place, and I poured about 3 gallons into her tank so she could get back to the cities, and she promised that "next weekend, my husband will pay you back", and I never saw her again.
"How do you know he has a PayPal account? How do you know he's set up to do electronic checking? How do you know he has a debit card?
He's an Italian lawyer who sometimes vacations in NYC and dines at expensive restaurants and he has an EyePhone. Europeans were moving away from paper checks very quickly 15 years ago and it seems likely to me that almost every European now has access to (and uses) electronic banking if they have what we would call a checking account. So, I don't know that he has access to all these things, but it's pretty likely. As for Paypal, maybe he doesn't have a Paypal account, but it's something he might consider as a person can do transactions with Paypal in some situations when other methods may not work. In fact, if he didn't have a Paypal account, he probably could have established one, funded it, and paid the restaurant (if the restaurant could accept such a payment) in less time than it took to get the police there.
"I have none of those things and don't want them."
Good for you. I have all those things; not because I decided one day that I wanted them or needed them, but just because they seemed to accrue with time. They also make for convenience, especially when traveling in Europe. Being able to get cash in local currency anywhere in the world (that I have been, anyway)is a great convenience.
I used to travel some in Europe both for business and as a tourist. In my experience, it's good to have a lot of options when it comes to paying for things. My guess is that the Italian lawyer from Naples who sometimes vacations in NYC is financially much more sophisticated than I am.
If the issue is what counts as a singles bar and when did the singles bar begin, it's not enough to say there were, going back into the 19th century (or whenever), bars that had women who could be picked up in them. We're not talking about prostitutes and low-class women. We're talking about basically wholesome middle-class young American women like Diane Keaton in "Looking for Mr. Goodbar" who changed their behavior and became amenable to the idea of walking into a bar alone on a weekend night with the idea of finding a man and having sex with him that night.
I don't think what changed was the idea of the singles bar so much as that we started thinking of such women as "wholesome" and "middle-class" as opposed to low-class.
"I don't own a restaurant, but once a young lady with two children ran out of gas in front of my place, and I poured about 3 gallons into her tank so she could get back to the cities, and she promised that 'next weekend, my husband will pay you back,' and I never saw her again."
Well, when one helps someone else, one does it without the expectation of being paid back. That's just gravy if they do.
I've helped a lot of people out in situations like the restaurant and AllenS's. I never saw them again, either, or got anything in the mail. People are funny.
Hardcastle & McCormick.
Starsky & Hutch.
Tenspeed & Brownshoe.
Smith & Wollensky.
Jake & the Fat Man.
Bosnia & Herzegovina
when one helps someone else, one does it without the expectation of being paid back
Wrong again, Cookie. If they tell you they will pay you back upfront. The restaurant charge--in an expensive place like that--would be something that I would feel.
On the other hand I got lots of cars running and bought fast food or groceries for people where it was just a good deed. Even the winter jackets ruined were part of the deed. That's different.
Re PayPal...I opened an account with them a couple of years ago because eBay started requiring it for a lot of purchases and at that time you couldn't do a one-time transaction.
Within a week my CC# was stolen. The card company was great about it but it was still a pain to sort out. So I closed the PayPal account.
Now you can do one-time PayPal transactions without having a card officially on file. A bit more secure, although no doubt the number could still be stolen. But it hasn't happened to me yet.
And I believe that now PayPal also wants bank account information if you open a PayPal account. No, thanks.
Darrell,
It doesn't matter what someone may tell you...if you choose to help another you do it without any expectation of being paid back.
If this is a real sticking point, you should choose not to help them.
This is not to say you should decline being paid back, but only that you cannot know if someone will actually pay you back or not, and if you decide to help someone you should assume they won't.
And I believe that now PayPal also wants bank account information if you open a PayPal account.
Only if you are going to be RECEIVING money. You can pay for merchandise without giving them a bank account number.
Fuck you, Cookie. The words spoken dictate the terms--not some shit you have in the back of your mind. Now you might decide to re-evaluate all your positions based on how wrong you are about this--but I doubt it. You are just THAT much of a know-it-all asshole. You? I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire.
True story. I was at this pickup joint and this friend of mine (who did exceptionally well with women, much, much better than me) is way intoxicated and he tells me not to wait for him because he met this girl and he's headed over to her place.
Twenty minutes later he's back at the bar and I'm astonished and I ask what happened.
"We get back to her place and we're about to do it and I tell her -- completely respectfully -- that she should know that I don't have any diseases, or anything like that, and she starts bawling her eyes out so I left."
To this day I still don't know why I found that so amusing at the time but it probably had something to do with envy of the lowest sort.
The last time one of my credit card numbers was stolen, the bank told me there was no way to tell when, where, or how. Could have been from a gas station in Darboy, WI months ago -- or maybe not. This has happened to me several times over the years and never cost me a penny. The credit card processors have refused the charges every time because of mismatch with billing zip code, expiration date, or three digit secret number mismatch. Fortunate that nobody tried to contribute to the Obama campaign with one of my numbers. That would have cost $50.
You? I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire.
Well, if he were on fire, I doubt he'd be yelling I'm Robert Cook! I'm on fire! Piss on me!. As you wouldn't know the name of the person in flames in front of you, you wouldn't have to decide not to piss on him because of who he is.
Me? I'd just roll him around on the ground and hope the fire went out via smothering.
I am in SUCH a good mood today! TGIF! And no, not the restaurant!!
I'm trying to imagine Cookie owning a restaurant or any other small business that takes serious hard work and an ability to cope with the myriad web of federal, state, and local regulations that impact him. I wonder whether an experience like that wouldn't cause him to grow up a little bit, or at least learn how to live in the real world.
"Fuck you, Cookie. Blah-de-blah-de-blah-blah-blah."
Well, Darrell, then you really don't have any generosity in you at all, do you? You just want to be sure you'll be paid back before you'll "help" someone.
Smith and Wesson
Pratt and Whitney
In the North Shore area we used to have a realtor named Head and Seeman.
Well, Darrell, then you really don't have any generosity in you at all, do you?
Wrong again, Cookshit. Can't you read or do you just lack the ability to understand? I've helped hundreds of people with no expectation of ever receiving compensation--I even told you about a handful of them. But when someone makes a deal to pay you back, you expect them to keep that promise. I bet you are one of those clowns that thinks to himself "Hmm, there are no witnesses and I didn't sign anything, so I don't have to return the money." Well, we've all met assholes like you. I hope you were not one of the dozen or so people whose life I saved. I'd be responsible then for keeping you in thios world and I would have to answer for that someday.
My parents, as a young couple in the 50s, et at a fancy restaurant in Paris. They were young and in love and left the restaurant, walking down the street, and they realized they hadn't paid.
The maître d' comes running down the street, yelling. They figure they're in big trouble.
"Madame, you forgot your gloves."
Pity the poor Ronald Goldman, who went to Nicole Brown Simpson's house to deliver the glasses she left behind...
Alan Stillman
Another famous dude I'm not related to.
As for the "I forgot my wallet" gag - I got no sympathy for this twit. It takes me about a week of use before I have my debit card number memorized, just from typing it in paying bills online. My guess is he played the asshole lawyer act and it cost him a ride to jail cuffed in the back of a squad car.
"I bet you are one of those clowns that thinks to himself 'Hmm, there are no witnesses and I didn't sign anything, so I don't have to return the money.'"
Uh...no.
"...when someone makes a deal to pay you back, you expect them to keep that promise."
Yes, but promises are often broken and expectations are often not met.
When giving (monetary) help, one had better have the expectation of not being paid back, as the sting of disappointment will be less sharp when one is not. If a guarantee of being paid back is the necessary requirement before lending the money, one is better off not lending the money, or in having a contract drawn up to formalize the arrangement and to provide a basis for seeking legal redress.
In a fleeting circumstance such as lending someone the funds to pay for their meal or gasoline, it's rather stingy to expect to be paid back, and one should provide the assistance with no strings attached. If the other party later makes good anyway, all the nicer for both parties.
tastid212, in what edition is the S&W ad to be found? I'm in Chicago and it's not in my print edition. Thanks
Just quit while you're behind, Cookie.
There is no excuse for someone breaking a promise. And like the good little cocksucking Leftie you are, you have to blame the victim, not the person breaking the oral contract. You know you are one of those assholes. Just admit it. "Why you have to admit that rape WAS a possibility when you came to Occupy. You have to accept that possibility or you shouldn't have come in the first place!" Dipshit.
It was up to AllenS to decline the gasoline or cash promised. And if he wanted to see if they would keep their word, that was up to him as well.
You don't make the rules, Cookie, and I still suspect that your word isn't worth the stink it travels on. You do not have to study contract law to keep a fucking promise or expect same.
"There is no excuse for someone breaking a promise."
And yet it happens all the time.
As for the rest of your spittle-flecked tirade, I really don't know what you're on about and perhaps you might want to...seek help for your rage issues.
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