Kennyz wrote:

Marco wrote:I've still not actually been there

Marco wrote:It is starting to resemble a dysfunctional relationship where the sex [food] is out of this world, but the rest of the situation is unacceptable

Actually, it's starting to resemble the Jerry Springer show, where a one member of a dysfunctional relationship calls out her partner publically, then the audience - none of whom have any first hand knowledge of the situation - cheer and jeer from the peanut gallery in order to provoke a fight.

The fact is that on weekends, Patty's is jammed and there's only one cook and one waitress. Shit happens, tempers flare and customer experiences suffer (or not, depending on the day and/or your expectations). To Patty's credit, the food never seems to suffer, though her demeanor is another story. The solution? If you're not ready to buckle in and go for the ride on the weekends, go there during the week when they're not so jammed.

Stagger wrote:

Marco wrote: It is starting to resemble a dysfunctional relationship where the sex [food] is out of this world, but the rest of the situation is unacceptable. It is not overall healthy. I've appreciated -all- the negative reports on Patty's as much as the positive ones. I've still not actually been there, but I know my tradeoffs and costs if I do go.

You know, I love LTH as much as anyone else but there is a certain dark side to having so many food and restaurant obsessed folks in one place. When we start providing pseudo-psychological deconstruction and doing a cost-benefit analysis before going to a DINER, it crosses the line. Seriously... At most of the diners I frequented in Maine during college, you were lucky if you got a grunt of acknowledgment when you made your order and a "later" when you left. Diners are not meant to be the second coming of Rainforest Cafe. This whole issue is about expectations... and in this case how they are out of line with reality. I don't expect to be coddled or "cared for" in any way at a diner. I expect decent salt-of-the-earth type food in a reasonable amount of time... period!

Eating, dining out, *is* a psychologically complex and overdetermined experience. You are trusting *strangers* literally to feed you, to duplicate the oldest experiences of nurturing that ---in previous generations of human history--- would only have transpired between family members. It is intimate; what they produce, and how they present it to you is ultimately *entering your body*. You are vulnerable, both to serious risk and delicious reward. The situation is always, therefore, volatile. The entire modern food service industry is premised upon reassurance that it is safe, emotionally and physically to be fed by strangers.

Is it emotionally safe to eat at Patty's Diner? I am not reassured by these reports. The notion that a family with young children present would be traumatized and mis-treated is below the safety threshold. I've never heard of any party, anywhere, having their seats confiscated in the middle of dining *for any reason*. Confiscating the water glasses, etc is a very clear hint that you are not welcome. That sends the message: I don't like you, I don't want you here, and yet *my* cooking is going in your mouth. Such humiliation is a violence perped not only on the dining party, *but upon every witness in the room*. It violates the basic unspoken premise of the situation: that your dignity will be respected here, and that you will be safe in exchange for your cash. Not coddled, not pampered, just safe.

It is no coincidence to me that the civil rights movement had as its flashpoint lunch counters, or busses. Because these are sites where you *are* trusting people your safety to strangers. And where your dignity is utterly on display. And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages: because they *are* experiencing comfort, comfort food, and the intimacy of dining where they *do* feel welcome, acknowledged and familiar. But if I am sitting there, satiated and warm, proud to be amongst the secret society of the old potatoes, and Patty or Suzy start going off on a family with kids--then I am no longer so proud.

Marco wrote:Is it emotionally safe to eat at Patty's Diner? I am not reassured by these reports.

Did you take that walk yet?

68° with a light breeze along the lake.

G Wiv wrote:

Marco wrote:Is it emotionally safe to eat at Patty's Diner? I am not reassured by these reports.

Did you take that walk yet?

68° with a light breeze along the lake.

"And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages: because they *are* experiencing comfort, comfort food, and the intimacy of dining where they *do* feel welcome, acknowledged and familiar."

Marco wrote:"And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages:

Marco wrote:I've still not actually been there

I don't have much more to say than suggest again you take a walk along the lake.

Marco wrote:

Stagger wrote:

Marco wrote: It is starting to resemble a dysfunctional relationship where the sex [food] is out of this world, but the rest of the situation is unacceptable. It is not overall healthy. I've appreciated -all- the negative reports on Patty's as much as the positive ones. I've still not actually been there, but I know my tradeoffs and costs if I do go.

You know, I love LTH as much as anyone else but there is a certain dark side to having so many food and restaurant obsessed folks in one place. When we start providing pseudo-psychological deconstruction and doing a cost-benefit analysis before going to a DINER, it crosses the line. Seriously... At most of the diners I frequented in Maine during college, you were lucky if you got a grunt of acknowledgment when you made your order and a "later" when you left. Diners are not meant to be the second coming of Rainforest Cafe. This whole issue is about expectations... and in this case how they are out of line with reality. I don't expect to be coddled or "cared for" in any way at a diner. I expect decent salt-of-the-earth type food in a reasonable amount of time... period!

Eating, dining out, *is* a psychologically complex and overdetermined experience. You are trusting *strangers* literally to feed you, to duplicate the oldest experiences of nurturing that ---in previous generations of human history--- would only have transpired between family members. It is intimate; what they produce, and how they present it to you is ultimately *entering your body*. You are vulnerable, both to serious risk and delicious reward. The situation is always, therefore, volatile. The entire modern food service industry is premised upon reassurance that it is safe, emotionally and physically to be fed by strangers.

Is it emotionally safe to eat at Patty's Diner? I am not reassured by these reports. The notion that a family with young children present would be traumatized and mis-treated is below the safety threshold. I've never heard of any party, anywhere, having their seats confiscated in the middle of dining *for any reason*. Confiscating the water glasses, etc is a very clear hint that you are not welcome. That sends the message: I don't like you, I don't want you here, and yet *my* cooking is going in your mouth. Such humiliation is a violence perped not only on the dining party, *but upon every witness in the room*. It violates the basic unspoken premise of the situation: that your dignity will be respected here, and that you will be safe in exchange for your cash. Not coddled, not pampered, just safe.

It is no coincidence to me that the civil rights movement had as its flashpoint lunch counters, or busses. Because these are sites where you *are* trusting people your safety to strangers. And where your dignity is utterly on display. And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages: because they *are* experiencing comfort, comfort food, and the intimacy of dining where they *do* feel welcome, acknowledged and familiar. But if I am sitting there, satiated and warm, proud to be amongst the secret society of the old potatoes, and Patty or Suzy start going off on a family with kids--then I am no longer so proud.

Oh give me a break, it is a diner. They weren't refusing to serve minorities. Let's not let this conversation get any more hyperbolic than it is. As I said, unlike some posters here, I have eaten at Patty's many times and have always felt welcome. It is just a diner. I do not expect the waitress to be my best friend. Just bring me edible food in a timely mannner. I am sorry if VickyP had an unpleasant experience there, but like I said, we have only heard one side of the story. Maybe the kids were unmitigated brats. Maybe Suzy just got done dealing with a particularly obnoxious family and just took it out on VivkyP's party. Whatever. Nothing beats when I was sitting at the counter of the "hillbilly grill" at Chicago and Damen years ago, and the woman behind the counter split a guy's skull open with an axe handle, when he complained too much about the food. The police were called and arrested the guy who got hit in the head (he was somewhat inebriated). Now that's bad service even for a crappy diner.

G Wiv wrote:

Marco wrote:"And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages:

Marco wrote:I've still not actually been there

I don't have much more to say than suggest again you take a walk along the lake.

So I am wondering why you are repeating yourself. I am hearing it as if I were in your diner, and you were asking me to leave.

Hey Gary,

I took a walk today with the dog - got to stretch my legs a bit and the dog was happy as well.

When i get stressed out, I like to do something that I call "weed therapy." There is nothing like yanking those bothersome suckers out of the ground to relieve the stressors of everyday life and to get my head back on straight.

Good weather today for gardening as well - what more could one ask for.

Marco wrote:"And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages: because they *are* experiencing comfort, comfort food, and the intimacy of dining where they *do* feel welcome, acknowledged and familiar."

This has nothing to do with defending Patty's. If you choose to read it that way, so be it. There's clearly a larger, more universal issue here about our expectations and how we as individuals handle it when they are not met. This particular discussion centers around Patty's but it could just as easily center around any other place at which a diner was disappointed by the service side of the experience and reported it here.

I believe that those here who are "defending" Patty's are really just saying that the idiosyncracies of the place -- no matter how severe -- do not diminish the experience for them. They know what to expect and yet, they still go there. There is also another camp who doesn't want to go there (and a small minority within that group who are actually glad it's closing). Thing is, no one's making these people go there yet they seem to be unhappy that others still do want to go there -- almost as if they are pleading that no one should go there because they don't like it. If these folks feel that it's not an "emotionally safe" experience to eat there, then they should stay home or go somewhere else. What others do should not be any of their concern, yet in following this discussion, it seems to be a primary focus of their concern.

=R=

Marco wrote:Is it emotionally safe to eat at Patty's Diner? I am not reassured by these reports.

Gliben-glaven...IT'S A DINER!!!

Marco, all this antagonism about a place you've never been to and will probably never eat at?!

I think I'm starting to see why the girl at BK flipped you off. When I first read it, I was squarely in your corner. Now, I'm beginning to see why she might have done it.

Time to let it go. And that goes for me, too.

So an honest (philosophical) question, since I have no dog in this fight: as long as the food is good, do the idiosyncracies of the place ever matter? Or is it always some flexible subjective standard? And if so, isn't food some flexible subjective standard as well?

Now this is an emotionally unsafe restaurant.

Sorry to add to this, but I'm curious Marco...

You say BK got your order wrong and you wanted your money back. Wouldn't you at least give them a chance to get it right first? Believe me I sympathize with you when you mentioned your story, but I never ask for my money back unless they can't get the order right. Just wondering.

As far as the whole Patty's issue at hand, can't pass judgement on this one until I hear both sides of the story. Usually when kids are involved it only becomes a more sensitive issue and a lot more annoying.

This reminds me of an experience I had many years ago at Ed Debevics, where I had ordered a banana malt, which had no malt flavor, so I asked the server if he could add more malt flavor, the gimmick being at Ed Debevics, "crude diner service" the server yanked my malt and brought a malted paste, and yelled "there malty enough for you !" Needless to say we got up and left. Next day I did call the manager and told him what happened and he apologized and said that shouldn't have happened the gimmick had gone too far and that he would talk the server.
There is no gimmick at Patty's, it is what it is, however a lost customer is a lost customer, whether it is a diner or a fine dining establishment.
Unhappy customers just as happy customers pass the word around and no business needs bad word of mouth.
Although Patty's is known for some "gruffness" I have experienced myself when Patty's temper runs high, the restaurant becomes silent because it is uncomfortable and she might even loose customers who decide not to return to that kind of environment.
As much a Patty is passionate about her cooking, no business can afford to loose business, especially now with the internet, where such events true or untrue are read by thousands.
Certainly no owner needs to hear from anyone that their business should close, and that from a person who hasn't even been there.
Since Patty doesn't have a manager however does have strong supporters of her business who know her personally perhaps now it is time to support her business by suggesting that her famous "gruffness" could at times cause her to loose business, and since few months back she hinted she might close due to lack of business, now is the time, at the height of her newfound popularity to review her demeanor.
That way her hardcore fans will have her for longer time and she will have more customers to enjoy her food, everybody wins.
What says ya Gary, you are a business man, help out a fellow business woman in time of need.
Thanks.

jesteinf wrote:Now this is an emotionally unsafe restaurant.

LMAO, yes!

The Onion wrote:GARDEN CITY, NY—With its colorful striped awning, kids' jungle gym in the parking lot, and all-American fare, Ernie's Family Restaurant resembles many other down-home restaurants that promise to treat its customers like family. But what sets this nationwide chain apart is that it actually delivers on its pledge.

The recently opened Ernie's Family Restaurant serves up down-home, family-style anger, bitterness and denial at reasonable prices. "We believe in treating our customers like part of the family," manager Dean Friesz said during Friday's grand opening of a new Ernie's location on Jericho Turnpike in Garden City. "That's why Ernie's offers, free with every Old-Fashioned Super-Duper Ernie's Entree, accusations, belittlement, and other barely disguised expressions of bitterness, despair and sour regret that typify American family interaction."

=R=

So let's see here - eating at Patty's Diner is

"a psychologically complex and overdetermined experience" that is "intimate" but leaves us "vulnerable, both to serious risk and delicious reward", the risk being humiliation and traumatization on the magnitude of the cafeteria sit-in's during the civil rights movement.

I think its time for all of us to quit taking ourselves too seriously and just sit back and realize - it's just food. We eat to survive, enjoy and to relax. If a place does not allow you to accomplish these three needs, find someplace else. If enough people fail to have their needs met at any establishment, it will fail, internet or no internet.

Abandon the hyperbole and psychoanalysis - life is too short for all that.


"Eating, dining out, *is* a psychologically complex and overdetermined experience. You are trusting *strangers* literally to feed you, to duplicate the oldest experiences of nurturing that ---in previous generations of human history--- would only have transpired between family members. It is intimate; what they produce, and how they present it to you is ultimately *entering your body*. You are vulnerable, both to serious risk and delicious reward. The situation is always, therefore, volatile. The entire modern food service industry is premised upon reassurance that it is safe, emotionally and physically to be fed by strangers.

Is it emotionally safe to eat at Patty's Diner? I am not reassured by these reports. The notion that a family with young children present would be traumatized and mis-treated is below the safety threshold. I've never heard of any party, anywhere, having their seats confiscated in the middle of dining *for any reason*. Confiscating the water glasses, etc is a very clear hint that you are not welcome. That sends the message: I don't like you, I don't want you here, and yet *my* cooking is going in your mouth. Such humiliation is a violence perped not only on the dining party, *but upon every witness in the room*. It violates the basic unspoken premise of the situation: that your dignity will be respected here, and that you will be safe in exchange for your cash. Not coddled, not pampered, just safe.

It is no coincidence to me that the civil rights movement had as its flashpoint lunch counters, or busses. Because these are sites where you *are* trusting people your safety to strangers. And where your dignity is utterly on display. And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages: because they *are* experiencing comfort, comfort food, and the intimacy of dining where they *do* feel welcome, acknowledged and familiar. But if I am sitting there, satiated and warm, proud to be amongst the secret society of the old potatoes, and Patty or Suzy start going off on a family with kids--then I am no longer so proud."

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Marco wrote:"And it is no coincidence that the defenders of Patty would react uncomfortably to critical messages: because they *are* experiencing comfort, comfort food, and the intimacy of dining where they *do* feel welcome, acknowledged and familiar."

This has nothing to do with defending Patty's. If you choose to read it that way, so be it. There's clearly a larger, more universal issue here about our expectations and how we as individuals handle it when they are not met. This particular discussion centers around Patty's but it could just as easily center around any other place at which a diner was disappointed by the service side of the experience and reported it here.

I believe that those here who are "defending" Patty's are really just saying that the idiosyncracies of the place -- no matter how severe -- do not diminish the experience for them. They know what to expect and yet, they still go there. There is also another camp who doesn't want to go there (and a small minority within that group who are actually glad it's closing). Thing is, no one's making these people go there yet they seem to be unhappy that others still do want to go there -- almost as if they are pleading that no one should go there because they don't like it. If these folks feel that it's not an "emotionally safe" experience to eat there, then they should stay home or go somewhere else. What others do should not be any of their concern, yet in following this discussion, it seems to be a primary focus of their concern.

=R=

Just want to say I agree with the summary presented above. My original intention was merely to challenge the statement that wishing Patty's would close was 'hateful' or an automatically invalidated attitude. Or the notion that one should never call out a place so strongly publically. I wish people would be *more* open and disclose such problems, because such info is valuable.

And for the record, I never commented on Patty's food, or lobbied for people not to go. My comments, to be precise, were never about the idiosyncratic experience of eating at Patty's. My comments were only on the *reports* posted here that were disturbing. And these reports, particularly this last one, seem to exceed the idiosyncratic category altogether. The incident reported seemed downright crazy, capricious and irrational. If I had been a witness to it, I would have felt diminished, is all that I was trying to say.

I did try to offer an analysis for *why* a diner, in particular can be such a flashpoint of emotional attachment or repulsion. But my attempt at an analysis was not to lobby for or against Patty's, for or against attraction or repulsion---just merely to try to understand the dynamics. For myself. Because I do think there is something mysterious and deep about diners, far more so than merely slightly slower fast food.

Marco wrote:I did try to offer an analysis for *why* a diner, in particular can be such a flashpoint of emotional attachment or repulsion. But my attempt at an analysis was not to lobby for or against Patty's, for or against attraction or repulsion---just merely to try to understand the dynamics. For myself. Because I do think there is something mysterious and deep about diners, far more so than merely slightly slower fast food.

For the record, I understand your point, and agree with it. Restaurants, all up and down the scale, are enormously complex psychological experiences, which is part of why they're fun to go to (and fun to write and read about)--when they work, they satisfy a multiplicity of needs beyond just hunger. And when they don't work, they frustrate a multiplicity of needs. That doesn't mean that every time we go into a restaurant, we're conscious of these needs. On the contrary, on a conscious level, we do go in thinking, "Relax, it's just food," as some posters have put it. But that's far from all that's going on. My personal pet theory (which I've expressed here before) is that how we feel about restaurants has a lot to do with how we feel about our mothers, who were our first feeding systems.

riddlemay wrote:My personal pet theory (which I've expressed here before) is that how we feel about restaurants has a lot to do with how we feel about our mothers, who were our first feeding systems.

Not to hijack this thread, but I'm intrigued. Is there another thread where you've elaborated why you think this is so?

Katie wrote:

riddlemay wrote:My personal pet theory (which I've expressed here before) is that how we feel about restaurants has a lot to do with how we feel about our mothers, who were our first feeding systems.

Not to hijack this thread, but I'm intrigued. Is there another thread where you've elaborated why you think this is so?

There is, but I'll be darned if I can find it, Katie. (Various search terms I just tried produced nothing, or so many false results I couldn't look through them all.) In any case, it's an intuitive judgment, one I arrived at after observing that we tend to get far more upset in restaurants when things go wrong than mere "rationality" would justify. (As if we are rational creatures at all, despite our need to believe we are.) I found this curious, and began to wonder why bad experiences in restaurants can upset us so disproportionately. In some sense, we begin to feel hurt, and sometimes to behave, like infants. This led to the insight that restaurants do return us to a state of infancy--another time in our lives when our care and feeding was the complete responsibility of others, others who were new to us and whom we were still establishing trust with (or whom we trusted, only to feel that trust had been betrayed), as happens in restaurants.

riddlemay wrote:This led to the insight that restaurants do return us to a state of infancy-

Oh dear, I'm afraid I just soiled my pants laughing so hard.

Lucky my computer is on the same floor as the washing machine.

Ah Gary, brilliant! By raising elimination you've made the Freudian connection for us! Food-safety-mother-oral fixation-anal retention. It's all so clear to me now

I think the direction this thread has been taking rivals probably the all time most unintentionally hilarious comments thread I've read (skip the piece and go straight to the first few comments if you like):

http://www.alternet.org/environment/129351/forests_pay_the_price_for_america's_love_affair_with_really_soft_toilet_paper/?page=entire

Coincidence that Gary's last post reminded me of this thread? I think not. If this isn't an a-ha moment, I don't know what is.

But as Freud said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes a diner is just a diner. But ham hash is always delicious.

Hellodali wrote:But as Freud said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And sometimes a diner is just a diner. But ham hash is always delicious.

Freud did say that. But that was because he smoked cigars, and didn't want to have his own needs investigated and understood the way he did others'. (Even though cigars cost him his life.)

I wonder with how many of his patients did he short-circuit the analytic process that way?

Part of my delight in reading the LTHForum goes well beyond the very helpful information about restaurants, shopping and other food-related topics. It involves the impressions of the posting members that are inevitably created in the reader’s mind as you read more and more of their postings. You conjure up personality images of your fellow LTHers, which are then confirmed or revised when you meet them, in person at the LTH events.

This thread about Patty’s Diner is a terrific example of going well beyond “How’s the food and service?”. An allegation of a simple “trigger incident” has led us off on a tangent into the very recesses of our psyches and revelations of our core beliefs. What a hoot.

Perhaps because of my advanced age – I am definitely in the OF (or AK) age-category – the personality images that my mind creates as I read some of the more revealing postings tend to be somewhat cynical.

Here are two examples:

“My personal pet theory (which I've expressed here before) is that how we feel about restaurants has a lot to do with how we feel about our mothers, who were our first feeding systems.”…” This led to the insight that restaurants do return us to a state of infancy--another time in our lives when our care and feeding was the complete responsibility of others, others who were new to us and who we were still establishing trust with, as is so often the case in restaurants.”

and

“My comments were only on the *reports* posted here that were disturbing. And these reports, particularly this last one, seem to exceed the idiosyncratic category altogether. The incident reported seemed downright crazy, capricious and irrational. If I had been a witness to it, I would have felt diminished, is all that I was trying to say.
I did try to offer an analysis for *why* a diner, in particular can be such a flashpoint of emotional attachment or repulsion. But my attempt at an analysis was not to lobby for or against Patty's, for or against attraction or repulsion---just merely to try to understand the dynamics. For myself. Because I do think there is something mysterious and deep about diners, far more so than merely slightly slower fast food.”

As I read these, I envision not the adult, but the elementary-school version of the poster as the kind of kid who is always first to frantically wave a hand in the air, almost levitating out of the seat, trying desperately to be the first to answer the teacher’s question and being rewarded for the effort by being scorned on the schoolyard at recess.

Hooray for the LTHForum. May it continue not only to provide valuable information, but also to entertain.

jimwdavis wrote:As I read these, I envision not the adult, but the elementary-school version of the poster as the kind of kid who is always first to frantically wave a hand in the air, almost levitating out of the seat, trying desperately to be the first to answer the teacher’s question and being rewarded for the effort by being scorned on the schoolyard at recess.

Say what you will about the passages you quoted, at least they were attempts to understand the situation, rather than to characterize fellow listers and their motivations. I think you should examine that.

I had corned beef hash with 2 over easy at Patty's the other day. I subbed biscuits and gravy for the toast. It was as good as ever. I experienced no incedental drama or trauma while eating. I'll really miss the made to order corned beef/ham hash at Patty's when they're gone.

riddlemay wrote:I think you should examine that.

Two more psychiatrists couch type posts then we lock the thread and move on.

Maybe I am just not as smart as some of you folks (its been known to happen ), but this all seems a little insane.

Of course, upon further analysis of the text and a quick consultation of the DSM-IV, perhaps 'insanity' would be a bit of a misnomer as.....whoa...caught myself there...almost started doing it too!


Anyone have any more pictures of the Old Potatoes???

G Wiv wrote:

riddlemay wrote:I think you should examine that.

Two more psychiatrists couch type posts then we lock the thread and move on.

FWIW, the "I think you should examine that" was meant to contain a touch of irony. (In addition to making a genuine point.)