As the LA Times article points out, it's the diner who is paying for the experience. Sucky customers still have to pay for their food.

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You are totally right John. Of course, there are always the customers who complain just to get free stuff. And the ones who stiff the waiters. I spent years as a waitress and I now spend half my life eating out, and I have to say dealing with customers was more annoying by far than dealing with bad service, simply because bad customers happen every night and truly bad service only every once in a while. In my experience most restaurants are genuinely trying to please their customers, while really bad customers are often just mean people out to have a bad time. I feel it is absolutely my job to stand up for diner's rights, but every now and then I have to give a shout out to my former colleagues in the service industry who have to deal with a whole lot of crap themselves.

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I hear you, Besha. Never been a server, but did my time in the service industry. I'm just saying that if you stick to the very top-tier restaurants in Atlanta (Eugene, Bacchanalia, Joel, etc) you pretty much get exactly what you'd expect in terms of service. It's the spots that fill in the second tier where my experience has been very hit-or-miss with respect to the whole "diner as guest" vs."diner as potential antagonist" scenario. In any case, props to you for discussing such things.

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Rebecca from Munich, Germany who commented on teh NYT article put it best: I find the patronizing tone of your article very interesting, considering the accusation you've made against "restaurant speak". Do you honestly think servers say the word "enjoy" just to annoy you? In all likelihood, the "patronizing" tone the servers took with you was either an honest attempt at politeness, or, if not, a direct response to your snarky attitude towards them. Having worked in restaurants, I can attest to the fact that the absolute last thing a server wants to do is feign politeness toward condescending (and very often flat-out rude) guests like you. But they do it anyway--because if they didn't, they would lose their jobs. Granted, there are options between "whaddya want" and "would you care to enjoy some coffee tonight," but you can't possibly expect each restaurant to re-train their staff before you show up, to avoid irritating you with misplaced politeness. The wait staff has to put up with enough whining already without your nit-picking over their choice of words. Tonight, Patronizing Language, indeed--if you're referring to your own article.

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After reading Frank Bruni\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'s article in NYT and the subsequent comments, I find Frank is in the minority with his article. 190 readers recommend the comment from Rebecca from Germany, and the many more like it. Frank has his head so far up his a** that he cannot tell when something is either being done by a corporate directive or from a true sense of pleasing the customer. I feel sorry for him and the commenter’s like him.

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Dealing with bad customers was more annoying than dealing with bad service? Not sure how that can be... When you are dealing with bad customers as a server, it is your job, and you are being paid- When you are dealing with crappy service, you are paying for it for money earned at your job. I do agree strongly with a few points in the manifesto- --Water: You have the right to filtered water, and to have it as a choice. I've hosted dinner with water tabs well over $60 and it is ridiculous. --Specials: I do want to know the price of specials. I've ordered many $40-$50 specials when the average dish on the menu may be half of that. -Pulling out the wallet once: Normally it can take a long time for a bartender to settle a tab in a crowded bar. This usually leaves one person standing alone at the bar (quite often the host), while the rest of the party is at the table. If they still want to keep the tabs separate, they should deliver the bar tab to the table. Wine: Levels: A restaurant pour should get 5 glasses from a bottle, and should to stretch to six if that is the size of the party. It seems that 4 glasses is now the normal pour. I've had parties of five that required a 2nd bottle just so everyone got a glass. We normally order multiple bottles, but usually not of the same wine. Wine lists: The server should ask who would like wine lists. Hosting a lot of business dinners, I like to keep in control of the list to keep someone from ordering bottles of Harlan without you knowing about it. Just being out for a casual meal, I have no problem with everyone having a list. Wine pricing: A restaurant should be able to charge whatever they'd like for their food and drinks, but when it comes to wine and the 200%-300% markup- please fill your lists with wines that I can't easily find. Once I find it retail, I'll rarely order it again in a restaurant. Vintages: Please list your vintages. I'd like to know if the Chateauneuf du Pape I'm ordering is an 02 or an 03. Or if you bring the wrong one, it is the same as bringing the wrong food.

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I do think all these articles do a service in that many restaurants obviously don't properly train their waiters, and all these points make for happier customers and in the long run happier waiters. I worked at restaurants where these kinds of points of service were so drilled into our heads that we would never get away with slipping up. Also, I think restaurants are beginning to see that they can't get away with bad wine service or crazy markups. The more educated the public becomes, the more this is true. Hardy - I am speaking from the point of view of someone who waited tables for a living and now eats out for a living, and I think the difference is that when you are doing your job in the service industry, you often come across people who seem to want to attack your very humanity. It is one of the last places in our supposedly classless society where, at least while the server is at work, they are part of a service class, and I think you'd be surprised how many people take advantage of that situation needlessly. Of course, paying good money to be treated badly is infuriating, and the distinction between which experience is worse is perhaps a little meaningless. But I, like many servers (probably all) went through some pretty horrible abuse at the hands of customers, and I now feel it is my duty to remind people to have compassion. Part of the problem is that people think that dealing with horrible customers is "part of your job." But in a perfect world, no one should have to take abuse as part of their job. Just as no one should have to put up with awful service and food and then be expected to pay enormous amounts of money for the pleasure. The more both sides of the transaction understand this, the better for us all.

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