Here Are The Official Ground Rules When It Comes To Taking Tables In Restaurants

It's Wednesday morning, which means it's time to offload some of our biggest complaints of the week in the latest edition of The Gripe Report!

Last week, my wife and I had a couple of errands to run before I started work, and we decided to grab some breakfast.

We discussed where to go, and I did my usual move of saying, "I’d like to go someplace healthy," and then I abandoned that, and we ended up at some bakery or Chick-fil-A or something.

Hey, at least I put in an effort to eat healthier.

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On this occasion, we went to a place called Paris Baguette, which is a strange place.

First of all, you’d think it comes from France, but it’s actually Korean. That alone is wild to me.

I don’t know why they didn’t pick a Korean city. "Seoul Baguette" doesn’t work very well, but "Busan Baguette" sure does.

At this place, you go in, grab a tray, throw a sheet of wax paper on said tray, grab some tongs, and then you just start raiding bakery cases.

It’s a lot of steps — I prefer just telling someone, "Give me one of those," and they hand it to me — but the food is good. If you must know, I had a Greek yogurt and cherry danish, and then my wife and I split a Dubai chocolate donut.

(Side note: I wanted to hate on Dubai chocolate because I thought it was just some trend, but it’s really, really good.)

But I hate this place, and here’s why: the seating situation blows.

It’s a popular place, but they only have eight indoor tables. 

Eight.

Every time I go in there, I feel my blood pressure going up as I see groups committing seat-taking foul after seat-taking foul.

So, here are some ground rules we all need to follow if we want to continue living in a functioning society.

The guy at the small table is following the rules. The lady by herself at what appears to be a table for a dozen people is not. (Getty Images)

Don’t Take More Tables Than You Need

I’m a firm believer that in a place where you seat yourself, you should try your best to sit at a table that is appropriate for the size of your table.

Obviously, the more people you have, the more table real estate you need, but my blood boils when I see a pair of people take a four-top where there are plenty of two-tops to be found.

My issue is that if a group of four comes in, their seating options are now gone, because the duo that needed more space stretched out while they drink their lattes and eat their almond croissant, and had to take the fours.

I live by this. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been out somewhere and I insist on picking a table suiting our party size. Yeah, I know the big cushy mobster booth in the corner is available, but that fits nine people, and there are three of us.

Plus, if you’re in a table service joint, you’re taking up room that could be occupied by a bigger party ordering more grub and tipping the server more for it.

Let’s just all agree to abide by this rule, and we’ll all be a little happier.

Or, at least, I will.

No Sitting Unless You Bought Something. 

Now and then, there’s a news story about a restaurant or a coffee shop that throws someone out because they didn’t buy anything, and then the person goes and bitches to the media, and it becomes a whole thing.

I’m always on the side of the restaurant in these situations.

First of all, if you need a place to sit, how about literally anywhere else? 

Benches are free. Curbs are free. The tailgate of your truck is free.

If you're too cheap to buy a coffee before mooching off the Wi-Fi, then you can go sit in one of those places.

The other thing is that when I have an armful of drinks and nowhere to sit because these freeloaders are hogging all the real estate, I get angry.

This is a massive complaint of mine in theme parks. You’ll have a tray of food that costs you several hundred dollars and nowhere to sit because some dopey family is sitting there on the phones, bathing in the AC because they were too stupid to realize Florida gets hot.

Don’t even get me started on when it rains. This problem gets exponentially worse.

So, if you’re not buying something from that establishment, get your ass up.

No Saving Seats

This might be the most controversial take, but I hate saving seats.

Maybe I'm just a gentleman, but I like the musical chairs of seat-snagging to be on a level playing-field.

I always feel super guilty when I’m with a group of people, and we can get a table because we can afford to have someone with a pulse occupy a table. Meanwhile, the poor sap who is trying to grab a bite to eat on his lunch break has nowhere to sit because he committed the cardinal sin of not bringing seat-saving reinforcements.

There’s no real way to police this, but we just need more people to show a little sportsmanship.

I always looked at it this way: I hate when I can’t grab a table because some other group drew up a play and squatted at one, so I try not to do that to others.

Of course, what do I get in return for that?

Nothing, so maybe I should just get over it and turn into a seat-saving douche.

"Just scored some more chairs, bruh!" - This guy. (Getty Images)

Steal A Chair If You Must, But Only From Approved Places

This rule requires strong judgment, which makes me think I might be wasting my time by explaining it, but here it goes…

On this fateful trip to Paris Baguette, I shot the stinkeye at a group of five people who came and took a table for four.

Obviously, they needed one more chair, and so one of them staked out a table and then went about searching for an extra chair. 

There were at least two options: the first was to take the chair from a closer table that had no one at it. The problem here was that this table comprised a booth seat and a single chair.

The other option involved going to another table, an exhausting eight feet away, and asking to borrow a chair from a four-top table occupied by one lady (who was also breaking one of my rules.

Well, lazy ass decided to take the closer chair, which meant that this table for two was now taken out of commission for a certain very handsome and witty writer and his lovely wife.

You need to think about a chair-stealing through, and this lady was too lazy or too dumb, or probably both, to work out this move properly.

If the restaurant is clearly full and tables are at a premium, you should have to run your chair-stealing plan by all the other customers. They can then veto the steal, provided they have a good explanation.

In this case, I would've said, "Hey, stupid, take a chair from the table with one lady at it."

Also, on this same trip (this place is like Dodge f--king City; it's just lawless), some lady stole a chair to rest her purse on it.

Ladies might disagree with me on this, but that should get you some sort of monetary fine. 

A Rebuttal In Favor Of Tethered Sunglasses

That's enough table talk, let's revisit something from last week…

I’m nothing if not fair (and shockingly handsome), so after a ripped tethered sunglasses a third corn chute last week, I thought it was only right that Larry get a second to defend their honor:

Nothing like the 1960’s habit of clipping your sunglasses to your shirt. As a Florida native, everyone I know laughs at guys with their sunglasses stuck on their shirts. Most of the people I know with sunglass lanyards own boats and are on the water a lot. They need good sunglasses that cost real money; they don’t want to lose. Thirty-dollar sunglasses clipped to an Izod polo with crocs and and socks. You can spot this invasive species a mile away. All your other gripes were spot on.

…

Larry is referring to my "clip the glasses to the shirt move," which I'd argue isn't so much dated as it is suave and debonair.

I think I saw James Bond do it… Although that may have been in one of the movies from the '60s, in which case, Larry is on to something.

What's interesting here is that the tether isn't just a practicality thing (although I'd argue wholly unnecessary), as Larry pointed out, it serves a social purpose.

It says, "I am a boat guy."

I'd argue that standing on or near a boat makes that pretty crystal clear, but hey, the glasses are just the icing on the boat guy cake, I suppose.

I'm not a boat guy (although I have gone kayaking a couple of times), so maybe that's why I think the tethered sunglasses are ridiculous.

I get not wanting to drop a set of nice shades in the drink. I think most people, even boat guys, could get away with $30-and-under polarized shades, but I'm not sure.

Maybe the other boat guys would make fun of you or give you a wedgie if you showed up with cheap, tetherless sunglasses.

Either way, once you're on dry land, I can assure you that you can live without the tether.

Also, for the record, I don't wear socks with my Crocs… I have no clue where this rumor got started.

…

That's it for this week, and what a week it was!

Be sure to send in your gripes for a future edition of The Gripe Report!: matthew.reigle@outkick.com