Food in Beard. Do You Tell Them?

"Saving it for later."

“Saving it for later.”

While at work last week, I came across one of those scenarios where I wasn’t sure what to do. Table 2 has a cute young couple at it and they are very very nice. They appear to be on a date and somewhat early in their relationship based on how they order their meal.

“Do you want wine?”

“Yeah, if you do.”

“I like white, what about you?”

“I usually drink red, but white is good.”

“No, I like red too, you want red?”

“Yeah, if you do.”

Adorable. Both of them trying so hard to please the other when we all know that two hours from now, one of them will be under the other and their bodies will be making fart noises together. I do my best to make them comfortable with each other and suggest a half bottle of red wine. They agree on a bottle and then their food negotiations begin.

“Do you want to share an appetizer or each get our own?”

“We can share.”

“Okay, cool.”

“Unless you’d rather have your own. I mean, I know that some people don’t like to share. Not that you don’t like to share, it’s just that some people might not want to.”

Please. In two hours, you’ll be sharing bodily fluids. Order a damn calamari and move on. They finally decide on a quesadilla appetizer after I tell them it is a very easy thing to split.

For her meal, she orders the cod and roasted potatoes and he orders a penne pasta with broccoli in a cream sauce. They drink their half-bottle of wine and things seem to be moving along swimmingly. When doing my two-minute check back, I notice that in the guys beard is a drop of cream sauce. It is just hanging there, dangling precariously from its perch ready to fall below. As he talks to me, I stare at the glob of sauce and it seems to latch on even tighter to the strands of beard hair, determined to stay. He obviously doesn’t know it’s there and his date has not told him. I scratch my chin as I ask him if wants some more wine, hoping that he will subconsciously mimic my movement and free the drop of cream sauce from his tresses. He doesn’t. The dollop is there to stay. It reminds me of a teardrop that Paula Deen would cry, all buttery and thick.

Should I tell this man that he has a driblet of cream sauce in his beard and it is quite possibly ruining the chances with his date who has her eyes cast downward at her cod? I know she is only looking down so that he can hopefully have the chance to clean out his beard. What must she be thinking? She can’t help but be wondering what other foreign objects are caught in that mountain of man hair growing on his face. Might there be some sesame seeds from his everything bagel this morning? Or perhaps some leftover pizza crust from lunch?

“Well, let me know if you need anything,“ I say to him, again rubbing my chin. I walk away, knowing that the dewdrop of deliciousness will soon harden and become a permanent piece of his face. When I clear the plates, I see it is still there but it has retreated further into the safety of the beard. I am surprised that not once did he use a napkin and I am even more surprised that she never told him. I wonder if it was enough to turn her off of this man. I watch him go to the men’s room and when he returns I am happy to see that the beard is now cream-free. I imagine what he must have thought when he saw it in the mirror.

“Oh, fuck. Really? That’s been there the whole night? I’ve been trying to be charming while I had a fucking glob of Alfredo sauce in my beard? It’s over. It’s over. She’s probably so grossed out by me now. Fuck.”

They decline dessert but they do have an after-dinner drink which is always a good sign on a date. They are laughing and telling stories and the flirting has amped up considerably. I am witnessing foreplay and it seems like she is not going to let a little thing like some white creamy sauce on his chin get in the way of her getting some white creamy sauce on her own chin later. They pay the check and walk out of the restaurant together holding hands

I guess it didn’t matter that I didn’t tell him, but should I have? If a customer has food in their teeth or sauce on their face, is it our place to to tell them?

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