I went to Pizza Express once - just once...
...on a night out with some friends in Liverpool - one of the lads was attempting to impress his exchange student girlfriend if memory serves. It did indeed have a slightly more classy air than the likes of Pizza Hut but it put out the most naff, flimsy, unappetizing, made-in-two-minutes shite I have ever had placed in front of me, starters included (garlic doughballs - turned out to be garlic-less doughbollocks). A bumper bag of overpriced wank, so it was - I'll take Pizza Hut anyday.

Another time, again in Liverpool, I, my brother and our respective partners accompanied my mam on one of her faculty do's, which was a meal in a posh restaurant local to the school. To start with, the faculty and guests occupied the entire upper floor of the place... except for our party and two others, who were told quite gruffly by the organiser that there was no room left upstairs (I checked, and there was ample room - other staff members even arrived after we did and were taken up there without so much as a murmur) and so instead we got coralled to a teeny-tiny table downstairs next to the door to the kitchen. Mum made the best of it as always, but as the meal went on, I found it more and more difficult to hide my affront. We were asked afterward if we wanted to go on to a club. Not giving my mum a chance to reply I asked 'Would that be with you?'.

'Yes, who else?' came the reply.

'So what will you do with us then? Lock us in the cloakroom? After this, I'm not going anywhere with you lot - I'd rather go somewhere I'm welcome.' The uppity bitch's face was a picture. Far from a reprimand, my mum got an apology from the organiser's year head the very next Monday, and was asked to pass the same to me. I was/am more annoyed that they did it to my mum than me - she was thier colleague after all, and had my mum been in charge of it she would have demolished walls to make sure everyone had a seat.

Another shite part of the evening of particular note though was the starter I ordered - a seafood salad. I'm not terribly sophisticated when it comes to cuisine so I was expecting prawns or something. No. What was put in front of me was the remains of a selection of the more mucus-membraneous life of the ocean and a small amount of designer salad - it was like chewing on flattened pencil erasers that had been marinated overnight in fish heads. Now I am a dedicated carnivore* but for the first time that night, I actually regretted that these things weren't still gambolling about in the ocean doing whatever it is they do, I dunno, harassing plankton or whatever rather than sitting on my plate. Which is pretty much all they did.

Suffice to say, I haven't been invited to any such faculty events since - stare and gasp at how gutted I'm not. No room. Stuck-up bunch of cunts.

* Gay blokes tend to avoid the phrase 'meat lover' in polite company :)
(thatblokeoverthere not quite as much an arsehole as I thought, Thu 27 Apr 2006, 15:14, Reply)