This is the thread where I say things and maybe other people say things too

[George]

File this complain under really, really, REALLY unimportant first-world problems.

Having worked in the restaurant business a few times as second jobs and once for a full-time, three-year stretch (that felt more like five or six), I sympathize with restaurant owners and workers. I really do.

But, if you've gone out of business due to Covid-19 (or any other reason), couldn't you at least put a note saying so on your website or take down the site completely? There are three restaurants near us we used to like to order from. One of the sites says Reopening May 1 (it's August now). The others haven't changed it all. Their phones either ring and ring with no answer and/or a recording comes on and says their voice mailbox is full. Drive-by reconnaissance confirms they have closed. And I'm sad to see this; don't get me wrong.

But, it seems like it would only take a minute or two to add a note saying Thanks For The Memories or Watch For Our Grand Reopening or something. I once had admin rights to a website and could do that in less time than it took to write this post.

Well, I guess it's better than in the days of paper take-out menus that would sit in a drawer or a folder for years as prices increased and offerings changed.

"A large anchovy pizza is now twelve dollars. It hasn't been $4.99 since the year we opened, back during Operation Desert Shield. And we can't deliver a 2-litre bottle of New Coke either. Sorry."

I am grateful to be able to complain about something so trivial while so many are looking for work. Restaurant work is a hard gig, to be sure, but you'd think they could at least update or take down the website before locking the door one last time.

[Cam]

Companies often pay someone else to make their web site. When the business is out of money, they can't pay someone to change the web site. It will sit there unchanged until the domain registration runs out, then it will be bought by a porn site. *shrug*

[George]

"Hi Charlie. It's Joe. Yeah, you heard right - we're done; closing up shop. I can't pay three employees with an average of ten takeout orders per night.

Would you please take down the website? I can't pay you for it any longer.

Thanks. I hope to have better news the next time we talk."

That was easy. Or maybe I still live in Mayberry.

I bet there are giant faceless corporations like Websites-R-Us hosting these sites who don't publish a phone number nor let you speak to a human being under any circumstances.

"Click here to try our new Live Chat feature!"

That's a rant for another day.

[Crazed_Insanity]

[Dicknose]

Or possibly the people are so emotionally overwhelmed by having to shut and layoff staff that they havent the energy to deal with things like websites...

[Cam]

It is weird having a lady who could be my daughter ask for my ID at the beer store.

[George]

DN - Of course. I hope I made it clear this was the most minor of gripes. But, see, if I owned a restaurant, it would bother me. Maybe they hope to reopen and keep things just as they were. I hope they do.

Speaking of ID at the beer store, I bet teens are trying to buy beer wearing face masks these days and hoping they won't get carded.

That was our primary M.O. as kids - look confident and hope they won't ask.

This was back when the drinking age was 18 and we were maybe 17...or 19 when it was 21. There was a weird deal with a highway funding bill back in the mid to late 1980s in which states wouldn't get federal highway funding if they didn't raise the legal drinking (or alcohol purchasing) age to 21. All the states eventually did, but at different times.

I had lots of friends who were legal when they turned 18 but then lost the right to buy when the state I lived in at the time raised the age from 18 to 19 but then jumped from 19 to 21 the next year. Suddenly a bunch of 19 and 20 year-olds were minors again. And, we'd be underage in one state but legal in the next state over. And in Canada. I was legal there and in states along the way during a summer road trip when I was 20, but not back home in Mayberry.

[Crazed_Insanity]

Must be quite a trip to fluctuate between major and a minor crossing various state lines...

Btw, if you go out of business, are you responsible for removing your store front signs? Most of the time these ghost signs simply remained until the new store takes over... at least in my neighborhood.

Of course internet domain names don’t work like that, but I suspect your phantom site won’t be up forever without you paying fees? So just give it a year, it should disappear...

[Dicknose]

18 here.
Never got "carded" even when 16.
Only time I got asked for ID was on my 40th birthday!!

recently someone in front of me being served was asked for id. I go next and say "need to see mine?" - they laugh and I go, well "Im more than twice the age". Pause - do quick maths. Damn - Im triple the age!

[Yw-slayer]

It is weird having a lady who could be my daughter ask for my ID at the beer store.

She was hitting on you!! Wait a minute...