Missed opportunities to try a torta at a local (Mexican) place.

On the far edge of campus there's a small, new-ish local (Mexican) place that I saw sells tortas at a reasonable price, so I've been wanting to go in there when I'm over thataways for a trip to the campus library.

Like two months ago, though, I pop in only to find out that like 8 people had walked in just ahead of me, so I ducked out and didn't go there that time.

This past week, then, I have to go the library again, and I go up there, only to find out that there's a sign on their door that they're temporarily closed for renovations!

Like, dang.

Inappropriate thoughts.

Because of the recurring tipping situation, I find myself having a lot of inappropriate thoughts about (South Asian) customers, like what used to be categorized as "edgy humor," but is now often socially impermissible.

Like, maybe they were all profligate gamblers in their previous life, and now they're overcompensating and being a little too tight with their money.

Jokes with 2 (South Asian) (student) customers the other weekday...

...who were in for lunch, after one ordered a beer and it was like 12:25pm when I delivered it:

- (to the beer guy) "If you had ordered that 26 minutes earlier, you would be drinking before noon!"

- (to the other guy, who chuckled slyly after hearing my joke) "Whatever you do, don't take a photo of him and put it on social media, his family will see that he's drinking at this time of day, and they will be very upset."

- (to the other guy, after the first guy said he was paying) "This is what he does after one beer, if he had a second beer, he would pay for the whole restaurant!"

. . .

(They seemed to enjoy my jokes, and the beer guy said he would have a second beer if it was the weekend. Though, on a like $26 bill, the tip was a flat $2, though I am guessing that it's more their [South Asian]-ness, and not their reaction to my humor, which they seemed to genuinely enjoy.)

Economic fates of folks I know:

This one (originally from California) graduate student I knew who was looking to get back there and had scrounged up a tech job in the past year or so and had moved out there had on LinkedIn the other day that he's now looking for a new job in the city where I used to live, and where he had moved from.

I can't figure out if he lost his tech job, or if living in California is sh*t, or if something happened in his life to draw him back to his old haunts.

A part of me thinks it's the tech economy being unstable, though, and I feel justified in deciding not to try to move in that direction five years ago, when I had considered it for a very short minute.

A pleased customer, with one of our special new dishes.

A few weeks ago during the local cooking competition, this one customer was very pleased -- she was older and big-boned and white with glasses and short hair and looked mildly bohemian in a manicured 'college town' kind of way, though she and her husband were visiting from a neighboring state, they said -- and she said to tell the chef that she loved the one special new dish that she had ordered and tried.

And, since another customer who had been in right before that was also very happy with the same dish, I went to go tell my one (Guatemalan) coworker who was cooking, the guy who I started the "diablo" joke with.

And, he said to tell them to go on Facebook and write there, "[His first name] was my chef and he is good."

So, I went to go tell the lady that -- the other guy had already left -- and she laughed and was just delighted, like visibly so.

Local cooking competition.

So, in the college town where I now live, there's a monthlong cooking competition across different participating restaurants, where the people who sell the most specially-created new dishes get a special prize, and there's also an audience prize vote for the place with the best new dishes.

So, since the (Thai) restaurant where I now work is taking part, I've been trying to sell the new special dishes with every single table of customers, and I've been telling my coworkers to do the same.

"But how do they know who sell the most?", my one (chubby) (Thai) coworker was like. "If we tell them, we tell them high, then we win."

I also later found out that my (Thai) coworkers were encouraging all our regular customers to scan the tableside QR codes and vote for us, even if they hadn't tried the special new dishes.

And, since people like us so much, they were like, "Yeah, I'll do that," and just going online and voting for us right then and there.

A short conversation the other day at the local community college dental clinic...

...where I went to have a $10 exam and cleaning, where students do it and then instructors check:

1st student (examining my mouth and pressing my gums with some tool): "Firm and resilient."

2nd student (entering data in the computer): "Firm and resilient."

Me (in between gum probes): "Is this a dental exam, or a horoscope?"

2nd student (laughing): "Sounds like we have a Leo here.  You're firm and resilient."

1st student: "Well, I guess that's better than the other option, 'Soft and spongy.'"