Easy. Read the blog before you answer.
This may be my shortest entry of all-time (# 351 if you are scoring at home). It’s really a question disguised as a blog (so much for disguise).
Do you think it’s weird to eat out when you are alone?
I’m not talking about fast food. I’m talking about sitting down, ordering, and eating in a restaurant.
Would you do it?
Have you done it?
Or do you just find this uncomfortably creepy. Maybe your preference would be to simply starve to death?
Or are you like me and eating alone with all of your friends (aka…my creepy uncomfortable feelings) is normal?
I do this even when I get the sense the hostess and waitress find me sad and pathetic.
I mean more sad and pathetic than usual.
Phil Gaton"
jeff
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 7:56 am:
Yes
Christine
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 7:59 am:
Weird? Not at all. I have eaten out alone many times when my husband is traveling. I actually enjoy the quiet and not having to make conversation with anyone. I do some of my best thinking and get the most work done. So if you are weird then I am too. And I will continue to celebrate that weirdness.
Dave
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 8:00 am:
Yes, have needed to do this or else starve. I suppose I was “cheaping out” of room service. Since it is strange to sit there, I usually try to bring a book, a file, or computer. This gives an impression that you are: 1. incredibly busy; 2. Use available second of time (because of number 1). Even though you may not be accomplishing anything, it gives others the impression that you are a “worker bee” and will leave with a positive impression. Caution: using a phone or wireless device just makes it look like you are trying to keep busy as 21st century dude! Even if only reading a book, chances are someone will try to see what you are reading. The more academic looking, the more impressive. Romance novel or comic book – might as well sit there hoping the waitress likes idle chit-chat.
Ellen
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 8:23 am:
Yes.
Okay, now to read the post…
Related to eating alone, I think this is practical as well as a great way to focus on and push the limits of enjoying our own company.
P.S. The photo is fabulous for this post. Great pic!
Karen
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 8:23 am:
Like Christine, if eating out alone makes you weird then I am right up there with weird people. I have eaten out alone when I wanted all my life. Sometimes I choose to do it even when there might be someone to eat with me. I enjoy sitting in an outside cafe and watching people. One can even meet new interesting people eating alone. I also have gone to movies alone. I guess that makes me REALLY weird.
Anyway, I don’t think it is weird at all but in fact, can be one of the more pleasuable things in life to do.
Diane
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 8:31 am:
I eat out alone. I go to movies alone (during the day-it would be weird to at night). I like my own company and am comfortable being by myself. I’d like to travel by myself, but my husband would never go for it.
Love the bear pic.
Miss Teacha
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 9:10 am:
Nothing weird about eating alone . . . i do it frequently. Sometimes, I want a good meal. . . I find that if you have a book or PC the servers leave you alone. No book means they think you are pathetic and will talk your ear off!
Jenny
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 9:11 am:
I’ve done it before while in college. That’s not that unusual, I don’t think, around campus- lots of people stop to eat alone in the middle of their day. Usually when I did that, though, I’d either be eating really fast or I’d make sure and grab a notebook to study, a book or newspaper to read, or something else to do so I wasn’t just sitting there. I think just sitting there would bother me more than anyone else around me, though!
Olwyn Hughes
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 10:33 am:
I don’t have many times to do this but, yes, I would eat out alone. I get lots of good thinking and work done when I do this.
Alfred Thompson
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 11:04 am:
I eat out alone a lot. It is a function of business travel. It’s not fun. It’s boring. But it’s not wierd. BTW I try to bring something to read while I wait for my food. It makes it a little better. But not much.
Tina Francis
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 12:01 pm:
Weird..No…Love to eat out by my-self. I actually find my own company pleasing.:) Actually, it never occurred to me that people struggle eating by themselves in public. Not until, a friend of mine told me she was not able to eat in public with out a companion. I thought this was weird! Go figure…
Pam Franklin
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 2:25 pm:
Well, I have been divorced for almost 9 years now, and I still won’t go to a fancy, sit-down restaurant and eat by myself. (By fancy, I mean the entrees cost more than $7.95.)
Fast food is no problem – I just take a book or newspaper and ignore the rest of the world.
I won’t go the movies by myself, either. That REALLY makes me feel like a loser. Casinos are a different story…
Em
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 2:58 pm:
Eating alone in a restaurant…a real sorta restaurant with wait staff and a menu that isn’t printed on the placemat…is a bit weird for me. But I’ve done it. And I think I should be able to do it without feeling so awkward. And really, isn’t everyone else in the restaurant busy enough with their own lives that they really don’t care about me? And yet, I have this feeling that they are all looking at me and wondering why I have no friends and family. But I push forward….those hurdles must be jumped!
Richard Byrne
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 3:47 pm:
It’s not weird. I’ve done it plenty of times. Like others mentioned, I bring my laptop or a book. That said, if it’s a restaurant that has a bar and I feel like having some meaningless conversation I’ll sit at the bar.
J
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 7:45 pm:
I feel awkward about going to certain restaurants alone. However, if they have a bar, then I don’t. I’ll happily eat solo while sitting at the bar (and not drinking). Or will happily sit at a 2-top and eat if I have a book.
Finding myself recently single, and hating to cook, this is a timely post.
Marriedin79
on Mar 7th, 2010
@ 8:01 pm:
I would probably take a book or computer with me. However, I’m the kind of person who would go up to another person who is alone and ask them if they would like to join me. What a great way to meet someone new!
Pam Franklin
on Mar 8th, 2010
@ 9:34 am:
There are times I wish I had a badge or sign that said, “There are people who like me in the world. REALLY.” But that would be truly weird, I guess.
Dave Sherman
on Mar 8th, 2010
@ 7:29 pm:
I find a special sense of relaxation when I can go to a restaurant alone before a late night meeting at school. It is a quiet time to myself and to read the sports section of the Chicago Tribune.
That is until six families from school walk into the restaurant. The kids freak out, and they think it is weird to see me there, alone.
Ok, maybe it is weird…