Time travelers; table for two

Let us take our minds to a place that we were once familiar with but probably don’t recall much about. Our childhood. I’m sure I can speak for most of us undergrads because odds are we are around the same age (give or take a few years). Can any one of you remember when there was a smoking section in restaurants or when they used to manually record a waiting list on paper and call your name when it was time to be seated? It all must seem so ancient to many of is when in fact it wasn’t too long ago that there things were actually protocol for the food industry. How about when the only form of entertainment for us kids was a blue, yellow, green, and red crayon (purple, black, and brown if you were lucky enough) and a dual sided sheet of paper with several activities on it. As time passes, we must learn to advance and grow in the technology industry with relation to the service industry. Each advancement seems promising and rewarding but with every pro, there is a con. 

I work in the industry so I am able to give my personal observation and opinion of the use of technology in a restaurant. As I said before, there will be pros and cons. For example, these days you can make online reservations and can create a well organized reservation and waiting list. (Although my restaurant does not utilize the portable buzzers like Panera Bread, those are pretty neat too,  in my opinion). With creating these systems in restaurants, we are able to seat guests more timely and it actually seems like we have our sh*t together (on the busiest of nights). Another thing I have noticed with regards to technology in the industry is the customers use to keep their kids quiet. !@$*)!@ WHAT? If i even knew what a tablet was as a youngin’ i’m pretty sure my parents would not even allow me to take it past the front door, much less out to dinner. I have had the honor of observing the absolute ridiculousness of children playing on their iPads at dinner. The only thing I can gather from this is that in order for the parents to keep their children from whining and creating an embarrassing scene while waiting for their meals is to shove a 7” interactive screen in their faces. Which brings me to my next point on the new devices that restaurant chains like Chilis and Applebees have adopted. Nowadays when you are seated you are (freely and against your will) given a tablet device which allows you to do multiple things such as play games, order foods, pay your bill, and call your waiter/waitress. I am really trying not to knock these great inventions but I wonder if it is taking away from the whole dining experience. We are wasting so many of our 99 hard earned american cents (in most places that is the standard price for unlimited games) to distract us from the social experience of dining away from home. I ask myself “what more could they think of to put in our faces” but if I speak too soon they will probably come up with something new before I could finish my sentence. 

I promise you I am not a scrooge against technology seeing as how i own a smart phone, smart tv, smart car (not the actual smart car but a car that is smart), and I have donated plenty of my 99 american cents to the empty stomach distraction foundation. I’m simply making obvious observations on how technology has grown and how it is shaping our social lives.