First – the good. If Exxon Mobile ever has another massive oil spill, Mama Mia’s garlic bread can be commissioned to soak it all up. Because based on the amount of butter these artery-clogging bricks of dough can hold, keeping pelicans safe and our water supply clean should be no trouble at all. \r
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Now, the bad. I went there the other night with my great grandma to celebrate her 91st birthday. This is a woman who has seen two world wars, the great depression, multiple national tragedies and the rise of late 90’s boy bands. Needless to say, she is as hardened as they come. But upon taking her first bite of lasagna, I saw a look in her eyes that I had never saw before. It was part disgust, part confusion and part sheer terror. It was as if she had ingested the very essence of all that is wrong with food. \r
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I told her to stop and that we’d order something else for her. That’s when the service became just as bad as the food. \r
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After essentially having to fire a flare gun off to get our waitress’ attention, I asked her if we could order a different entrée. Now granted, my great grams is an angry German woman who kept yelling things like, “I ordered za lasagna, not a bowl full of grease!!” but still. Our server got extremely annoyed, as if we were preventing her from getting off her shift. Based on her neck tattoo, my guess would be she had a Maury Povich marathon she was missing. \r
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About 40 minutes later, our merry server returns with a circular saw with some toppings scattered about. In other parts of the world, this is called a pizza. It’s one thing to serve a thin crust, but when you could use it to till a corn field, that’s another. Anyway, my grams ate a few pieces with all the zeal of a Fear Factor contestant being forced to consume a bowl full of dead locusts wrapped in bull testicles.\r
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Undeterred, I tried one last thing to salvage the evening. I went to the hostess and asked if there was anything, “special” they could do since we were celebrating my great grandmother’s birthday. Surprisingly, she said yes. I went back and waited with anticipation. What would they do? A group of Italian tenors? A cake in the shape of the leaning tower? No. \r
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They bring a slice of cheesecake with a candle in it.\r
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Unfortunately, that wasn’t the surprise. The real surprise was the long blonde hair resting on top. Fed up with the experience and freaking out, my great grandmother in her thick German accent, started screaming, “I WILL NOT EAT THE HAIR PIE!, I WILL NOT EAT THE HAIR PIE!!” Needless to say, it was highly embarrassing.\r
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We won’t be returning. \r
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