The most Awkard moment during dinner

i just wanted to hear some stories from fellow cruisers in regards to dinner.

What was the most awkward moment while dining amongst your fellow cruisers ? :p

I can't think of one and we have 18 Princess cruises for 278 days

One cruise on HAL - with an officer at the table. A mother and daughter duo came to the table and ate their salad with their FINGERS !!!!

Then a single man was on the other side of me and he took grissle out of his mouth and put it on the TABLE !!!

My hubby, Dad and I just looked at each other with a look right out of a cartoon - picture eyes popping out and back in again.

Non of the three of them came back, and then we enjoyed a great gruise with one of the engineers and his wife!

WOW.................

Aw!! I was gonna tell the gristle story. :eek:

One cruise on HAL - with an officer at the table. A mother and daughter duo came to the table and ate their salad with their FINGERS !!!!

 

Then a single man was on the other side of me and he took grissle out of his mouth and put it on the TABLE !!!

My hubby, Dad and I just looked at each other with a look right out of a cartoon - picture eyes popping out and back in again.

 

Non of the three of them came back, and then we enjoyed a great gruise with one of the engineers and his wife!

 

WOW.................

Just curious - what is the proper way to remove grizzle from ones mouth and where is the acceptable place to put it??

Use your napkin to remove it discreetly from your mouth. I usually place it on the edge of my plate.

It has to be to the left of the setting.

This is easy because it was SO awkward that I've never forgotten it. We did 5 cruises out of Galveston Jan-Mar 2005, and had AD dining on the Princess cruises. We were seated at a table with 6 conservative, Christian Texans, who expounded through the entire dinner about their delight with the recent presidential election outcome. Now, we all know that politics and religion should NEVER be dinner topics, particularly when you don't know your tablemates well, let alone not at all. Apparantly this group never got the memo or were so arrogant as to not care (that's my theory). I kept my mouth shut through the entire meal as DH tried desperately to change the topic and kept squeezing my knee under the table as warning. Finally, just as dessert was being served, something especially egregious was said, and I could keep silent no longer. I said, "I'm sorry, but I simply could not disagree with you more", and the other six must then have realized that they didn't have an ally in me. We finished dessert in silence and they left the table before coffee was served. Thank God for Anytime Dining (see, I'm religious too!)

AWKWARD!! Yes, I was the awkward one. On formal night I spilled a full glass of red wine on the white silk dress that the lady seated next to me was wearing. :eek:

Sure hated to lose that glass of wine. :rolleyes:

It really did happen, and I apologized profusely. The lady was so nice about it, would not even let me pay for a cleaning. The couple continued to dine with us the rest of the cruise and never appeared upset. :)

lollll... that sounds pretty funny when you think about it.. something to remember the cruise by.

We were on a cruise a few years ago and one of the women was not there for dinner one night. Her husband said she was in the cabin as she JUST came down with the norovirus. The next night she came back for dinner coughing when she should have still been in quarantine. Needless to say, we contacted the Maitre'D after dinner and switched to Anytime!

CHECK PLEASE!

Lindy

AWKWARD!! Yes, I was the awkward one. On formal night I spilled a full glass of red wine on the white silk dress that the lady seated next to me was wearing. :eek:

 

Sure hated to lose that glass of wine. :rolleyes:

 

It really did happen, and I apologized profusely. The lady was so nice about it, would not even let me pay for a cleaning. The couple continued to dine with us the rest of the cruise and never appeared upset. :)

i have to admit i'd feel pretty bad .....was it uncomfortable with the dinners to follow ?

Then a single man was on the other side of me and he took grissle out of his mouth and put it on the TABLE !!!

Must have been some gristly bear steak on an Alaskan cruise.:cool:

It has to be to the left of the setting.

To the left or right of the salad fork???

To the left or right of the salad fork???

Underneath.

maybe he was saving for later.. lol

Never had an "awkward" moment, but we have had some absolutely hilarious tablemates....we enjoyed them alot!

It has to be to the left of the setting.

You are too funny Colo! :D

On our last cruise, we had breakfast in the DR and shared the table with 5 other people. We were enjoying their company until the discussion turned to Theology/Religion. DH and I had no interest in this conversation, and felt very excluded from it.

Breakfast was pretty much over, but we were trying to be polite and not interrupt our tablemates in the middle of talking, so we ended up sitting there for like 40 minutes waiting for even a tiny gap in the conversation (they were all talking on top of each other, and barely getting a breath in). Eventually the wife of one of the men noticed us sitting there and asked "so, what do you have planned for the day"? And that was our out... finally!

In retrospect, maybe we should have been "rude" and either got up and walked away without a proper "goodbye", or cut someone off in the middle of a sentence to dismiss ourselves. But we were both bred better than that so it's hard to do!

On our last cruise, we had breakfast in the DR and shared the table with 5 other people. We were enjoying their company until the discussion turned to Theology/Religion. DH and I had no interest in this conversation, and felt very excluded from it.

 

Breakfast was pretty much over, but we were trying to be polite and not interrupt our tablemates in the middle of talking, so we ended up sitting there for like 40 minutes waiting for even a tiny gap in the conversation (they were all talking on top of each other, and barely getting a breath in). Eventually the wife of one of the men noticed us sitting there and asked "so, what do you have planned for the day"? And that was our out... finally!

 

In retrospect, maybe we should have been "rude" and either got up and walked away without a proper "goodbye", or cut someone off in the middle of a sentence to dismiss ourselves. But we were both bred better than that so it's hard to do!

why they chose to discuss religion on a cruise dinner is beyond me.

leave politics and religion out. it always sparks heated debate and frankly... some people dont care ..

One cruise on HAL - with an officer at the table. A mother and daughter duo came to the table and ate their salad with their FINGERS !!!!

 

Then a single man was on the other side of me and he took grissle out of his mouth and put it on the TABLE !!!

 

My hubby, Dad and I just looked at each other with a look right out of a cartoon - picture eyes popping out and back in again.

 

Non of the three of them came back, and then we enjoyed a great gruise with one of the engineers and his wife!

 

WOW.................

I swear every word is true....the salad episode was really funny - i saw one of them pick up a cherry tomato and pop it in her mouth - OK no big deal, next it was the slice of cucumber...getting a little strange. But when they started in on the lettuce , it was just too funny and gross all at the same time.

I'm sure the grissle incident has happened a lot but it was so gross just laying there on the tablecloth.

I will admit that it is a troublesome problem....just what does one do with a mouthful of food you can't chew? I guess I usually try and put it in my napkin and kind of wad it up in my lap.....gross? yeah but at least no one has to look at it!:p

I swear every word is true....the salad episode was really funny - i saw one of them pick up a cherry tomato and pop it in her mouth - OK no big deal, next it was the slice of cucumber...getting a little strange. But when they started in on the lettuce , it was just too funny and gross all at the same time.

 

I'm sure the grissle incident has happened a lot but it was so gross just laying there on the tablecloth.

 

I will admit that it is a troublesome problem....just what does one do with a mouthful of food you can't chew? I guess I usually try and put it in my napkin and kind of wad it up in my lap.....gross? yeah but at least no one has to look at it!:p

I was always taught that you take it out of your mouth the same way you put it in there. If you put the meat in your mouth with a fork, then you discreetly deposit it back onto the fork, and then place it back on the plate. You'd do the fork thing with items like pits (from olives, cherries, etc) as well.

If you have paper napkins, spitting it out into that could be a good choice (since you can just use a fresh napkin for hand/face wiping). But with cloth napkins it seems much more awkward... how do you get rid of the unwanted item in your napkin? Or do you later wipe your hands/face and place the napkin back in your lap with the bit of food still stuck inside?

The proper way to remove food from your mouth is the way it went in. If it went in on a fork, then it's supposed to go out on a fork, with the exception of fish bones. See Miss Manners.

My Great Aunt (1902-2001, yes) was a very polite and formal woman well versed in manners. I'd almost venture to say manners were her hobby and she knew the most obscure rules of politeness one can imagine.:)

I was taught that any unedible food removed from my mouth should exit by the same means it was introduced.

Gristle should very discreetly be returned to the side of your plate using your fork. It won't look much different on your plate than had you trimmed it from the steak in the first place.

I could only imagine her horror if she had witnessed the man seated at our table spit his olive pits into his glass of water.:eek:

My most embarrassing moment...after sitting with our new tablemates on the first night of an RCI cruise, they asked us if we cruised a lot. I proudly said, "Oh yes! We cruise quite a bit." They asked how many times we had been on cruises and (at that time) I said 18 so far. He smugly said, "Oh. We've been on 42 with RCI alone." That shut me up real quick! :o I've learned my lesson since then. ;)