My mother and I went to a restaurant today, just as we do most Tuesdays. It was a restaurant she had been to, but I had not. She told me that she really liked the place. My first impression, once we entered, was that the place looked very neat, modern and clean.

Then we ordered our food. A while later, the waiter brought the wrong dish. I said, “This is not what I ordered – I ordered _____.” The waiter said, “Maybe you will like this.” I thought, “Oh my goodness. This guy can’t be for real.” Then I said, “I want what I ordered, the _______.”

No “Sorry,” no nothing. It was as though I was wrong, and I had ordered exactly what was brought to me. What had my sister, the restaurant critic, always told me? “At a restaurant, the customer is always right.” But not today.

In retrospect, I can imagine some things I could have said to the waiter, or even better, to the manager, following that weird episode:

1. “Excuse me, I ordered _______, and the waiter brought me________. When I told him what I had ordered, he did not even say, ‘I’m sorry.’ It made me feel as if I were wrong.”

2. “I can’t believe this. I ordered ______, and the waiter brought __________, and when I told him it was not what I ordered, he said, ‘Maybe you will like this.’ It made me feel like it was the food for the person who had left just minutes earlier, on his way out of the restaurant, said to the kitchen workers, ‘You can cancel my order.’ Well, I didn’t want to eat his order. I wanted MY order.”

(3) “I’m never coming to this restaurant again. Your waiter not only brought me the wrong dish, but when I said I wanted what I had ordered, he tried to push that wrong food on me, and he didn’t even have the manners to say ‘Sorry.’”

You know what? I feel a lot better now.

Mr. Ebsen may be contacted at Robertebsen@hotmail.com