The time has come, Kansas City

Okay, that does it.

Kansas City, we owe it to ourselves to get at least good service at restaurants.

Don't we?

How long does this have to go on?

How long must we be exposed to people who have no idea how to wait on tables at restaurants yet they have chosen that as their vocation? (Did these people not have mothers?).

I just got back from a restaurant in Westport (it shall go unnamed), had a $10 ticket for stew and a drink yet the waitperson thought they should keep the entire $5 difference between the check and what I gave them to pay for it.

And with restaurants in town, it's always something.

I remember being at a restaurant not that long ago, on the Plaza, of all places, and the waitstaff didn't bring me anything near a bread plate.

And it was supposed to be a good restaurant. A "sophisticated" one.

In this town, it's all pretense.

I'll never forget the first time I flew into San Diego and went to dinner with my parents at a restaurant in that city.

There, in San Diego, they know the waiter or waitress is the face of the restaurant. There, they train them, before they even get near a customer, on not just how to wait on a customer--what a thought, huh?--but on the history of the place as well as what's on the menu.

Revolutionary, eh?

So the time has come, Kansas City.

Someone--someone--needs to open a school for waitstaff in this burg.

We're big enough, as a city. Millions is spent each year on dining out.

We shouldn't have to only go to the extremely expensive restaurants in this town in order to get at least good service with our meals.

It's gone on far too long.

Someone?

Anyone?

Bo Ling's Restaurant on the Plaza

I had dinner on the Plaza last week, at Bo Ling's, if you can't tell, and I have to say, it was nice to be back. 

Bo Ling's is like that.  It really is like an old friend--you've known each other for years and they rarely, if ever, let you down.

And I write about it for that reason--because it's like seeing an old friend again--but for a couple more, too.

Like running into that "old friend" again, you find they've made themselves better, fortunately.  They've improved in some ways, it seems.

Besides still offering good, dependable Chinese (actually Chinese-American) food, it seems like their internal marketing is much better.

One example of that is the fact that there is also now a more pure, true, separate Chinese menu that they also offer.  They may have had this for some time but I haven't been there in quite a while so it was new to me and it's a great addition for those who either know and like more authentic Chinese food or for the more adventurous.

The second thing I noticed about their internal marketing of their restaurant is that now they offer a very cool, self-promoting, coloful plastic bag with handles to take your inevitable carry-out with you as you go.  It's just a nice, smart, simple touch and it seems to make a big difference, in its own small way.

But here's where you notice the "old friend" still has a couple things--literally, two--they could change and so, improve with.

That "old friend" has some of the harshest, brightest lighting in any restaurant of any town I know.  Do these people not know what a dimmer switch is and what it can do?  Holy cow.  If the light were any in the dining room, we'd have gotten sun burns.  If someone could and would just tell them to soften that lighting, it would do wonders for the atmosphere and ambiance in the restaurant.  Really.

Lastly--thankfully, I could only see two thing the "old friend" needed--there's that green on the walls.  Whew.  That is bad.  It really does look like the color of very fresh pea soup.  It's far too harsh.

They either need to paint the walls a softer, more appealing shade of green--and quickly--or get rheostats for the lighting in the main dining room.  Softer lighting hides an assortment of faults.