When you have a baby in your house, things tend to be a lot louder than they were before the baby was born. Many toys for little kids can be very loud and especially annoying as time goes by, and babies themselves can be very loud, screaming and crying at all hours of the day and night, sometimes for no apparent reason.
What’s a mom to do when she has a baby who sometimes likes to scream? (That’s every baby, isn’t it?) Should the mom refrain from eating at restaurants with her child out of fear that her child might scream and someone in the restaurant might be annoyed? That seems to be what one older couple thinks.
Or, should the mom choose her dining establishment wisely, perhaps picking a place that is known for being rather loud anyway and is geared for families and groups? That’s what Katie Leach did.
Leach shared on Facebook that she chose to eat dinner with her 10-month-old son at Texas Roadhouse. According to Travis Doster, a spokesman for Texas Roadhouse, the restaurant was “voted one of the loudest restaurants by Consumer Reports. We are proud to be loud. If you want to hear clinking wine glasses and clinking forks, then this probably isn’t the place for you.” Sounds like the perfect place to eat with a baby.
During dinner, Leach’s baby did scream from time to time. She explained on Facebook that “He had been screaming off and on just with everybody as they were singing happy birthday. And when one of the waitresses would come up, he’d scream to tell them hi. We all tried quieting him down, which a majority of the time he did, but he also was so excited to be around all the commotion. He was not yelling to be mean, or because he was mad, it was purely from excitement and being happy.”
A happily screaming baby boy was apparently not what the diners sitting behind Leach wanted to hear at Texas Roadhouse. Before they left, they slammed a note down on Leach’s table. She was shocked at what the note said.
The two diners who had been sitting behind Leacher were, according to her, probably in their 50s or 60s. The note they left on the table read, “Thank you for ruining our dinner with your screaming kid. Sincerely, the table behind you.”
Texas Roadhouse had no problem with the baby’s joyful screams. In fact, after seeing the note, the restaurant comped the entire table’s meals and invited them to come back again.
Do you think the diners who left the note were out of line, or do you think the baby screaming at the table was unacceptable?