RE: I take Nadi out to dinner at a surprisingly good restaurant I have been ignoring for years

that's a funny story about the place putting you in the back near the doors. I had forgotten that places sometimes have a dress code. I remember getting rejected from one of those such places. I was pretty embarrassed and was unaware they had a dress code. I didn't return.

Do people still pick on Olive Garden like it isn't a nice place or something? I never really understood that because I always thought it was a pretty nice place to eat.

Dude, Italian restaurants are so prevalent over here that it is tough to differentiate one from the next. We have a running joke here that any time a business shuts down that we bet whether the next place will be a spa/massage place, a coffee shop, an Indian, or an Italian restaurant. We'll put small wagers on it but one of us is always correct. I sometimes wonder if this entire area is just one huge hidden camera show and they are just laughing as they install a 40th Indian restaurant into the 6 block area.

I kind of feel things are the same here with Mexican restaurants, but I really like Mexican food, so I don't mind that there are so many. I think part of the problem with this Italian place is that it is in the downtown area next to a fancy hotel where the Dow Chemical, Dupont, and Dow Corning executives stay when they are in town. Midland near where I grew up just has this haughty attitude in general because of "Dow". My wife and I used to love Olive Garden. We don't go as much as we used to just because it's so bad for you, but occasionally we still go and though the food is likely not really very "Italian", I don't think it is bad. I think most people are just trying to be more sophisticated than they are. Though we did have a domestic dispute where a guy shot his wife in the middle of the OG near where we live, so it might kind of be a little white trash these days....