Pepper? Really?

My Dearest and I went on a date Saturday evening. We didn't really know where to go or what to do. Dinner? Movie? Coffee? Shopping? Run errands? Thankfully, our date night did not include running errands, but that's a post for another week.

We decided to go out for pizza. We very rarely ever go out for pizza, since my Dearest makes the best home-made pizza.

We went to a nearby college town's popular pizza place that we haven't gone to in a long time. After we were seated, ordered our drinks and food, I sprinkled salt on my beverage napkin to prevent my napkin from sticking to my drink. I noticed that there were pepper specks in the salt shaker.

During the meal (good salad and even better pizza!) for some reason, I rotated the salt shaker and noticed that against the shaker glass was a dead bug. I was grossed out, but part of me laughed since my Dearest and I both worked in restaurants and have seen nearly everything.

My Dearest decided to ask for a manager instead of just bringing it to the attention of our server since our server could just brush it off. We knew that if this came to the attention of the manager, every shaker would be scrutinized that evening before the restaurant closed.

The manager took the salt shaker, gazed at it, and declared it to be pepper. My Dearest told him that it has wings and legs.

The manager then told us that they "uh, empty out all of the salt shakers every week on, uh, Thursday." My Dearest was relieved it had only been in the salt since Thursday, as we were there on Saturday. The manager took the shaker into the kitchen.

He returned moments later and confirmed that it was indeed a bug, a barfly, which may have been attracted to the lemons, limes, and other fruit in the nearby bar area. My Dearest asked if they got many of those, and the manager pointed towards the bar and said that they hang around there. My Dearest and I looked at each other as we both knew he meant to say "fruit fly," and he did not mean to say that a person who frequents bars was dead in our salt shaker.

Incidentally, there is a Barfly film.

Just so you know, I don't usually salt my food. Now, I will be especially cautious in restaurants.