Fast Food Hell---a rant from a guy who doesn't rant as a rule!

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I am not a snob when it comes to food as I will eat anywhere, anything, at any time but I prefer full service restaurants followed by fast casual restaurants and, finally, fast food places. I don’t remember the last time I was in a McDonald’s, Burger King or Wendy’s but, usually, after going to a Friday afternoon movie I will go to either Arby’s or Subway for a few reasons: 1) Thursdays are usually my ‘free’ day where I don’t watch my food intake 2) and I usually go to a ‘better’ place and spend too much money 3) I make up for that by going ‘light’ on Friday spending and eating plus 4) I have better control of my calorie intake and 5) invariably I have coupons for both places. It has been years since I have been in a Wendy’s but last week I got a page full of coupons in the Wednesday ‘junk’ mail and after going to the Dollar Tree and Winn Dixie I asked Rion where he wanted to get a bite and he picked Wendy’s from among the coupons I had so we went to the one on East Sunrise Boulevard. There were 6 people behind the counter and I swear all were trainees! It really looked like none of them knew what they were doing. It wasn’t busy, with maybe 4 of us in ‘line’, and it took at least 25 minutes to give our order, pay for it and finally pick it up. I would hate to see how long it would be take if they were busy! It is also one of the few fast/fast casual places that you help yourself to as much soda and/or lemonade you want but maybe it is a way for them to cut down on costs though at $2.39 they make a pretty good profit on a glass of lemonade which is what I had. With the ‘free’ fries and the lemonade the check came to $5.88. It just isn’t a place to go if you are in a hurry! Oh yes, they must also be saving money on condiments as the ketchup ‘kettle’ was empty! I know it is hot and humid in August in South Florida which might explain the assistant manager’s attitude at the Arby’s, also on East Sunrise Boulevard, the past few Fridays I have been there. Having been in the restaurant business for 38 years I don’t ever recall being rude to a customer. I know it is one of the most tense service positions to have dealing with customers not to mention one of the most poorly paid positions in the work place. I have been going to this Arby’s I believe for 15 years and have never had a problem until recently and each time with the attitude of this assistant manager. She is recently new in this store and I remember the first time her serving me and observing her a few other times waiting on people, that I mentioned to Allen that I wondered if she ever smiled? There was no welcome, no ‘can I help you’ and no ‘thank you’ when she was paid but, okay, she isn’t getting paid enough to sing and dance for me. This past Friday, without going into all of it, being the only customer on line with one other customer sitting and eating, she never acknowledged me waiting for her to take my order and when she finally came over to the counter and asked me what I wanted I put the coupon on the counter, pushing it towards her. Granted I could have said what I wanted but it was exactly on the coupon and she was off with “You have no right to treat me like a dog” and “I will call the police if you take a picture of me as it is illegal”—okay I do take a lot of pictures but very seldom of people I don’t know nor did I have my phone in position to take one. Maybe one or more of her crew didn’t show, maybe she was having a rough day, maybe she was having money problems, I really don’t know what the problem was but I finally asked “Do you not want to wait on me? Take my order? Do you want me to leave?” At that point she entered my order, took my money and, I swear, must have told the woman making the sandwich to make it extra sloppy to the point that the filling, especially the sauce, would spill all over. Okay compared to the mass shootings over this past week this all is really nothing to moan and groan about but it seems meanness is seeping into all our lives from people we deal with. Smiles, showing courtesy to others, being civil to each other seems like a thing of the past. Am I wrong?