(no subject)

Yesterday, i got to have lunch and visit with my brother, and i got to chat with New Director -- and find out useful information! -- at the end of the day. These are very good things. I also urged New Director, as gently as i could, to make calendaring decisions that would make Crisis Circus less likely in January.

With my brother, we went to The Fish Market near Frys. N needed to get a WiFi base station to take back to Beijing. Christine enquired why he was taking something made in China back to China: apparently the Chinese market gets the factory seconds. At the Fish Market, we sat out on the patio, enjoying the beautiful day and letting my brother enjoy the cleaner air. While Christine was away from the table, a staff person came out and was opening the big umbrella, the expansion passing through the air space that Christine would have been occupying. Christine returned while the staff person realized that the umbrella was too far under the eave to open all the way, his arms raised up holding the spread contraption. "Shall we move?" we asked the staff person. "Oh, no," he replied as he signaled for help -- with his eyes? telepathically? -- and someone came out to push the umbrella five inches out of the way while he lifted it the last few inches and pinned it open.

This barely registered with us, really. I'm always attentive to how restaurant staff manage open air comfort, the umbrellas and heaters. It's just my general curiosity, and i would have assumed everyone had an interest in people fiddling with gadgets near them. But as we returned to our chatter, the staff person stood by our table and said something. My spatial reasoning is far better than auditory processing. I immediately understood the problem with the umbrella, but i couldn't quite figure out what he was asking. I made the "It's all fine," standard response to waitstaff and looked at Christine and N (always expecting my dining partners can parse waitstaff better than i). They, too, looked puzzled as the staff person repeated again, "Let me get your meals." We all then made the, "No, we're fine," response and as he left raised our eyebrows at each other in puzzlement.

A short time later our waitress came out and asked if we'd gotten our bill. We shook our heads and she left in puzzlement. She returned again with a more clear communication: the staff member had liked us and had bought our lunch for us. She seemed as puzzled as we were, but didn't press the subject.

So we had a free lunch.

My brother covered the tip.

I remain pleasantly puzzled. I'm not sure how to pass this gift on, but somehow i will.

Meanwhile, i was tickled that i was able to pass on the Lego book to my nephews, so that they could replace the tattered catalog with another colorful Lego themed item.