"With a name like yours you couldn't possibly have come from common stock".......
"What are you running away from?"
"where did you get your money from to do this place up?"
"we give you three years.... tops"
"where did you get the money from for that new car?"
"why were you closed?"
"if we want to make up a story about you, we will, and you had better get used to it"
"I will bring your business down..... I will never supply you with anything....."
"you're very friendly..... would you consider having sex with me...."
"this is absolutely SNOT... foul disgusting food......disgraceful, horrible"
"is your chef foreign.... he looks foreign"
" we've heard your chef is gay.... if he is no-one will eat here....we'll make sure of it"
Just some snippets of actual comments that immediately spring to mind between 2005-2008...... we call them the stabilising years......
By this time we were still under the radar of the big, well established restaurants in the area..... but this was changing.... our restaurant was regularly full at weekends.... the compliments were coming thick and fast and we were being noted in national press about how we went about our business...... two ordinary people following a dream and making a go of it, serving really tasty, excellent quality food......
..... but we realised that this was upsetting for some folk who really needed to see us fail.... and they continued to hurtle missiles at us.....
But we enjoyed our work and felt confident that what we had was good.....
...... so we cracked on.....and in late 2008 early 2009 we were informed about our insertion into the Michelin Guide.....
We had a little cry!.....
.... and the crazy questions and comments (like above) slowed down........
We still noticed the eyes cast sideways at us; we still heard some great gossip about us and we still had to go about our job of building the business.....
.......we think we're really boring.....
..... others disagree clearly.... and therefore watch us like we are plotting some crazed scheme in the tiny hamlet we live.....
...... quite frankly it all sounds terribly exciting...... but we really couldn't be bothered....
The Life and Times of an Innkeeper makes one rather tired at the end of a busy week to contemplate anything quite so outrageous.....
sorry to disappoint!
We do look back at these "stabilising years" fondly now and are happier to recall some of the funnier comments; leaving the darker stuff for family and friends' conversations!
I'm wondering whether this isn't a little cathartic......
anyway..... I'm off in search of a steak.... it's my night off.....
TTFN
M
