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Good looking out, CNN. Thanks for all of the BREAKING NEWS on this one. People in Syria are like, NO, TOTALLY, IT’S CALLED PRIORITIES AND IT IS ALSO CALLED NEWS. And these tips are such great tips. Holy cow. Just so great. ASK QUESTIONS ABOUT THE MENU! A lot of people wouldn’t think to ask questions about the menu, but if you ask questions about the menu you can spend up to a minute and 45 seconds thinking about something other than your crushing loneliness. AND THEN YOU CAN LIVETWEET THAT! Solo dining can be fun or solo dining can be THE MOST fun? Bring a book. Not this one. Sit at the bar. See? Fun! “Hey, this bar is great! What’s a menu?!” Get drunk at the bar. Go home. Forget your book at the restaurant. Fuck the book. Watch CNN. Throw up. Have fun with it. (Via EpicPonyz.)
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If you need to be told this stuff, I think I’m beginning to understand why you’re always eating alone.
5. Keep looking at your watch and saying “I don’t know where they could be! They were supposed to meet me here an hour ago!”
6. Keep telling the waitperson that it’s your birthday, and you’re sure your friends are just playing a joke on you by being so late. After consuming an entire appetizer by yourself, put on a party hat, order a piece of cake, and quietly sing “Happy Birthday” to yourself.
7. Customers and/or the manager buy you a drink and pay for your bill. Repeat once a week at a different restaurant until the bottom falls out.
8. Take your Prozac.
9. pretend to have someone with you. table for 2. ask for 2 ice waters, 2 menus. talk to the empty seat across from you. When the waiter takes your order, pause, and say, “mmmm. That does sound good. I’ll have what she’s having.”
10. Keep referring to the empty chair in front of you as Elijah’s.
11. Quietly masturbate.
I’m calling hogwash on 11. You don’t have to be alone for that!
12. Eat with your hands like there’s nobody watching.
Wear gloves like utensils hurt your hands.
Sing your order to the waitress.
Exclaim “IT’S HEAVEN ON EARTH” after every bite you take.
12. Pretend you’re Bruce Willis in 6th Sense, and the invisible person on the table, it’s actually the one who’s alive.
5.5) Show up in a wedding dress, crying. Make sure to have streaked mascara. Perhaps false eyelashes dangling off one lid? Call everyone a bastard and drink vodka by the glass.
Um, Lilbobbytales, is there something you’d like to share with the group?
Order a dirty martini, take out your copy of “He’s Just Not That Into You” and a highlighter.
Go ahead and loudly masterbate. You’re alone. But remember to wash your hands afterwards. That’s just good table manners.
Eating alone IS the worst. Due to irresistible happy hour pricing and a gap in my schedule between work and school, I go to the same restaurant every week and eat a pizza alone. And it’s the worst. I am able to make it slightly better by making it as uncomfortable for the people working there as I can, without ever explaining WHY I am there at the same time every week, eating alone. Last time I went there, the hostess started to grab two menus, and when I reminded her that I was alone, she put one back and said “Oh, sorry, that’s just a habit, most people come in pairs.” I responded “That’s because only sociopaths eat alone.” She hates me so much now.
I would have thanked her for getting a menu for Harvey.
A whole pizza, oh, Facetaco. At least it isn’t a Failure Pile in a Sadness Bowl.
My rebuttal is two-fold:
1) It is a 9″ pizza for only $3, and since I have class afterwards, I can’t store any leftovers.
2) I am a glutton.
I do the same thing once a week. It’s my favorite part of my week. Pizza and book and beers. Alone.
I don’t like people much.
high-five for anti-social eaters!
there is no better dining experience than sitting solo in a mexican restaurant eating tacos and drinking beer while reading your way through the “song of ice and fire” series. “Salsa is Coming,” amiright?
The mole sauce is dark, and full of terrors.
I would agree but I am never able to successfully hold a book while eating. WHAT ARE YOUR SECRETS? Can I be your padawan?
@Kate Schmidt young padawan, the secret is laying it flat next to your plate, and using your cell-phone to keep those pesky pages in check.
I love the solitary downvote for this comment. “Three dollar pizza?!? DISLIKE!!!!”
Eating alone isn’t that bad. If you have something to read or do while your sitting there, who cares? I don’t find it uncomfortable or embarrassing.
People have the same hang ups about going to the movies alone, and I don’t see why. If no one wants to go see a movie I want to see (most recent example – Blue Valentine) – I just go by myself. I actually saw Inception at the IMAX theater, and was the only one there. A private screening of Inception was great.
I LOVE to go to movies alone. I’ve never understood why people don’t, because you’re not talking during movies anyway. Why do you wanna sit there in silence next to someone you know as opposed to a complete stranger? I don’t get it.
YES. I always tell people this and they look at me like I’m crazy. But if I have someone to hang out with for once, I want to talk and be social with that person. I can sit silently in a dark room staring at a screen by myself every other night of the week.
other perks of going to the movies alone: you might get offered a doobie by some random dude, and then later you can give him a handjob.
You’re welcome, cinebuddy
True, but I’ll always feel a lot more like a weirdo seeing 21 Jump Street alone instead of something like the new Werner Herzog documentary. It’s a hang-up for sure, but fun movie alone = sad lonely, and art/ foreign/ serious drama/ doc alone = personal and intellectual investment!
Oh, I love seeing fun (or so-called fun) movies by myself. It’s much easier than trying to convince someone to see any of the Twilight movies with me.
I saw Shame alone. Just me in a trenchcoat next to a bunch of other people in trenchcoats on a Tuesday afternoon. Totally normal.
That I went back later that night, same trenchcoat, new wig, new glasses… well, that’s for other reasons.
Saw Wild Things in a theater by myself when I was 15. Matinee showing. Every other person there was an old dude also there by himself.
My parents did a terrible job protecting me.
personally, i am a big fan of it. every day at lunch I take a walk and eat alone. it’s often the most peaceful part of my day.
you just have to own it. i find that it’s only as awkward as you make it.
Costco, did you write this? If not, here ya go:
I like the suggestion of using Twitter.
“Just ordered a personal-sized pizza. #imsolonely #whydoesnobodyloveme”
That’s the thing about Twitter. You’re never alone with Twitter! Why can’t you just go out to eat with Twitter?
Yeah but it can seriously backfire because if you’re sitting alone and you kind of think “my friends on twitter will get it” and then you tweet something and then nobody responds then you kind of just think how sad it is that you don’t even have fake twitter friends and then you’re even sadder. i mean, probably this happens. to other people.
#dyingalone
You would think that more people would want to hang out with someone who Tweets while they eat alone. #redflag
Just play it cool. “Two espressos, in separate cups.”
Is that a Limits of Control reference?
“Hi, is this the menu? How many pages are in the menu? What food is available in the menu? Is there a separate wine list or are all the drinks listed inside the menu? Are these the specials? What’s special about them? What’s the soup of the day? What’s the soup of the day on Thursday? How much is all the food in the menu? What’s your twitter username so I can ‘at’ you? Will you sit next to me while I order? Will you smile and laugh as I place my order so it looks like we’re here together? I’m Rob. Will your name be on my bill?”
Yep, one thing I know that waiters LOVE is when there’s a solo diner who is going to take as much time as a regular table but only tip for one actually takes ten times longer because he or she won’t stop asking stupid questions about the menu.
Tips For Solo Dining:
1) Sit at the bar.
That is a good tip … you can probably skip ahead of any line, and you are more likely to get your free refill on soft drinks quicker and more often.
Oh man, this is just like that episode of Veronica’s Closet where Veronica writes a column about going on a date for one but it reads like a masturbation euphemism but women like it because of feminism!
Guys, remember that?
Guys?
The lady in the picture is doing the Voldemort head-tilt.
eat at hooter’s.
And masterbate some more. It’s okay because everyone else is too.
Do not lick wing sauce off of your fingers later. Even if you did wash your hands.
I’ve only been to Hooters once and I didn’t find it sexy at all. Probably shouldn’t blame Hooters for that though, I was six years old.
Or you could just be of the mindset that it’s nobody’s goddamn business why you’re eating alone and just enjoy your meal?
The Cathy live action flick is shaping up nice.
I actually prefer eating alone. No need to make useless small talk, pretend to enjoy a friend’s story or having to wait for someone to be ready to order. I usually know exactly what I want going into a place, so if it’s a sit-down deal (diner, local pub), assuming the service is adequate, I’ll be in and out in 20-30 minutes.
I never eat out at restaurants by myself, but I go to concerts by myself all the time. I’ve gotten to the point where I actually prefer it, because I can see or ditch the opening band if I want to, I can stand wherever I want to, I’m not on anyone else’s schedule. Killing time between bands can be kind of a bummer, and if the place doesn’t have a barmaid, then I feel like I can’t go get another beer without fear of losing my spot, but other than that, it’s not really too bad.
And if you’re self conscious, you can just bring a note pad and act like you’re a rock critic.
Just order in, for pete’s sake!
I think we’re forgetting the most important tip for successful solo dining (I assume we’re talking about dinner here, as solo lunch during the work week is relatively normal): When choosing your dining destination, be sure to go somewhere with the lowest probability of running into someone you know.
There are few things more defeating than having the solace of your solo date ruined by the sheer panic of seeing a friend (or worse, a group of friends) walk in, and knowing that (a) you’ve got to quickly come up with a viable excuse as to why you are there by yourself, and (b) your friends will not believe your excuse, no matter how valid it may seem.
Yes! and you have to have an excuse why you don’t want to join them.
That actually happened to me when I was seeing a movie by myself. On my birthday. I was killing time before I met up with friends for dinner and ran into people from work. And they knew it was my birthday because they had to come sing to me because it was also the birthday of the owner of the company (start-up) and then instead of sitting alone in a theater watching a movie by myself like I wanted to (which I really REALLY enjoyed as it was like the only time I had peace in NYC), I had to sit next to work people and ugh. Then it started raining and my friends had to work and I ate dinner alone on my birthday… which would have been fine but someone else was having a birthday dinner at the restaurant so I drank a few beers and took my food to go… and then the subway got stuck for like 15 minutes and I ate my food alone in the dark and cried.
Maybe this image will cheer you up:
It did!!! Thanks!!
1. Get hungry.
2. Take yourself out to eat.
3. ???
4. Profit.
All of the things on that screen are none of the things that I need to see @ 9:48am.
The only tip you need to make dining alone an awkward experience for several people:
Find someone who is also obviously dining alone [you can tell by one of several ways: a) menu questioning b) Twittering c) book reading d) quiet or loud masturbation e) freaky bangs] and pretend that you think that they are the blind date that you were supposed to meet up with [don't be afraid to go after a member of the same sex, even awkwarder!] Make sure that you refer to them by a screen name. When they correct you, telling you that they are not freeky_deeky69, pretend to be very hurt and question them [What, I'm not good-looking enough for you?; Is it my hips? Damn these hips!; What about all those things you said about us doing it in the bathroom of Ruby Tuesdays?, etc.] Then sit down one seat away from them at the bar and begin asking the bartender questions about the menu before pulling out your copy of the illustrated Kama Sutra.
Solo dining? Anyone?
Harrison Ford is doing it wrong. He is not sitting at the bar or using Twitter, and Helen Hunt back there clearly disapproves.
“He’s doing it all wrong. I might just walk right up to him and tell him, ‘I’m mad about youuuuu’re method of solo dining. You’re doing it wrong. Is that as good as it gets? It’s not what I want, and I’m a woman. Twister.’” -Helen Hunt
Oh, sit at the bar? I usually just stood there, like an idiot.
Sit in front of a mirror.