The Booth, the Whole Booth, and Nothing But the Booth

Welcome to the Judge John Hodgman Podcast.

I'm Bailiff Jesse Thorne.

This week, the booth, the whole booth, and nothing but the booth.

Sophie is filing suit against her parents, Toby and Thor.

If they're seated at a restaurant table they don't like, Toby and Thor will ask to sit elsewhere.

Sophie thinks that her parents should just deal with the table that they've been given.

Who's right?

Who's wrong?

Only one man can decide.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman enters the courtroom and presents an obscure cultural reference.

Hi, do you have a table for dinner?

Certainly, sir.

How many in your party?

I'm alone.

You're alone.

Follow me, sir.

Here is your table.

Thank you.

Would you care for a cocktail, sir?

Yes, I'd like a toddler and vonnick.

Todka and Vonic.

Yes.

Certainly, sir.

Oh, and Bailiff, would you mind turning out the spotlight on me?

Certainly, sir.

And would you mind swearing them in?

Certainly, sir.

Sophie and Toby and Thor, please rise and raise your right hands.

Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

So help you, God, or whatever?

Yes, I do.

We do.

I do.

Do you swear to abide by Judge John Hodgman's ruling, despite the fact that he eats eats standing up?

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Judge Hodgman, you may proceed.

Sophie and Toby and Thor,

you may be seated for an immediate summary judgment in one of yours' favors.

Can either party name the piece of culture that I referenced as I entered the courtroom, Toby and Thor, two names I will never stop being delighted, I get to say over and over.

You are operating as a team, so you're going to have to come up with one guess because you're being sued by your daughter, Sophie.

Sophie, why don't you go first?

Oh,

I guess home alone, because you said the word alone, and that's the first thing I thought of.

Home Alone is a movie.

We will put that in the guess book.

And now, Toby and Thor, the long wait is over.

What is your guess?

I think it's from like a Steve Martin movie.

Does that sound right?

I really want to say

Mills Diner from Outs, but I'm going to go with your guess.

Which Steve Martin movie, though?

The one with Lily Tomlin?

Yes.

Well, that's all the time we have for Judge John Hawkins this week.

Oh, man.

I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you for a guess now.

I know it's from a movie, but I can't name it, so I'm going to say My Dinner with Andre.

The famous Steve Martin movie, My Dinner with Andre.

All right, put that in the guest book.

We're recording, or I at least am recording this week at WERU 89.9 FM in Orland, Maine, with our Maine-based producer, Joel Mann.

Joel, do you have a guess since you're here?

The jerk.

The jerk starring Steve Martin.

Right.

Well, all guesses are wrong, but pretty close to right.

Thor, I thought you were going to steal this one.

It is from a Steve Martin movie, but you could not remember the name.

It is not from the jerk Joel, which is, I think, Joel's favorite movie.

It is from a 1984 movie called The Lonely Guy.

Overlooked and often forgotten funny Steve Martin movie in which he goes, being a single person, goes into a restaurant and asks for a table for one.

And the minute that they realize that when he says alone, the entire restaurant stops talking and they put a spotlight on him.

It's very funny.

That's so obscure.

Nice guessing, though, Toby and Thor.

You're both adorable parents, but Sophie hates you.

Why, Sophie, do you hate your parents?

I wouldn't know.

I don't hate my parents.

I wouldn't say that.

Sorry, I raised an objection to myself.

I was leading the witness.

Sophie, what brings you to bring your parents to my fake internet court today?

Oh, yes.

Well, I worked in the food service as a hostess for over two years.

And I remember the, I guess, kind of backlash I would get from other servers if a guest would ask to sit at a different table and it would kind of mess up rotation and kind of mess up the fairness I guess of how people would get seated or the tables that servers would get and so whenever I go out with my parents and they get a table that they're not too favorable about it's kind of like well some tables are not you don't want to sit at but like someone's got to sit there and I don't want to ruin a server's rotation and I don't want to ruin their chance of getting money or tips or anything like that.

So I find it a little inconsiderate, I guess.

So that's why I hate my parents.

understood, and now you're suing them for irreconcilable differences, and you want to be an emancipated minor, but you're not a minor, right?

How old are you?

I'm 21.

Well done.

And do you dine out with Toby and Thor a lot?

A good amount.

Yeah, I'm pretty close to home, so I'm about 30 minutes, so I'll sometimes just chill back.

And guess what?

They're paying, right?

You know it.

Free, yeah.

I rule in favor of Sophie.

Where do you go out to dinner when you want to soak mom and dad for a free meal?

You can name the places.

There's Moco Mandy, which is a really cool restaurant by our house.

Where is that?

Where do you live?

Oh, right, that's right.

We live in Sterling, Virginia.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, so there's Moco Mandy.

There's

what's that one place with the cheese?

The cheese and honey.

Capnos.

Kapnos Taverna, which is really good.

What is the name of it?

Kapnos Taverna.

Okay.

All in Sterling, Virginia.

Sterling, Virginia, I believe, is Patton Oswalt's hometown.

Yes, it is.

Yes, it is.

Yeah, he went to the middle school that I work at, actually.

Seneca Ridge Middle School.

Yes.

Are you a teacher?

I taught there for nine years.

I'm actually the school librarian now.

Oh, fantastic, Toby.

That's amazing.

But you didn't teach Patton Oswald, I presume.

No, no, he was there long before I was.

Right.

Right, right, right, right, right.

But his name rings out in the hallways of dear old Sterling Middle.

Well, my co-librarian, who retired last year, she was actually the librarian while he was there.

Really?

She worked there for 40 years, yeah.

But in any case, all right, enough about Pat and Oswald.

Toby and Thor,

how do you respond to this charge that you guys are changing the tables too much when you go out to Bladedihoo Taverna or wherever you go?

I think it doesn't happen very, very often.

Maybe one out of 17 times.

That's a very specific statistic, Thor.

It's too specific to be true.

We were actually talking about the other day, we were trying to figure out the last time we asked to change seats, and I think it was about four months ago.

And

we made a reservation at a restaurant, and we went there, and the table was right in front of the door, and it was kind of cold.

And this was just with Sophie and Thor and myself.

It was a little cold so I asked if we could move it to a different table and the woman looked around because there was all these other empty tables and she said those are all reserved and I said right and I made a reservation as well and she just looked at me and she said no

and then I said okay and we sat the table she sat us at so we don't make a big deal if they say no we just ask.

That's true.

And sometimes they say yes and they'll move us somewhere else and sometimes they say no.

Let the record show that Thor quietly said under his breath, that's true.

In the most cool and supportive way.

I actually also heard him say, not like my lying daughter.

Oh, my.

Well, I appreciate, Toby, that you somehow have turned this podcast into your own passive-aggressive Yelp review for this restaurant that wouldn't seat you or you wanted to be seated.

Do you want to name the offending restaurant?

Because I actually think that that's pretty crummy that you weren't moved.

No, I mean,

I know I don't want to name the restaurant, but I mean, that's the way things are.

And I understand how

sometimes they have things.

So excuse me, this is my courtroom.

I'm ordering you to name the restaurant.

Well, sadly, I don't remember the name of it.

Sophie, do you remember the name of the restaurant where they wouldn't reseat your parents?

No, I don't remember it.

I don't remember a thing.

Whoa.

It wasn't supposed to be aggressive.

Sophie, are you okay?

Yeah, I was.

No.

I don't even remember a thing.

I find in favor of Sophie's new hacky sack character.

I told you, I just turned 21, you know?

Yeah, what do you?

You got a Bud Tallboy on my podcast over there?

I don't even remember a thing.

Oh man, I remember it wasn't just my parents, it was me, my parents, and my ultimate team.

Sophie, what would be the most egregious example of Toby and Thor, who have already demonstrated themselves to be pretty terrible, rude monsters?

The way they speak so quietly and politely, and your dad so quietly supports your mom with a little that's true.

What would be the most egregious example one that might actually cause me to rule against them

oh

no well

um

i can't think of a specific example i just know that it's just

oh goodness it's just like thank you for your intense preparation for this podcast

no like i like it's just they all they all blend together i guess you ever hear a saying where'd you go to college uh george mason university george mason university Did you ever take a course there and you hear the famous saying, specificity is the soul of narrative?

No.

No.

I was hoping that they might be teaching that at George Mason University, but it is true.

Specific examples would help you in this case if you want to take a minute to think back and maybe pick one out where you really were really like, this is not right, mom and dad.

I guess there was this one time, it was for my high school graduation, I guess.

Now, this is, by the way, this is a beautiful story already.

Now,

my faith is restored.

All right, let's go, Sophie.

Thank you.

It was supposed to be the greatest night of my life, high school graduation, until Toby and Thor ruined it.

Exactly, yes.

But anyways, so

we got to the restaurant that we had made a reservation at, and I guess over the phone,

neither party, my mom or the hostess themselves, kind of specified if it was going to be inside or outside.

Oh, I object.

Nope.

And so

I'll let Sophie continue.

Okay.

So, um,

so I guess no one really specified inside or outside.

And we got there, and they had set us up outside, and um,

and so it was very just kind of like, no, we don't want to sit outside, we want inside.

And they were kind of like, oh, I'm sorry, like, we don't really have the table for that.

And we didn't, you know, there was no note saying a preference.

And

we kind of got the table, like,

there was a lot of persuasion to the so there were just kind of these smaller circle tables just kind of pushed together to make one l long line for twelve people and I was very very mortified by that so I think that's the most specific example that has been ingrained in my mind for the last time so in this case in this case this is your high school graduation so the the party of twelve was you

are you saying myself I am a party of twelve or are you saying

that that you're this was not just

you and Toby and Thor.

I love saying Toby and Thor.

Yeah.

It wasn't just you and Toby and Thor, it was you and Toby and Thor and some family members and stuff.

Yeah, it was my parents, my brother, Eric, and then a lot of extended family and stuff.

So, Toby, you objected.

Tell me your version of the high school graduation fiasco.

When I made the reservation, I said indoors because I dislike sitting outdoors.

So I would be very specific about that because I really dislike sitting outdoors.

You claim that you told the hostess when you made

the reservations manager when you made the reservation that you wanted a table indoors.

Yes.

I'm very sure I did because, again, if you didn't hear earlier, I dislike sitting outdoors.

No, no, you don't even like sitting near a door.

Never mind.

Outdoors.

That's a good point, Gan.

You're right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay, so you requested a table inside.

Yes.

I mean, I mean, this is fascinating just because I find these kinds of encounters at restaurants, these misunderstandings and how they are resolved incredibly nerve-wracking.

And yet, when they are resolved skillfully, I find it extremely satisfying.

And in this case, I'm not even sure how it was resolved.

You arrived at the restaurant, the table was set up for outside.

You said, excuse me,

you made an error.

I want to sit inside.

They said, we don't have the tables to do that.

And then what ended up happening?

I believe I just told them they had to find a space for us

to Sophie's

mortification.

And did they?

They did.

It was four years ago, and I don't really remember much more than that.

I just remember we ate inside.

I'm sorry.

I thought I was dealing with a human being similar to me, where you would remember every detail of a small, uncomfortable encounter and relive it over and over and over again for years.

That's what I was saying.

If it's more of a personal encounter, I do that.

But if it's something larger like this, I think I let it go.

Right.

Well, I mean, I think Sophie's point is that you don't really think very much about what effect you might be having on the restaurant and its processes.

I mean, there obviously was an error made here.

They should have seated you

according to your request.

But you could appreciate that it would be very disruptive to suddenly have to move a table for 12 inside.

No, yeah, I appreciate that, and I was appreciative that they moved the tables.

And I believe when we had our meal and we tipped them, we tipped them well.

What would be well by your standards?

25%.

All right.

You know what, Toby?

You're doing pretty good.

Well, thank you.

Let's take a quick recess and hear about this week's sponsor.

When we come back, more justice.

You're listening to Judge John Hodgman.

I'm Bailiff Jesse Thorne.

Of course, the Judge John Hodgman podcast, always brought to you by you, the members of maximumfun.org.

Thanks to everybody who's gone to maximumfun.org slash join.

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Let them know Jesse and John sent you.

Court is back in session.

Sophie wants her parents to stop asking to change tables at restaurants.

We've heard her mom's side.

Let's get back into the courtroom to hear what Sophie's dad, Thor, has to say.

Now, Thor,

your name is Thor?

Yes, it is.

Great, I'll move on.

Sophie,

has that been a good thing for you in your life, Thor, or a challenging thing?

My name?

Yeah.

You may know it's also the name of a Norse god and famous Avenger.

Oh, yes.

Oh, yes.

Did that not come up in your life at all?

I mean I know he's no Iron Man.

Oh.

And I admit it would be weirder if your name was Captain America.

Do you have a lot of problems, for example, with members of the Avengers accidentally tagging you in their tweets?

No, that hasn't happened.

I do think a lot of people expect someone who is six foot two and with long hair, so that's a little bit of a disappointment for them.

You are a little bit mild-mannered for for a Thor, I gotta say.

That's true.

Thank you.

Thor, do you have any insight as to what's going on here, why Sophie is upset with you?

Do you think that she's out of line?

Do you think that she might have a point?

For a moment, believe that you're not just there to support Toby.

And tell me your true mind.

Well, I think I am

in sync with Toby, regardless, but I think children in general don't like seeing their parents make a big deal of anything or complain about either poor service or

overcooked food or poor seating arrangements.

So I can understand her not enjoying seeing that.

And I myself don't like to complain.

It takes a lot out of me to do that.

But I think if something isn't to your satisfaction, you should say something.

And I know it's uncomfortable for Sophie and her brother, but

I think we're doing the right thing.

Well, you are named for the famous Norse god Thor the uncomplaining.

So, in that sense, you are aligned with your namesake.

Sophie, do your parents exhibit any other bad behavior or what you would term bad behavior in a restaurant?

Complaining about food, sending things back, being rude to the wait staff?

Yes, there's one thing I remember.

So, we, my entire family, we went to Vermont one time.

I think this was like a few years ago, but we went to Vermont.

We went to a very nice restaurant called Farmhouse that's on Burlington,

like downtown Burlington.

And

we went there and we got fries for the table.

And my mom started eating them and then she kind of paused for a minute and then she ate another one.

She stopped and then she asked the server to come by.

And the server was like, oh, like, is everything okay and everything?

And

my mom was just like, are these salted?

And she was just like, she's like, oh, no, they should be.

My mom was like, yeah, they don't taste salted.

Like, you should tell the chef.

And then the server was like, oh, okay, would you like us to bring you another one?

My mom went, no, just tell this chef.

And I thought that was really mortifying because it's kind of like, if you're going to complain about your food, I just send it back.

Like, you don't have to, the passive, like, just tell your chef.

Like, I was, so that was, that's one, that's another thing I didn't like.

I loved your imitation.

Oh, yes, go ahead, please.

I was going to say,

Sophie also doesn't like it if I try to tell jokes with the waiter or the waitress.

No, I love that.

I love that.

I just, it's,

I guess, a form of performance anxiety.

When my father makes a joke, I feel like I need to

do something.

And so I get a lot of performance anxiety from it.

But no, I love the dad jokes.

You mean when your dad makes dad jokes to the wait staff, what performance anxiety do you feel?

What do you feel you have to do?

Laugh?

I'm not sure if you're a son.

Yeah, I feel like I need to join in on the banter or something.

I don't know.

She laughs extra hard.

Yeah, well, I mean, if you feel like you have to laugh at a joke that you maybe don't find particularly funny, but have to do it in order to create a social situation that isn't strange, imagine how the server feels who just wants to do his or her job and doesn't need to be harassed by a pun from you for.

I was a server for two months and then the anxiety was too much, so I quit.

Is that the entirety of your restaurant experience is two months?

No, no, I was a hostess for over two years, and then I thought I could be a server, and then it was too much.

No, it's too much, I would imagine.

It's hard.

Yeah, it really is.

You don't want to play mind games on them.

You know what I mean?

Because they're balancing a lot.

You don't want to just be saying like, oh yeah, well these french fries are not salted, but I don't want you to do anything about it.

I'm going to indicate that there's a problem.

No, I overruled.

I'm going to finish my terrible imitation of you, Toby.

I'm going to suggest that there is a problem, but I'm going to rob you of the accepted way to solve the problem, thus leaving you in a state of perpetual, I don't know what's going to happen.

Now you may object.

Okay, I object.

Go on.

Okay.

Sustained, make your objection.

Have you not watched the three episodes of Law and Order that I watched in order to prepare for being a fake judge?

I don't know how this works at all.

So why don't you tell me the story about the French fries in Burlington, Vermont?

No, it pretty much went the way she said, except I didn't quite have that tone that she

relayed.

Yes, she did.

Her imitation of you was terrible.

Yeah.

But I figured I had the fries.

I put salt on them already, so why send them back?

I was just letting the chef know for the next time, so he didn't send out unsalted fries for the next person.

Joel Mann, you're a Mainer up here in Maine.

Have you been to Vermont?

Yes, Burlington.

Burlington, Vermont?

And the fries there, salty or not salty?

They're perfect.

Perfect.

Salty.

This must have been an anomaly.

Were you at the table with us, Joel?

I don't know.

That was right next door.

That was one table over.

Well, you probably had fries after the waitress went back to the chef and said, you need to start putting salt on the fries.

Since you had solved the problem already, why did you tell the wait staff member that they ought to go have a word with the chef?

So the other customers would be able to

have

salt on their fries.

They would not go through the horror of having to salt their own fries.

The horror.

Sophie, do other family members,

I understand you have a brother, is that correct?

Yes, I do, yeah.

Do you have any other siblings?

No, it's just my older brother.

And does he take the same issue with Toby and

Thor?

Yeah, he's on my side.

He and I both believe that when going out,

it's more of

the people you're with at the restaurant versus like where you're sitting.

So he does, my brother Eric, he does agree with me.

No, he does agree with you, and I agree with you too.

But

if

the place that you're you're sitting is uncomfortable or if the people you're sitting around are so loud that you can't enjoy the people you're with,

then there's no harm in asking to be moved.

But we've never asked to be moved once we've been seated.

We only ask

when a hostess brings us to a table.

And if they say no, we say okay.

To be, I mean, the issue, Sophie,

of sitting around patrons who are loud is an issue given the fact that your delightful parents are barely audible.

And it also has an issue.

I can't stand hearing people chew.

Oh, maybe a restaurant is the wrong choice for you.

Well, no, if there's a table of people who

are not chewers, I don't want to sit next to them.

I know that you already have a successful career in school librarianing, but could I suggest a secondary career in angry angry podcast email letter writing?

Yeah,

we got a lot of letters regarding mouth sounds.

All podcasts do.

I can understand that.

Do you have, what is it, mesophonia?

Is that what it is, Jesse Thorne?

That sounds right.

Mesophonia.

It's select sound sensitivity syndrome, also known as sound rage.

Yes.

Do you have sound rage, Toby?

I I do, actually.

So

you're telling me that when you go out to dinner with Thor, you occasionally hulk out?

Depends who's at the next table over, I guess.

Sophie, have you ever seen Toby transform into a raging monster because of the sound of someone chewing?

I think that's part of her secret, is that she's always angry.

You know what?

I really respect that joke a lot, but I am going to ask you to answer the question as posed.

No, as you said, my parents are very mild-mannered, so when they are upset, to other people it might seem like they slightly raise their voice about something.

But to me,

because I can tell the difference, I wouldn't call it hulking out, but I mean, I have noticed, but that's really it.

Toby, have you ever told patrons sitting next to you to chew less loudly or differently?

No, I'll just cover my ear with my finger, like, so I don't hear them.

In a discreet way, I trust.

She'll also stare at them sometimes.

Like a little side-eye.

Yeah, I'll look over at them every once in a while, hoping they'll get the hints, but I never say anything, no.

No, okay.

Just a little finger in the ear and a side-eye glance.

Yeah, yeah.

That falls within the realm of acceptable behavior in a bad chewing situation.

So, you know, Sophie, I need to rely on your expertise as someone who was a hostess in a restaurant and worked as a server for two months before the dad jokes got to you.

This story that your mom tells about showing up at a restaurant full of empty tables, being seated near the door and asking if she could sit in a different table and the host or hostess or whatever saying,

no, those are all reserved.

That makes no sense to me.

It's not as though literally a single table is reserved, unless it's a rare thing where it's a large party or it's a VIP or a friend of the chef or whatever.

It's not the case that when someone makes a reservation, they reserve that a specific table is set aside for them.

Am I wrong, Sophie?

Yeah, no, you're right.

That was kind of ridiculous because there were a bunch of, because ours was a four top and there was a bunch of other four tops that can be rearranged.

So that was kind of unnecessary.

So I'm looking for evidence of any particularly egregious behavior

on Toby and Thor's part.

Because as far as I can tell, the crux is you are occasionally embarrassed by your parents

while you are getting free food off of them.

Our job is complete.

And that is basically a universal condition.

I think it's not the act of them asking because,

I mean, they're very polite when they do ask and stuff and understanding if they say no.

It's It's more of, um, I think my issue, not I guess issue, is more of like um it's inconsiderate to the serving staff themselves, just because uh some there have been instances where someone has asked to move tables and we've moved them and we end up triple seating a server and one server hasn't gotten a single table in the past hour.

So it's it's more of for me, it's kind of more inconsiderate to the servers or the serving staff to switch tables because we're robbing a certain server of the chance of like getting money.

Right.

Do you understand what your daughter is talking about, Toby?

Do you accept that Sophie has something to teach you, the parents, in this case?

Oh, I do, yes.

She makes a good point.

But I'm paying the bills, so.

I think I've heard everything I need to in order to make my verdict.

But before I go, so that I understand, Sophie, if I were to find in your favor, what would you have me rule?

If they want a specific table, then I would like for them to say it to the hostess before we are seated so the hostess can make certain arrangements to make sure everything is fair.

And if they forget to ask it at the host stand and do it later, then

to just deal with it and sit there.

Yes, but it's often the case that you won't know what table you're being seated at until you're shown it.

Yeah, I think if you at least say

if you don't want to sit next to the door, if you go up and be like, hi, table for whatever, if you went mine, could we sit a little further from the door just so they can

like, if it, if certain situations like that, I see what you're saying.

Uh, that seems perfectly reasonable, uh, Toby and Thor.

First of all, pipe down, Thor.

You're getting a little bit too much.

A little bit too much Thor here.

Oh, my.

Well, I was going to say

that

we would want her to

accept us for who we are.

Save Save the best requests for last, huh?

Well, I've requested a tiny table for one in a quiet corner of my chambers.

I'm going to go sit there and order up some hot apps and consider my verdict.

I'll be back in a moment with my decision.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

Sophie, how do you feel about your case?

I was feeling really good when I came in, but now I'm not.

What's changed?

I think hearing it from someone else, it kind of makes me feel like an inconsiderate daughter, especially since I'm getting a free meal.

When you say someone else, you mean someone besides your parents?

Is in someone where the frequency of their voice actually registers in your ears?

Yes, I believe so, yes.

Because previously you had spoken to your parents about it, and they had replied,

It's like you were there.

Toby, how are you feeling?

I'm feeling pretty confident.

I think

we had some good examples, and I think what we're asking is pretty reasonable.

Thor, how about you?

How do you feel?

Well,

I know never to be too confident on this show.

That is a good point.

Well, we'll see what Judge John Hodgman has to say about all of this when we come back in just a second.

You know, we've been doing my brother, my brother, me for 15 years.

And

maybe you stopped listening for a while.

Maybe you never listened.

And you're probably assuming three white guys talking for 15 years, I know where this has ended up.

But no, no, you would be wrong.

We're as shocked as you are that we have not fallen into some sort of horrific scandal or just turned into a big crypto thing.

Yeah, you don't even really know how crypto works.

The only NFTs I'm into are naughty, funny things, which is what we talk about on My Brother, My Brother, and Me.

We serve it up every Monday for you if you're listening.

And if not, we just leave it out back and goes rotten.

So check it out on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right, we're over 70 episodes into our show.

Let's learn everything.

So let's do a quick progress check.

Have we learned about quantum physics?

Yes, episode 59.

We haven't learned about the history of gossip yet, have we?

Yes, we have.

Same episode, actually.

Have we talked to Tom Scott about his love of roller coasters?

Episode 64.

So how close are we to learning everything?

Bad news.

We still haven't learned everything yet.

Oh, we're ruined.

No, no, no, it's good news as well.

There is still a lot to learn.

Woo!

I'm Dr.

Ella Hubber.

I'm regular Tom Long.

I'm Caroline Roper, and on Let's Learn Everything, we learn about science and a bit of everything else too.

And although we haven't learned everything yet, I've got a pretty good feeling about this next episode.

Join us every other Thursday on Maximum Fun.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman re-enters the courtroom.

First of all, I will say that you are all adorable.

I would love to have dinner with you anytime, in part because you're all charming and I think very thoughtful, and also because it would allow me to get some private thinking done because you're so quiet.

It would be like eating alone

for the benefit of your company, but I would also get to sort of think what I'm going to do the next day.

No.

There are a couple of things that I need to say.

Overall, I don't think that Toby and Thor have done anything egregiously wrong.

None of the examples that either they provided or Sophie, you provided, which it was your job to provide, egregious behavior that must be stopped through fake judicial intervention.

None of that was demonstrated, I'm afraid.

What

you were describing, Sophie, and what Toby described for herself are the sorts of things that happen in the catastrophic controlled chaos that is a restaurant every day.

And as far as I can tell,

people do ask to sit in different tables.

I have asked the same.

People do occasionally note that their French fries are undersalted.

And I think saying as much to the waiter or waitress in a polite way, just to give them a heads up, that maybe they got a bad batch of fries going out, that's actually a considerate thing to do, so long as it's clearly phrased as

help rather than a passive-aggressive complaint.

And I think the situation where

Toby and Thor asked to be moved away from the door and were told that all of these empty four tops were not available because they were specifically reserved, is garbage.

That should not have happened.

That is anti-hospitality, and it is wrong.

And I am ordering,

no matter what my verdict is, I am ordering all parties to rack their brains and remember what that name of that restaurant was

so that I can say something about it online.

Or just write the notes to the restaurant.

I mean, that's the sort of thing where the server might be inexperienced or the host in this case might be new and not really understand how the process works and might be confronted with a question that seems a little confusing and daunting and kind of not knowing what the answer is and making up an answer just to have an answer because they don't know how to deal with the question.

So that is a case where, if not to complain, I think it is worth a note to the restaurant.

If you want to do it privately, that's fine, because public shaming, there's plenty of that going on these days.

But a private note to the restaurant just to say, this happened and it was not a cool feeling, and I don't understand why it happened.

Can you explain to me why it happened?

Because I kind of would like to go to the restaurant and I don't have a good feeling about the restaurant.

A responsible restaurant would, at all times, attempt to

make you feel comfortable.

And part of that is acknowledging that quiet older couples sometimes don't want to sit next to the door.

That's fair.

So, Sophie, you really didn't make your case at all in any way.

Darn it.

That said,

Sophie brings to bear experience and expertise

about the secret behind-the-scenes language of restaurants that not a lot of people know about and should.

And if it was not made clear by Sophie, I will attempt to make it clear now to Toby and Thor.

Restaurants tend to be, and I've not worked as a waiter, but I've heard this enough from people who've worked in the industry.

The tables, and you can stop me where I'm wrong on this, okay, Sophie, but I just want to make sure that everyone within the sound of my voice understands this.

That the restaurants have their tables are basically broken down into zones, and certain wait staff cover certain zones.

Is that more or less correct, Sophie?

Yes.

Right.

So the job of the host or hostess

is, in part, obviously, to make the customer happy and to get them seated promptly, et cetera, et cetera, but also to distribute customers evenly among the zones so that every member of the wait staff has an opportunity to make a certain amount of money over the course of the shift.

Is that more or less right, Sophie?

Yes.

Right.

So if

you, as a customer, say, I don't want to sit here,

I want to sit over there,

you might be asking to move from a zone where the person doing the service has only one customer to a zone where the person doing the service already has three customers.

And that will cause disruption among the serving staff and disorder and imbalance, and you're wrecking their system.

Yes.

And you know what?

That's fine.

As a customer, Unfortunately, sorry, people who work in wait staff,

restaurants do need to serve the customers customers before the wait staff.

And I think that the employees understand that, that it happens.

But it is a move with

cargo attached to it.

You are going to be disrupting something that you're not going to be able to see.

And if it's a good restaurant, you won't see it at all.

But it is a disruption.

It is taking money from one server and giving it to another server and ruining the balance that the host is trying to maintain.

And the host may bear the brunt of that decision.

So, other parents who are not as charming as you,

Hulk, Toby, and Thor, let's just say, like people from the darker DC universe who go into a restaurant and make these requests willy-nilly and are jerks about it and doing it all the time, they're causing a disruption.

And that disruption will be visited upon the host.

alternate universe, dark DC universe parents who are doing this in Sophie's restaurant, Sophie might get yelled at by those servers when she's trapped into making that decision.

That's the secret language behind the scenes of a restaurant.

Now, you know, this podcast is on the record as being very highly encouraging of remembering at all times that the people who are serving you in a restaurant are human beings who are trying to make ends meet, that we work within an imperfect system where wait staff are largely paid out of tips rather than a living wage, and that that's messed up, which means you should tip generously as much and as often as you can.

There's very, very, very rarely, if ever, a reason to withhold a tip or to skimp on a tip.

Life is too short for that kind of thing.

And also to not trap your server into laughing at your jokes.

Or

the server is a captive audience.

Believe me, as a weird dad, long before I was actually a dad, I...

I always jumped at the opportunity to make a joke to the captive audience of the server.

Only later in life did I realize that I was performing a kind of psychological torture that needs to stop.

The tip does not rely on the laughter.

They don't.

Yeah, but they don't know that, Toby.

They don't know that.

May I present to the court one of my favorite dad jokes?

Is it a Thor joke?

It's a Thor joke.

It's a Thor dad joke, yes.

Okay.

It better be Norse-themed.

Oh,

set me up for failure already.

So it's,

there is a dessert called afogada.

Is that what it is?

Yeah.

Avogadro.

Avogado.

Yeah, avogado, yes.

You know what avocado is, right?

No.

Oh, okay.

It's a scoop of vanilla ice cream with a espresso shot on top of it.

Sounds delightful.

Yeah.

You should look into it.

Get it going in Castine.

You could become the avogado king of Castine.

Maine.

Okay, go ahead.

Avogado, go.

So my dad wanted that, and the server came over.

You know, they did the whole, like, how is everything?

Are you guys interested in dessert?

My dad said, yes, I'd like some.

And then they said, oh, sir, yes, of course.

Like, what would you like?

And he was looking at the menu and and he's like, oh, I'd like some.

I forgot to, like, I forgot, but I've forgotten.

Yeah, I get it.

Guess what?

This is my podcast.

I don't have to laugh.

If I were serving you, I would have to go, ha ha ha ha ha, very funny, sir.

And that's precisely why I'm ruling against Thor and Toby and ruling in favor of Sophie.

Because even though Sophie presented no case whatsoever,

her request for a ruling was reasonable.

And this is not a ruling that is designed to connote shame to be heaped upon Toby and Thor.

Toby and Thor are doing mostly nothing wrong.

It is only a ruling that I think is,

in Kant's categorical imperative sense, is the rule that we should all follow, which is if you have a specific table that you want to sit at or a spec of table, it is in your interests and the interests of the restaurants and everyone's interests that you let that be known clearly as early as possible in the process.

And

a good restaurant will seek to accommodate you as much as it can and won't lie to you if it can't accommodate you.

And if it does lie to you about not being able to accommodate you, and all those four tops are being currently occupied by ghosts who can't be disturbed or whatever it is.

If they don't accommodate you, that can guide your future choices about whether or not you want to dine there.

But given that Sophie has been able to articulate some of the secret language that goes on behind the scenes at restaurants, it is imperative upon you, Toby and Thor,

and not that you are thoughtless people in general, but be mindful of the fact that the request you might make might be affecting their system and to give them as much possible advance warning of your seating preference in order to avoid the kind of conflict that might show up behind the scenes and be visited upon the poor host who is only trying to make you happy if they're doing their job correctly.

If you make your specific requests known as early as possible, that is a reasonable

thing to do.

And

also to not make special requests very often if you can help it.

I don't think you guys do that, but in general, like it's a thing when you ask a restaurant to move tables, and there should be a reason for it, a real good one.

So,

you've done nothing wrong, Toby and Thor, you're both delightful.

I really look forward to seeing how you get us out of this Infinity War pickle we're in next year.

But on this technicality, I find in favor of Sophie.

Sophie, I find in your favor, but out of karmic balance, I order you to take your mom and dad out to dinner.

Find a way.

This is the sound of a gavel.

Judge John Hodgman rules that is all.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

Sophie, how do you feel in your moment of triumph?

I'm really surprised because, to be honest, towards the end of the podcast, I was just like, oh, okay, I kind of see my parents' point of view now.

And I was like, oh, yeah, I kind of agree with them now.

Yeah, I mean, that's just the maturation process.

I guess so.

Like, eventually, you'll be 37 and you'll be looking at your hands and thinking, oh, I am my parents.

I can only hope.

Toby and Thor, how are you feeling?

Well, it's a little bit of a surprise, but I stand by my jokes.

No jokes, Thor.

No jokes.

Toby, how do you feel?

feel?

I'm a little shocked.

I mean, I don't think it's always possible to

suss out the restaurant and look in seats because you never know when there's going to be a loud chew at a table next to you.

But we'll do our best.

Well, all three of you, thanks for joining us on the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

That's another Judge John Hodgman case in the books.

Before we get to our swift justice, we want to thank Ian Brody for naming this week's episode The Booth, The Whole Booth, and Nothing But the Booth.

If you'd like to name a future episode like Judge John Hodgman on Facebook, we regularly put out our calls for name submissions there.

You can follow us on Twitter at Jesse Thorne and at Hodgman.

Hashtag your JudgeJohn Hodgman tweets, hashtag JJ H.

O.

And check out the Max Fun subreddit to discuss this episode.

This week's episode was recorded by Adam Rooner at Clean Cut Studios in Washington, D.C., our nation's capital, and by Joel Mann at WERU Radio in Orland, Maine.

Our producer on the boards here in Los Angeles is Jennifer Marmer.

Now, Swift Justice, your small dispute answered with quick judgment.

Tony says, I think grown men should always wear shirts in public.

My brother thinks it's okay for men to walk around topless and claims I'm a prude.

Who's right?

I'm going to throw this one to Joel Mann here at WERU in Maine.

Joel?

Please keep your shirt.

He's shirtless right now.

Keep your shirt on, fellas.

Yeah, do as I say, not as I do, says Joel Mann, who always mans the knobs and dials over here, completely shirtless and shoeless.

No,

he's wearing a nice button-down shirt.

Wear a shirt, you guys.

You can take your shirt off

at the beach or at the lake or in the sauna.

Tony, you're not a prude.

You're just a member of civilization.

Congratulations.

That's about it for this week's episode.

Submit your cases at maximumfund.org slash JJ Ho or email Hodgman at maximumfund.org.

No case is too big or too small.

We look at all of them: maximumfund.org slash JJHO or Hodgman at maximumfund.org.

We'll see you next time on the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

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