​Yesterday I received a press release about LongHorn Steakhouse opening in Hialeah. Normally, a restaurant opening in Miami is cause for a Short Order writeup and, sometimes, a first look at the eatery and its food. But this press release made some of our writers chuckle.

After all, this wasn't a new Design District restaurant offering foie gras beignets, fine swine, and tiny grilled octopi with little tentacles beckoning to be chomped on. This was a place that sold $20 steaks from cows with no pedigrees. A (shudder) chain restaurant.
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​Long before cable television and the thousands of programming choices that we now have, television was born in the late 1920s. Its primary function was (and it may surprise some) and still is to serve as a means of communication during emergencies. That's why we have those pesky emergency drills. Naturally, broadcasting companies needed to recoup some money -- and commercials came into our lives.

Commercials are mostly useful place markers that tell us it's time to grab a handful of chips or soda.  Between cable and DVR's many of us don't even have to suffer through them anymore. But sometimes...sometimes...commercials are more than just a mindless 30 seconds we have to live through. Those commercials usually debut during the Super Bowl.

Maybe it's got something to do with the $3.5 million dollars it takes to buy a spot during the game (which, according to Nielsen, was watched by a record-breaking 111.3 million people), but Super Bowl commercials are usually watchable. They're clever and filled with special effects or star-power. This year's crop of ads featured Matthew Broderick reprising his role of Ferris Bueller for Honda, Jerry Seinfeld trading the Soup Nazi for an Acura...and a rescue dog named Weego!
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​Yesterday, First Lady Michelle Obama ate a cafeteria lunch at a local D.C. area elementary school as a sign of support (and photo op) to mark the new USDA nutritional standards for public school lunches.

These rules, which must be implemented by July, 2012, aren't perfect (French fries are still considered a vegetable -- though they should be baked), but they're a start.

Some of the new regulations are just plain common sense. To sum it up - feed kids less processed crap and more fiber rich whole foods that have less sugar, sodium, and fat. Some key parts of the new rule include the following:
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​I remember going out on a date from hell about nine years ago. The guy, who's name I couldn't remember if a gun was pressed to my head, took me out to a very nice dinner at One If By Land, Two If By Sea in New York...and proceeded to talk on his cell phone the entire time. I'm talking several full-blown conversations. The company might have sucked, but at least I got a good meal as a consolation prize.

At the time, I considered it pretty damn rude to answer a phone during dinner. That was, alas, before social networking sites began practically begging you to share every bite and morsel of food with the entire world. Now, Tweeting about your dinner (OMG! The rolls are warm!) is the norm -- but is it still rude?

I admit I'm guilty of the same behavior. Sometimes when I'm out to dinner with my husband he has to remind me that it's just the two of us at the table -- Suri the iPhone is not invited to dine with us. That gentle prompting is all I need to put away the phone and gaze lovingly at my husband -- and my branzino.

Hence: phone stacking. In case you've been trapped under a large rock, phone stacking is the game invented by Lil-B on Tumblr. Originally called "Don't Be a D**k During Meals With Friends", the game is simple (and meant as both a teaching lesson and a punishment):
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​A Massachusetts woman recently had a cupcake confiscated by a Transportation Security Administration agent at Las Vegas-McCarran International Airport. The offending baked good was packaged in a jar, which immediately made it a potential weapon of mass destruction (and we're not even talking about what it can do to your thighs).

The story reads a little like a bad sit-com. According to ABC News, Rebecca Hains was traveling with her husband and toddler when they were stopped because of the cake-in-a-jar. Hains told ABC: "We also had a small pile of hummus sandwiches with creamy fillings, which made it through, but the cupcake with its frosting was apparently a terrorist threat... I just don't know what world he was living in."

TSA spokesman James Fotenos told ABC News affiliate WCVB: "In general, cakes and pies are allowed in carry-on luggage." He also said the TSA was looking into why the cupcake was confiscated.

I have to admit that TSA and customs officials are completely inconsistent in their efforts to flush out terror-inducing treats. In the past year alone, here are some items I've passed through various checkpoints:
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​​The U.S. Department of Labor Office of Public Affairs is suing Whole Foods in an attempt to "reinstate a former employee with full back wages and benefits after the company allegedly fired the worker for voicing and reporting workplace health concerns regarding a raw sewage spillage at its store in Miami Beach".

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, Miami Division, according to a release issued by the U.S. Department of Labor.

Miami New Times covered the story back in 2009, when said whistleblower (we called her Janet) told us how "brown water -- along with chunks of toilet paper -- leaked onto the floor of the cheese and prepared foods sections". Janet took pictures of the mess and sent them to Whole Foods regional offices along with a complaint. In exchange for her dilligence, she was fired by executive marketing coordinator Russ Benblatt for reporting "misleading" information.

That same executive marketing coordinator sent an email to Short Order recently, stating:
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​There's been recent buzz over a buffet restaurant in the UK that tacked on a three pound fee because a woman's baby stroller was taking up space. According to the London Evening Standard, another woman at the same restaurant was also charged a fee for her six month old.

Media backlash was so bad that the restaurant issued a formal apology on its website stating that "COSMO is a very family-friendly restaurant and we pride ourselves on making children and parents feel valued - which is why we serve thousands of families every single week. The Minimum Charge Policy is intended for toddlers who eat but not as much as a child. It was and never will be intended as a charge for Prams or for babies."

Remember the story of McDain's restaurant in Pennsylvania?  They made the Wall Street Journal when they decided to instate a six years and older age limit for children at their restaurant.

The other day one of my friends posed a question on Facebook. Apparently she had watched as a woman changed her baby's diaper in a restaurant booth. Is this normal behavior, she pondered?  Most said it was disgusting...but a few parents said "what are ya gonna do?"


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