My Single Mom Life

Christine made a post about kid friendly restaurants and birthday parties for kids, and entitlement jerks.
Basically the dad was mad because the restaurant didn't offer his 3 year old son no free gift or cake at his birthday when they dined out.

I worked in many different restaurants when I was working outside the home, and I can tell you that not a single one ever gave anyone, kid or otherwise, a free gift or free cake, on their birthdays.
The cake was added to the bill, and it was usually just a slice of cake from our dessert menu unless someone called in advance to arrange for a whole cake for the entire group to have.
We would sing if asked, but most people didn't because it is publicly humiliating for both the birthday person and the restaurant staff who are forced to sing it.

That dad is a butthead.
He complained about the crappy meal, the bad drinks, the bad service, and yet he expected the restaurant to shower his 3 year old with a gift and free cake, as well as sing the damn happy song.
______________

But we did do this once, to Sebastian on his birthday, at our fave Chinese buffet here in town.
He was about 10 or 11, and my sis and I felt like embarrassing him.
We pre-arranged with the manager to bring a cake over at the end of our meal, a small Pepperidge Farm one we brought ourselves, and also to sing to him.
The entire staff who work there are Chinese with very heavy accents.

We finished our meal and Sebastian thinks that's it, when the whole wait staff comes over with his cake and like 100 candles on it.
It was like on fire, I thought for sure the smoke alarms in the place were going to go off.
We never asked for the candles, the staff did that on their own, but it made it even more funny to sis and I.
They get to the table, Sebastian is already mortified because of the flaming cake o' death, and they start singing.
"Hoppy birfday to woo, hoppy birfday to woo", all really thick Chinese accents, so thick you could barely understand any of the words to the classic birthday song.
Every patron of the restaurant is staring at our table, people are standing up to see, and how could you not see?
There were 20 wait staff all dressed in matching black pants and white shirts, singing very loudly, and a tiny cake with flames shooting off the candles.
People were laughing, some were singing along, and Mark is nearly pissing himself with laughter.
My sister and I have tears rolling down our cheeks because all we wanted was the cake brought over, and maybe like 2 waiters to sing, NOT the entire staff, and it was just so loud and so bright, we were losing it with laughter.
Sebastian's face was bright red, he was so embarrassed, but it was just awesomely funny.

We've never done that again, but we threaten it every time one of the teens have a birthday.
We always take them out on their day to where ever they want to go, and when we get there, we joke about how we tipped the waitress etc to bring a cake and sing.
Both teens usually get immediately red in the face, and ask like 100 times through the meal if we're kidding or not.
We usually hold out on the joke till the very end, when we finally tell them we were kidding, but watching them get nervous every time a waiter passes by our table is priceless.