I've been attending the meetings out of curiosity; I hear the restaurant's music sometimes, but I'm far enough away that it doesn't actually bother me. I rarely go out at night, so I hadn't encountered the "nuisance" aspects of it, which include lots of loitering drunk people, mysterious box trucks with no license plates blocking bike lanes while unloading, and bouncers swearing and trying to stop and frisk people walking past the restaurant.

("Why does a restaurant have bouncers?" you ask. Well, one of the complaints was "He's operating a nightclub but just using a restaurant license to do it.")

Anyway, I was intrigued to attend the latest video call because last time ONE DERANGED PERSON got on the line and spent ten minutes telling everyone else that the place is fine and if it isn't nobody cares and if you do you're a narc. I wanted to see if they were gonna come back to rant again and they did, but they got stymied by the moderator, who insisted that if you wanted to talk you had to "raise your hand" in the video call and they clearly couldn't figure out how to do that.

But then. After the airing of grievances and the owner's lawyer apologizing for no-showing at the last meeting, the alderman's spokesperson got on the line. FIFTY MINUTES into a one hour meeting, she said, "Before you inform the owner about the steps he needs to take to prevent this from becoming a legal issue, the Alderman has a question. He understands that the building landlord has served the owner with an eviction notice for the business, and we'd like to know if you and your client are aware of this?"

Every visible face on the video call did a jaw drop. It was awesome. I was muted and I still went "OooooohOOOOOOHHHHH!"

So yeah turns out the owner is "a little behind on the rent" but is confident he can bounce back, and then the moderator gave him a list of twenty things he needed to do (or not do) to fix the non-rent-related problems, two of which were "Stop doing unlicensed bottle service" and "No sparklers indoors".

I knew the one deranged person defending the restaurant's activities had to be known to the owner and they are.

Paid service with no ads: Well, if they're not funding it with ad revenue, they need to charge us something.

Paid service with ads: Well that's bullshit.

@endigolikesarson In the original, for the running joke regarding Valant and doors, Apollo calls Valant a muggle

While in the remaster, he says this which is way funnier even without the baggage

"The hat is customizable," he said, struggling with the velcro patch on the front. "If I need it, I have an ICE one too. I pick based off the business i walk into."

"Customizable is an important hat descriptor," I said. "what can I get you?"

"You wouldn't believe how offended people get these days," he said. "And I'm supposed to do something about it if you're offended? You chose to be offended!"

"We all have hundreds of thousands of decisions everyday," I said. I thickened my accent. "That's what my stepdad always said. But I can make one easier - we have a delicious Ethiopian roast available."

"Like if I told you you have a bull ring," he said, "because bulls have rings in their noses. Is that offensive?"

I laughed. "I've heard that before."

"It's a joke, but people get offended. Maybe you're offended."

I looked at him. I smiled. "You aren't trying to offend me though, right?"

Of course he was. I was being friendly and the friendlier I was, the faster he switched topics. He was saying anything inflammatory he could think of to see if I'd take the bait. After about 20 minutes of my redirecting and deescalating, he settled into a more normal interaction. He took up too much of my time showing me a product I'd feigned mild interest in to get him to stop talking about getting accused of inappropriate behavior at work. When we finally disengaged, he spent 10 minutes trying to catch my eye again. When he failed, he left.

There's this new breed of customer who insists on trying to incite political conversation through their clothing and, when that doesnt work, their snide little comments. If I owned my own business, maybe I would have given the guy the fight he wanted. But I work for a corporation and I love paying my bills so I deescalated.