Source.

Call me the king of take out because I’ll be honest, this is one fad that I’m having trouble getting behind. I’m just having a tough time figuring out how this helps. Aren’t people kind of psyched when a restaurant isn’t crowded? Less waiting. More arm room. Cleaner bathroom. Better service. Aren’t those all good things? Sure I’m positive there are people out there who take a look at an empty restaurant and make an unbecoming judgement about said establishment. Personally, I’m okay with those people not eating out anymore. Tell fuckin’ yelp-reviewer-wannabe-food-critic-who’s-dad-grew-up-in-NYC-and-so-“knows what it takes to be a respectable eatery”- Wesley to eat spaghetti-o’s out of a pan for all I care.

Now, we can disagree. You can argue that you’ll miss the hustle and the bustle. You’ll miss the background noise of Franklin Park, the atmosphere of Glady’s, the blast of heat as you walk into Barbancino. But can any of you argue that you’ll be happier with the dolls!? Because we’re not talking arranging the space, putting up fake walls, etc. We’re talking motherfucking mannequins.

If I wanted to eat in my deceased grandmother’s attic (rip grandma I miss you) then I’d eat in my deceased grandmother’s attic. Great grandma, great doll collection, great attic potential, not a huge fan of eating away from the table so that could be a fatal flaw in the plan but I digress. I don’t know the answer to how we bring back small businesses under the current circumstances, but it’s not dressing the places up like a 1960’s replica town about to get vaporized by a nuke.

On the other hand, if the point of this plan is to encourage me to actively avoid restaurants, then it’s working. World’s scary enough without me eating with a bunch of dolls.

Okay okay okay so maybe I’m being too harsh and there’s something to this plan. Best case scenario they do it tastefully. It’s not too weird. Nobody gets busted for checking out a mannequin’s ass. Everybody’s happy. We don’t have to make this weird. Let’s see what the proprietor of this establishment has to say:

"I've always had a thing for mannequins -- they never complain about anything and you can have lots of fun dressing them up," 

Yep, now it’s weird. Now this is becoming less about saving the world from virus and more about the mannequins. Look, I feel for small business owners thinking outside the box right now, but is there any, any, any worse opener in the HISTORY OF THE WORLD than “I’ve always had a thing for mannequins..” To make matters worse, what does he follow up with?

“We’re all craving to gather and see other people right now […] They don’t all necessarily need to be real people.”

Umm. Yep. Yes they do. Yes they do. They do have to be real people. They have to be real people and not dolls because that’s how we avoid becoming psychopaths. This quickly escalated from “check out this guy’s brain” to “please check out this guy’s basement.” Honestly grandma’s attic sounds pretty great right now compared to eating with this guy’s curated collection of obedient doll-people.