Adults Only, Please

While I was sitting in Chili's last night (before I got sick), I came to a decision. I will lay it on you and then I'll explain.

I don't believe that you should sit in the bar area of a restaurant if you have children that are under, say, ten years old.

Here's the thing. AC and I have had a long few weeks, and we had an especially long day on Friday. After a baseball game on Saturday, company over for dinner, and then another game on Sunday afternoon, we were ready for some down time. We decided to go out to dinner while the kids were at Awana. We chose Chili's; it's close, they have a bar, and we knew that they would have Sunday Night Football on.

When we sat down, it was still reasonably empty; nice and relaxing. However, by the time we ordered our food, it was full...of people with little kids!!! Seriously, there were kids everywhere.

-Three tables over, a man and a woman came in with so many kids that they took up two tables.
-Two tables over there was a couple with a baby who was young enough to still be eating baby food; if the mom wasn't quick enough shoveling it in, he would fuss and make noise.
-The table next to us was a couple with two kids; the daughter kept turning around to try to entertain that baby, which just made him louder, and the son spent the the whole time complaining... "when is our food going to be here","they didn't put salt and pepper on the corn", "no dad, I don't want you to do it..."
-The table behind AC had a lady with two boys; they had their crayons and coloring stuff and were mostly quiet, but one kept hacking and sounded like he was going to bring up a lung any minute.

There was one table that had two guys and their sons, and the boys were probably eleven or twelve...they were fine. They ate, chatted, and watched the game. No problem!

Now I don't expect it to be quiet in the bar, but if I'm sitting in a bar, enjoying a drink and watching a game, I want to be greeted with fun bar noise. Loud fans, cheering, things like that. NOT the sounds of a bunch of little kids. If I wanted to be surrounded with kids and coughs and whines and giggling and tantrums and squeals, I'd sit in the restaurant.

Please, people, be more courteous to those who just want to drink a cold one and watch the game!