One of the drawbacks of my long-running TBTropes series is that the tropes have begun to repeat themselves. This was part of the design, though. I wanted to create a way to describe Tom Batiuk’s bizarre writing choices, so we can identify each when it appears. But this has made it harder to write new blog posts, because I’ve already explored the Batiukian technique de la semaine.
Like I said in the comments, I didn’t write about Buck Rub Week (October 13) or Crankshaft Lawyers Up Against Glitter Week (October 20), because I did almost two years ago. Almost everything in If You Make Sure You’re Connected, The Writing’s On The Wall applies perfectly to these two weeks of Funky Crankershaft.
I called this a Comedy Disconnect: “trying to be funny rather than communicate ideas, (sacrificing) reality in a desperate attempt to get laughs at all costs.” Which Batiuk does constantly. Despite routinely describing his life’s work in terms like “45 years in, ‘Funky Winkerbean’ creator isn’t going for funny.” He’s going for funny, but he certainly isn’t hitting it.
And we’ve got another reuse of an old technique this week: reusing a joke when it no longer makes any sense.
In Fight The Power, I wrote about how Batiuk continues to rely on Dinkle jokes long after the world changed in ways that rendered them problematic. Maybe high schoolers and high schools in the 1970s and 1980s had to silently tolerate Dinkle’s behavior. But senior citizens and churches in the 2020s do not. The environment changed, and the times changed. Act I Dinkle worked as a comically exaggerated depiction of megalomaniacal high school band directors. Now he just looks like a pushy, abusive lawsuit magnet.
Imagine a shot-for-shot remake of a classic teen/young adult comedy like Dazed And Confused or Fast Times At Ridgemont High or Revenge Of The Nerds set in the current decade. But it doesn’t update any of the outrageous details of life circa 1976-1983, or introduce anything that’s changed since then. This trope already has a name: Harsher In Hindsight. But since Batiuk loves to do this to his own work, I’ll give it its own name:
Not Funny Anymore: When a once-functional joke no longer works because the context around it has changed.
Harry Dinkle is Not Funny Anymore. Ed Crankshaft is Not Funny Anymore. And the Pizza Box Monster is Not Funny Anymore.
This is Halloween week. In Act III, PBM showing up at Halloween and terrorizing Montoni’s was one of the few fun things that happened in Funky Winkerbean. But the new reality is that PBM is now Pete and Mindy’s business partner. This reframes the underlying dynamic of “PBM is scary, because nobody knows who he really is.”
On Tuesday, Pete tells Mindy “you need to stop obsessing over who the Pizza Box Monster is.” No, Pete, you need to start obsessing over it. Because you’ve apparently entered into a business relationship with this person, and talked your fiancée into joining! Putting your trust, your financial future, and by extension your marriage, into the hands of an unknown person who wears a wacky costume, is skull-collapsingly stupid.
Never mind that this situation isn’t even possible anymore. Know Your Customer laws require any financial institution to thoroughly identify all parties early in the proceedings. And any party in the partnership would have the right to view any contracts they’ve signed. Mystery solved.
But it gets worse. Does Pete simply not care who the Pizza Box Monster is? Or does he know who it is, but isn’t telling Mindy? Because that’s a great way to destroy your spouse’s trust in you.
In a downstream joke that’s also Not Funny Anymore, Pete tells Mindy she’s beginning to sound like her grandfather Ed Crankshaft. The only reasonable response to that is an immediate trip to a neurologist. A young woman should not be talking like a 106-year-old dementia patient. Especially if Batiuk is going to act like Pete and Mindy are a generation younger than they actually are. Even more so when it overlaps with Dumbass Has A Point. Mindy is right to want to know this person’s identity, even if she doesn’t know why.
The scariest thing Pizza Box Monster could do this week is send Pete and Mindy a picture of himself in Russia with their life savings. Or even worse: their merged comic book collection. I guess they’d have to actually get married first, though.
Son of Stuck Funky 
I’m sorry, but someone has to say it:WHERE’S ZANZIBAR, TALKING MURDER MONKEY?!
I want the Pizza Box Monster to be Zanzibar. But then Zanzibar takes off his gorilla mask and is revealed to be Mopey Pete.
IYKYK.
Today’s Crankfuckery
Day 3 of Annual Pizza Box Monster Storyline
(sound of crickets)
What really irritates me is that he responds to being confronted with common sense the way he did when he was nine and his mom said covers always lie: he either whines about being bullied or makes a smug comment like “Its called writing” that makes a boast of not wanting to understand the problem.
10/30: We come to a stupid cliffhanger that could have been avoided if an idiot nine year old boy weren’t calling the shots. It’s as moronic for the reject from Masked Singer to hide his identity as it is for Pete to idiotically fear learning it.
A stupid cliffhanger that wasn’t set up at all. Really, Tom Batiuk, we’re going to do this NOW?
It should have been done earlier.
What would be a good Funky video game?
MORTAN COMBAT: Morton Winkerbean wanders around the nursing home. Unlock the scene where he says “We had Jello today!” He then poops his pants.
LES-MAN: Wakka wakka wakka, as he sits in place and watches his wife die. Gain extra guilt points for him not doin’ shit!
CHIEN PARKS-MAN: Can your withering gaze and endless sarcasm defeat your foes? (Yes, because I wrote it)
LUST FOR LISA: Lisa dies.
LES INVADERS: Wave after wave of big fat balding smug heads attack WestEarthville! Lisa dies.
WIN AN OSCAR GAME! You win an Oscar every turn! Also, Lisa dies.
DINKLELYMPICS: You have to win an important football game! It rains out every turn.
I GUESS IT’S BEEN A YEAR NOW! You play this every day, and once a year, the strip’s joke is funny. HARD TO WIN!
THE PHANTOM EMPIRE: YOU’RE JUST BECKY: You’re just Becky, that whiny preteen with the greasy blond hair. For some reason, it controls your mind. IT plays YOU now! YOU PLAY FOREVER, UNTIL THEY FIND YOUR ROTTING CORPSE WHEN THE NEIGHBORS COMPLAIN “BOY, IT SMELLS FUNKY UP THERE!”
GRAND PRIX CRANKSHAFT: You run kids over! It’s super great!
CRANK-PEORDAY! It’s Jeopardy, except the only question is “How old it that fucker?” The correct answer changes yearly.
HOT OR NOT? THE “ONLY CINDY AND CHIEN” EDITION: No. And yes. OK, it’s kind of easy.
CIVILIZATION XIII: IT’S JUST WESTVILLE. Advance your civilization over thousands of years! Nothing changes, you dumbass. Well, your wife gets cancer, there’s that. And you still don’t get a Pulitzer.
FASTER, ZANZIBAR! KILL! KILL! Our best-selling title! Get the “Only Les” edition!
I always thought it would be fun to make a Funky Winkerbean fighting game. There must be some moddable fighting game where this is possible. The problem is, the joke wouldn’t be worth the effort involved. For example, the nine women in “Doppelgängerstadt” each is a selectable character, but they all have the exact same moveset and animations.
I’ve got it. I know the exact video game mod I want to make now.
Fallout 4: Westview.
It takes place in greater Cleveland instead of greater Boston. The Memory Den is Montoni’s. The Institute is now hosted at Kent State University. The synths they make still creep people out, but it’s because they’re actually far more realistic than the Funkyverse characters.
Nate is Les. Nora is Lisa. Shaun is Summer. Codsworth (or maybe Nick Valentine) is Holtron. Kellogg is Frankie. Dogmeat is Le Chat Bleu. Bull Bushka is Strong. Kayla is Piper, and her newspaper is called The Bleat. Only Nate/Les is playable of course, because Nora/Lisa has to die. (The default game lets you play as either spouse.) Caps, the currency, are represented by comic books.
After getting out of the vault, Les’ quest is to collect everything he needs to write his book about Lisa. Les has to choose between the Minutemen, Railroad, Brotherhood Of Steel, and Institute based on which one he thinks can best help him publish it. They still ask him for help with their cause, but he ignores them.
Because all of Les’ dialog choices ignore everything else that’s happening in the story. When the ghoul kid trapped in the fridge says “Help! Let me out!”, Les’ dialogue choices will be:
Fallout 4 has tons of side characters, but so does Funky Winkerbean. Have fun pairing them up.
The Cayla-Cindy palette swap saves development time too!
Funksona
Your parents, seemingly hating you, have left you with family in the “cozy” town of Westview where you’ll spend the next year attending high school. But things are… odd. Classes of seniors and freshmen going to school for untold numbers of years. Your English teacher talking to a woman who isn’t there. Social life seems to revolve around the local pizzeria. An old woman is pregnant with a movie star’s child. And an air of misery that seems to hang over everything, in spite of the forced smiles and smug smirks. As you awaken to an awesome power, you and your friends must investigate the dark and horrifying secrets Westview holds while trying to live what qualifies in this town as a normal life.
Panel 1: “Funky can’t wait to get this sale contract because he’s dying to find out you who you are.”
Panel 2: Pizza Box Monster beats Funky to death with his own Walkman.
Panel 3: “My father was in AA, you asshole. He never got clean because of your stupid stories.”
“My name–the name I had, when they implanted my brain in this pizza box, in 1945 Berlin–was…ADOLF!”
Pete, blankly: “What’s a…’dolf’?”
“HITLER!”
“Who’s hitting you?! Nameless Blond, am I hitting this guy?!”
“I–verdammit! I’m history’s greatest monster!”
Blondie: “I think that’s a Pokemon!”
“I–NEIN! I don’t even know what that is! Are you people idiots?! If I ever get my hands on that idiot Mengele for putting my brain in here–!”
“Mengele. That’s like, some kind of pasta?”
“I’d shoot myself in the head, if my head wasn’t a pizza box!”
(Within weeks, Hitler’s Brain in a Pizza Box would become assistant manager at Montoni’s. Then Best Man at Les’s 5th wedding. “Hitler’s Brain in a Pizza Box” became Batuik’s most successful spin-off strip, beating even “Crankshaft’s Talking Hemorrhoid Herbie”)
(I am very very stressed and tired right now, glad it doesn’t show)
ohhhh! Will we actually have our answer to the pizza box mystery tomorrow? It’s Lisa right?
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheUnReveal
Yep, I’m seeing 1.00000000000000000000000000001:1 odds on today’s tease ending in some Wilson from Home Improvement shtick (at best). If there is an actual reveal, I’ll eat my hat, red feather and all.
And it’ll be ambiguous as to whether Pete knows. What escapes Batiuk is that either way, Pete is no longer husband material…..or human material…..or even Sleestak material. If he aggressively refuses to ask, he’s an idiot and a coward. If he’s hiding it from her because he thinks it’s funny and cute, Zorak should kick his a$$ until his head falls off for being a dumb kid stuck in a He-Man Women Hater’s Club mindset.
Today’s Crankfuckery
Day 4 of Annual Pizza Box Monster Storyline
(Comically exaggerated gasp)
IS IT REALLY GONNA HAPPEN
IS THE PIZZA BOX MONSTER GONNA FINALLY REVEAL THEMSELF
“Themself” indeed! Looks like CSRoberto was the closest to guessing this week’s ‘reveal’ tease.
PBM could start up with pronoun demands next. “It’s MA’AM!” would even get a smile from me.
It’ll be Ed.
There is only one known character who can possibly be under those pizza boxes.
Batton Thomas.
Think about it. Wouldn’t this be a perfectly Batiukian solution?
It’s the most inane solution so it’s him.
If it’s an inane and boring solution, he’ll boast about it.
Almost assuredly with the word “elegant” in there.
Defining elegance downward is his thing. It’s what he does!
I still like the theory that it’s Cindy, inexplicably angry that she let Funky keep all of Montoni’s in their Lisa-brokered divorce settlement. First she terrorizes Funky for years as PBM and now she has the half of the restaurant she regrets not taking in the divorce.
It’s Livinia, having faked her death like Phil Holt. Why fake her death and put on pizza box armor so she can bedevil a small town pizza joint with mischief and hijinks? Well, why not? It wouldn’t suit an author to spill all the beans right away without leaving a little bit of mystery. After all, as an esteemed literary titan once said, it’s called writing.
After the 10-31 strip, I feel it’s even more likely this will be the resolution. Just Batton sitting at the counter, wearing the pizza box costume except for the head. Eating pizza, smirking, and looking down his nose at everyone else as if they’re the weirdos.
Or he’d say they just missed him. If that’s the case, Batiuk will have ripped off a Canadian kid’s show called Polka Dot Door. What would happen is that the male host was always mysteriously absent when a mascot character called Polkaroo made the scene and always claim to have missed him when he left. Red Green had Polkaroo walk back in costume except for the headpiece to highlight the fact that not even the five year olds were fooled.
I think I called this an Unreveal, but it might be an Anti-Climax instead. Or it might be both. If anyone can to both these things at the same time, it’s Tom Batiuk.
Knowing that he’s a stupid nine year old boy who sees women as interchangeable, it’s obvious that the rancid cherry on top of his bullflop sundae is going to be a joke at Mindy’s expense. Here, she just takes it. In real life, she confronts Pete with a valuable new friend: Mark E Desade, Attorney At Law, come to hit him with a palimony suit.
@PJ I don’t think they’re married yet. I wondered if Batiuk skipped the wedding story, and we’re supposed to infer that it happened offscreen, and they’re married now. But one strip this early week showed both Pete and Mindy’s hands in detail, and no rings were present (even though an engagement ring should have been).
But yes, I’d love to see any kind of legal professional give Mindy some unvarnished advice. Where’s Lisa when you need her?
In Central Park….
I’m pretty sure they’re not married yet as well. On his blog, Batiuk teased (threatened?) an upcoming wedding story line, and there aren’t too many candidates for that. (Unless Max and Hannah are going to decide to get married, but a Blandy/Mopey wedding has actually been set up in the narrative, so…)
(Wait, I’ve got it! Max/Hannah and Blandy/Mopey decide to have a DOUBLE WEDDING! Only things get messed up, and Max ends up married to Blandy, his twin sister, and NO ONE NOTICES because Blandy and Blannah are basically interchangeable anyway! Come on, do it, Batiuk, I dare you!)
That’s always bothered me. How do these women know they’re in the right house given that they look like clones?
Also, good point about Ed not being funny any longer. As a parody of a grumpy, teen-age hating old fossil, he was a blast. Now, he’s just a destructive cry for help in a red cap.
Yeah, the red hat is an organic example of Harsher In Hindsight, because of the political connotations that red baseball caps now carry.
Certain symbols and article of clothing have been ruined forever and Batiuk can’t talk his way around it.
I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry for this.
Eh, don’t be sorry. When a comic insists on using the phrase “Bum Boat” on a regular basis, it deserves what it gets.
Oh yeah? Whadda you got?
anal sex, butt, expanding, bunghole.
That would make one hell of a “Connections” category.
Halloween: If it is a woman, we’ll be able to call her Dinah N Dash because we are in for an unreveal.
Also, it may not be Batiuk’s intention that Pete and Ed know whose muffled voice is hidden by cardboard but Jesus Freaking Corbett, acting like a dumb and mean nine year old brat kid would in real life leaving the idiot wondering why she cussed him out for treating her shabbily.
Yawn. Why is Batiuk even bothering to pretend?
Clearly, the only correct way to reveal the identity of the Pizza (Box) Monster is to have Les write a book about it.
If s/he shoots Les, s/he deserves a medal.
Walking slowly in the darkness, she held up a hand. She whispered “What’s that stink?”
He sniffed. “Rocket fuel. OLD rocket fuel.”
“Okay. And you know this how?”
Pete scoffed. “I know a lot, <i>Chien</i>. I write comic books, you know!”
Although she knew he couldn’t see it, Chien rolled her eyes. “I’m amazed you can smell it over your pizza stink.” She ran her flashlight over the object, shrouded in darkness. “It’s…a V2?!”
Pete said “The Nazi rocket bomb…thing?” He expanded his flashlight’s beam. “In…<i>Westview?</i> Under the band stadium?! What is this?!”
Klieg lights flared on. Like in a football stadium! Well, a shitty high school one anyway. They shielded their eyes, but a little too late to not be blinded.
“SO!” bellowed a voice from a bullhorn. “You are with the confusion of your heads, JA? With the explaining at long length I will be doing!”
Chien pointed her MAC10 submachine gun in the general direction of this dipshit, because you already got that he’s a dipshit, right? (“Subtlety” is not one of my writing skills) Her words came out in a hiss.
<i>”Dinkle.</i>”
“Ach ja, fraulein! With the remembering of me your brain is doing, ja?”
She frowned. Okay, frowning is a thing she does a lot. “Why are you talking like this?”
“BECAUSE…” hissed Dinkle, like a snake! Or the plumbing you maybe had in your first apartment in college, how should I know, was I your roommate? “I–AM A NAZI!”
Pete said “Well, duh, we all knew that. Big reveal, von Jerkenheimer.”
Chien rolled her eyes so hard, she could see through her ears. She’s been eyerolling all her life. She realized she needed to get in there with Q-Tips. “And this if for why?”
“SO I WILL WIN THE BATTLE OF BRITAIN!”
“Yeah, you guys already lost that.”
“Oh. Right. I mean–THE BATTLE OF BANDS!”
She and Pete exchanged confused glances. “What?” she said. “With who?”
He shrugged. “I dunno, Poland or something? Look, I’m a Nazi AND a high school bandleader, how sane do you think I am?!”
Pete said “I ain’t got time for this.”
“What?” she said. “You write comic books! Once a month!”
“What is it that you do?”
“I…do…Huh. Never thought of that before. Look hawt so internet nerds obsess on me?”
“Chien! We’re about to die! Will you be my bride?”
“Uh…fuck no?”
“Fair enough. Pizza? It’s on me!”
She laughed. “If it’s Montoni’s, it’ll be on you because I’ll dump it on your head!”
“DEAL!” They shook hands, and walked away laughing.
“MISSILE! I GOT a MISSILE!” yelled Dinkle. “I’M LAUNCHING IT!”
But because this was Dinkle’s missile, he could not get it up.
Walking slowly in the darkness, she held up a hand. She whispered “What’s that stink?”
He sniffed. “Rocket fuel. OLD rocket fuel.”
“Okay. And you know this how?”
Pete scoffed. “I know a lot, <i>Chien</i>. I write comic books, you know!”
Although she knew he couldn’t see it, Chien rolled her eyes. “I’m amazed you can smell it over your pizza stink.” She ran her flashlight over the object, shrouded in darkness. “It’s…a V2?!”
Pete said “The Nazi rocket bomb…thing?” He expanded his flashlight’s beam. “In…<i>Westview?</i> Under the band stadium?! What is this?!”
Klieg lights flared on. Like in a football stadium! Well, a shitty high school one anyway. They shielded their eyes, but a little too late to not be blinded.
“SO!” bellowed a voice from a bullhorn. “You are with the confusion of your heads, JA? With the explaining at long length I will be doing!”
Chien pointed her MAC10 submachine gun in the general direction of this dipshit, because you already got that he’s a dipshit, right? (“Subtlety” is not one of my writing skills) Her words came out in a hiss.
<i>”Dinkle.</i>”
“Ach ja, fraulein! With the remembering of me your brain is doing, ja?”
She frowned. Okay, frowning is a thing she does a lot. “Why are you talking like this?”
“BECAUSE…” hissed Dinkle, like a snake! Or the plumbing you maybe had in your first apartment in college, how should I know, was I your roommate? “I–AM A NAZI!”
Pete said “Well, duh, we all knew that. Big reveal, von Jerkenheimer.”
Chien rolled her eyes so hard, she could see through her ears. She’s been eyerolling all her life. She realized she needed to get in there with Q-Tips. “And this if for why?”
“SO I WILL WIN THE BATTLE OF BRITAIN!”
“Yeah, you guys already lost that.”
“Oh. Right. I mean–THE BATTLE OF BANDS!”
She and Pete exchanged confused glances. “What?” she said. “With who?”
He shrugged. “I dunno, Poland or something? Look, I’m a Nazi AND a high school bandleader, how sane do you think I am?!”
Pete said “I ain’t got time for this.”
“What?” she said. “You write comic books! Once a month!”
“What is it that you do?”
“I…do…Huh. Never thought of that before. Look hawt so internet nerds obsess on me?”
“Chien! We’re about to die! Will you be my bride?”
“Uh…fuck no?”
“Fair enough. Pizza? It’s on me!”
She laughed. “If it’s Montoni’s, it’ll be on you because I’ll dump it on your head!”
“DEAL!” They shook hands, and walked away laughing.
“MISSILE! I GOT a MISSILE!” yelled Dinkle. “I’M LAUNCHING IT!”
But because this was Dinkle’s missile, he could not get it up.
Shit! Double post! Sorry, guys, I’d delete it if I knew how to!
‘lawsuit magnet’, that’s gold right there my friend.
Today’s Crankfuckery
Day 5 of Annual Pizza Box Monster Storyline
COME ON BATIUK REVEAL WHO THE PBM IS UNDER THE MASK ALREADY
THE SUSPENSE IS KILLING ME
So… Blandy saw that Pizza Monster was eating, so presumably saw that he/she/it didn’t have the headpiece on, and decided to announce her intention to see who it is, rather than actually… just looking?
Of course, the big question is: will tomorrow show us that Pizza Monster has already put the mask back on, thwarting Blandy’s attempt to discover the identity of the person she’s tied her financial future to? Or will we see Blandy and Mopey saying “Oh, I never would have guessed it was THEM!” without telling us who “them” is? (I suppose it’s possible we’ll actually find out PM’s identity, but… HAHAHAHAHAHA, not in this comic.)
(And Batiuk did the “Could the Pizza Monster be a g-g-g-girl???” thing, like, seven years ago, when Funky hired the Mr. Monster cosplayer to stop the pizza theft. Yeah, I know, Batiuk repeating himself? That’s unpossible!)
If Pizza Box Monster was Maddie, I don’t know if that would actually be a somewhat amusing echo of Donna Who Used to Be the Eliminator or an eyerolling one. Perhaps both simultaneously.
That’s another good possibility, The three major possibilities are:
It’s 1 but with stupidity on Mindy’s part
It’s revealing that Batiuk thinks it would be impossible to identify a female in a costume that conceals her face and body.
You can tell by the voice. Since Batiuk is stupid, he can’t see that.
If it could fool the Flash in 1963, it can fool him.
Yeah, it’s a classic comic book swerve. Makes the limitations of the media work for you.
11/01: He’s consistent in that the fake-out is even stupider than we expected. I would have put him or her in a balaclava but Batiuk has who ever decorated sabotaged herself because GORL.
Of course there’s a typo. My editor doesn’t care, either.
I loved that 1960s cartoon theme song!
“Spideman, Spideman,
Doin’ whatever a spide can!
Catching Cranks, just like…fries?
Okay, I’m bored already. Here comes the Whateverdude.
Lisa’s SoDeadermaaaan!”
Writerman, writerman
Does whatever a writer can
Wins awards, signs his books
Gives you lots of dirty looks
Look out! It’s one more writerman!
Writerman, Writerman!
Does whatever a writer can!
It’s called writing!
You beady-eyed nitpicker!
My songs don’t have to rhyme!
Is he strong? Listen, bud.
He’s got radioactive blood.
Which means he has cancer now.
Time to exploit his prolonged demise
Here comes the Writerman!
(I’m totally getting a Grammy for this. Not from the Grammy people, I’m sure someone will just hand me one of their used ones. As one does.)
Or you could just WALK FIVE FEET AND LOOK WITH YOUR OWN EYES. Did you really need to call a company meeting about this? It’s Halloween, so you can even wear a mask if you don’t want him* to see you looking at him. Aren’t there any customers you have to be out there to serve– oh, right.
*- no, it’s not a woman. You’d think another woman would be able to detect this. Apparently not a woman written by Tom Batiuk.
What is his costume supposed to be? Confused Senile Man in His Hospital Pajamas Who Escaped the Dementia Ward and Took Off His Slippers?
(shrugs) Maybe they’re writing to their readers’ demographic.
Today’s Crankfuckery
Day 6 of Annual Pizza Box Monster Storyline
my disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined because I didn’t get to see who the PBM is under the pizza boxes (and likely never will be for at least another year)
Wow, there’s a lot to be “impressed” by with this Unreveal. The fact that the spider on the screen doesn’t look like the one in the restaurant; the fact that the angle it’s positioned in doesn’t match between the two, either; the idea that someone would be stupid enough to put a decoration right in front of their security camera (though, honestly, with these dimwits, it’s probably more surprising they actually have a security camera at all); or the fact that the spider decoration was actually there in the same spot earlier in the week. Really, that last one is actually somewhat impressive; Batiuk made the effort to set up a punchline days in advance? Didn’t think he had it in him. It’s still an inane cop-out to a “mystery” no one cares about, but he tried, sort of.
If the PBM wanted to ensure that he could eat in privacy without having his face seen, he would have gotten his pizza for takeout and eaten it at home, or found a closet to hide in while he was eating, or something like that. Instead, he’s sitting in the main dining room. These morons apparently don’t think they have the right to walk into the main dining room of the restaurant they own during business hours, because they might see the face of their own business partner.