FRIDAY NIGHT TRADITIONS...............

When you were a kid did your family have any type of weekly ritual......Like Pizza every Friday night or Sunday dinner at the relatives?

In our house Siggy would take us on Friday nights to Snuffy's Steak House in Scotch Plains

New Jersey......

More then just a steak joint this place had character or should I say "A Character"...... the best waiter ever....... his name was Frank......We always sat in Franks' section.....in a booth right across from the bar.....

As a little kid and I remember going there as long as I could remember......I loved to see the "House Monkey" at the bar.......They had a stuffed chimp dressed up in clothes and he was attached to what they call today a "zip line".......Infact the monkey's name was

ZIPPY......They would.......all through dinner....slide Zippy from one side of the bar to the other and I thought this was the greatest thing in the world.....What did I know I was a kid.....But I guess this is why as an adult I have a love for the Hollywood chimps that they dress up and put roller skates on.....I love those damn monkeys......

And Frank.....well, he was a hoot....I always remember him being like 70......from when I was little to when I became an adult Frank always stayed the same age.....OLD....

With a big white handlebar mustache......when he died he was probably put in the waiter hall of fame.....he was that good....Everyone wanted a table in Frank's area.....

When we got married and had daughter we too kept up the Friday night tradition.....When she was just a toddler we went one night with my in-laws....that would be The Big Boss.....who's a combination of Ernest Borgnine and Don Rickles..... and my mother-in-law who was the twin to Hyacinth on Keeping up Appearances.....
I sat next to daughter my mother-in-law across from us......Frank ofcourse was our waiter....then I see things disappearing off the table.......rolls....bread.....sugar packets....Couldn't figure out where they were going until I looked down into daughter's lap.....
She was stock piling the table freebies like the people in Boca Raton do at the
"All you can Eat" early bird special places.....
Where did she learn this......I have to admit from my mother.....Yes, Millie had a habit of putting stuff in a napkin and quietly putting it in her purse.....
She picked up this habit in Florida and daughter was just following what she saw Grandma do.....
Needless to say my mother-in-law was humiliated......
And needless to say we never went out to dinner with them ever again...
Hey kids will be kids............
and I'd like to report that she never did that again.....