In this case you cannot blame this on Obama

Last night, as we try to do each Sunday, we had dinner with my son and his family.    We went to a Macaroni Grill - for those of you not from California, think Olive Garden with better food.  It is a modestly upscale restaurant (with some great dishes and efficient and pleasant service).   But when we came in the place was almost empty - on a Sunday night.   Very often on Sunday evenings at about 7 one needs to wait for a table but last night we got in immediately.

My immediate hunch was that this was economically related.   This is a mildly upscale place and we had not been into a MG for a while - I thought - "The economy is still not robust and people are staying home.   But my initial hunch was wrong.   When I asked the waiter he said this was dead for a Sunday and that he actually let some of his staff leave early because business was so slow.   But the explanation was quite simple - most families were home watching the Giants get to inning 37 to beat the Detroit Tigers in a sweep of the World Series.

However, there is one footnote here.   As we were leaving we were given four discount coupons that one can open on the next visit to get a discount or a cash prize.  Evidently, places like this still need to work on keeping business.

I am not a Giants fan but those 37 innings were some of the most exciting that I have seen in the last several years.   The Giants played as a team with the help of at least two former Rivercats pitchers (Zito and Casilla) and the enthusiasm of fans from all of Northern California.