Dine and Dash?

So here's what happened:

Saturday night, a friend and I went out to dinner. I'd been craving a meal and wine from this establishment for a long time.

We were seated promptly. We made emphatically enthusiastic decisions on what we wanted to chew and what wine to sip. It was a toss up between two appetizers – a meat or a cheese. The waitress recommended the cheese. Smiles all around.

Wine was sipped slowly.

Appetizer appetized.

Entrees served at 10:20pm. I took a photo. It’s timestamped.

Fast forward about 20 minutes later. Our plates were cleared. And we still had a little bit of wine to finish. About 10 more minutes passed and I noticed our waitress leaving. She didn’t head out for a smoke, she was gone. Her shift was over. She didn’t close out her tabs. She didn’t bring our check. She didn’t say a word. The other waitresses walked by our table repeatedly. They filled water glasses of other diners and brought them dessert menus. 

 
No one approached our table. 

Even the hostess of the restaurant passed by our table a few times and said nothing to us. The restaurant started to clear out. One of the other waitresses finally stopped by our table…to take the salt and pepper shakers. Still not a word.

More diners filed out of the restaurant and we sat, ignored. Now we were getting restless. We started to gather our belongings. Our table was adjacent to the POS station. 11:50pm

We didn't take a page out of the book of the four men who base jumped off the 55th floor to skip out on their drink tab but we had a decision to make.

What would you do? Would you ask for the check? Would you walk out of the restaurant without paying for your meal? Would you go on the honor system and just leave cash on the table?

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