Sloppy breakups make the world go ‘round!
Eggplant Heartbreak Addition by DrGrimoire,
xexnoncores,
ch00bakka, and
mxsinister
Deer Independent Courier & Chronicle
Don't Whistle While You're Pissing
| Portland, ND | Setting Orange, Chaos 45th, YOLD 3189 | Free Love and Herpes |
BREAKUP SEASON
👅🪷
(⁂yummylotus)
Everyone loves love.
Okay, that's a lie. But everyone does love petty drama, and there's no drama better than a public breakup. With Valentine's day just around the corner, we're approaching peak season for poorly thought out romantic gestures, unwelcome proposals, and at least a dozen guys taking their beautiful girlfriends to the Cheesecake Factory and calling it romance. It's perfect. So, in the spirit of the season, I'll be reviewing a variety of Portlands eateries, entirely based on the quality and quantity of public breakups I've personally witnessed at them. Is this a good way to choose where to eat? Maybe not. Am I willing to recommend these restaurants at any other time of year? Not all of them. But for this tragical, magical time of year, I'm willing to forgive little things like "food poisoning" and "complete lack of ambiance" in exchange for what really matters.
Schadenfreude.
FOG, BY AMBROSE
You aren't getting a reservation here. Frankly, you don't want a reservation here. The latest venture from chef and restaurateur Chaz Ambrose, Fog fails yet again to live up to the hype—the food is excellent, but nobody's gonna break up during this meal. Fog's twelve course tasting menu of "local seafood from three coasts" is going to set you back about a month's rent, or two months' if you get the wine pairing. (I didn't pay a dime, thanks to a little journalistic nepotism. One of Chef Ambrose's apprentices writes for the Odyssey.) It's made it to this list because the one breakup I did see was a perfect example of the genre: loud, messy, and star-studded.
It turns out that the five hot Korean girls at the table next to mine were the legendary K-Pop girl group THRICE, slumming it in Portlands for their weekly meal. My Korean isn't the best (I only learned it to kill the ghost of Park Chung Hee), but from what I could gather, Seo-ah and Hyun had been secretly dating for years, only Hyun had also been sleeping with PEARL's Sun-Young since November. It all came out during the third course (twenty-four karat golden snapper) when Hyun got a sext from Sun-Young, right after Seo-ah announced to the group that the two of them wanted to go public with their relationship. I don't think I'm allowed to translate "씨발년", but it got screamed loud enough to shatter the place's windows. Fog's security (the chef's scary husband, Marius) got them out of there before they did any further damage, and I got a special extra dessert as an apology for the tinnitus. Never knew oyster ice cream could be so good. Or even palatable.
URBAN RESCUE RAINFOREST CAFE
Do you like rainbow snakes? Flying prairie dogs? Necromancer cats?
If you answered yes to any of those questions, well, now you know what I was surrounded by when I was listening to a woman dump a guy she had been married to for ten years. Ten!
It’s the most bizarre experience I’ve had in a while. I’m enjoying my stuffed bison heart entree (a really odd food at first sight but trust me, it’s to die for) when all of a sudden he bursts out of the petting zoo crying (yes, it’s a restaurant petting zoo combo). It startled all the animals nearby and nearly caused some golden goat to kick a girl in the face. She screams, the parrots return it, and soon the entire place is screaming like banshees. Parents, children, the dumped guy—all screaming like banshees! Ugh, I’ve heard real ones before, and let me tell you, the comparisons I make are real here. Right down to the headache I got when I left.
Just really, really odd. I do not see this place being open for more than six more months as of writing this, so it’s hard to rate how being dumped here is. Because who on earth allowed all those animals in the restaurant? Isn’t it a safety hazard? They’re so going to get some kind of fire soon, honestly.
SIX GUYS
Thought Five Guys was mediocre, too expensive, and way over-hyped? Well, Six Guys is Three Portlands’ brand of that, but worse. Somehow.
Asking about the number of break-ups I’ve seen here is like asking how many times I’ve seen necromancy happen. It’s too many count, too messy to think about for long, and honestly not as interesting as you think. Trust me. People take themselves to Six Guys because it’s where dreams go to die, where hangovers go to hope they can sober up in time for an exam, where wannabe writers go to sit on a grate table and plug away at their laptop because Starbucks was too crowded or the barista was seeing ghosts.
Seriously, they should get security for this kind of thing. It happens so frequently that there’s scorch marks beneath all of the tables, and near the counter where you order food. The floors smell like the literal essence of desperation, to the point where many a Deer College apothecary major has bottled the stuff and turned it into the world’s shittiest amateur perfume that literally leaks through dating profiles. Seriously. They say it’s an ingredient to a love potion but it just makes sad losers like sweat squared.
NOT ANOTHER FUCKING STARBUCKS
Three Portlands' answer to chain coffee shops, Not Another Fucking Starbucks has all the soulless ambience and overpriced, over-roasted coffee of its namesake without any of the convenience of the app and the rewards points and the personal cups et cetera. And yet, for some reason, everyone goes here. It's probably memetic or something. Anyway, if your girlfriend asks you to meet her at Not Another Fucking Starbucks, you're probably going to get broken up with. It's even happened to me. Hardly a day goes by when I don't see some sad sack begging for another chance over a double whipaccino mochafrappe. It never works. It doesn't matter how many times you promise to change, because it's not her, it's you, and this was never going to work anyway.
Because you're the kind of person who goes to Not Another Fucking Starbucks, and your "indie" music career isn't going to take off.
SAUCED CHICKEN
Absolutely horrible name for one of the best fusion joints in town. Ever heard of Indi-Mex? That’s what they serve here. Apparently the owners are a couple consisting of an asura and someone claiming to be the reincarnation of the outlaw Juan Flores, but I’m not one to judge when I’d marry Cthulhu in a heartbeat.
That love in the air is probably why I have only seen two breakups here, both over the chicken tinga masala tacos. And even then, I found out a month later both couples got back together happily, celebrating over smoked lamb tacos and amchur steak asada bowls. Those rock, by the way. If you’re going here, definitely do it to celebrate Valentine’s, Mexican Independence Day, or Diwali.
THE DEER FEEDER
The Deer College cafeteria has the same philosophy around the break-ups as it does the food it serves: quantity over quality. At least twice a semester, I have to hear someone tell their now-insignificant other that they're "just not ready" and "it's not you, it's me" just in front of the ice cream machine alone. And it’s no less than three times per year they do it while they’re in front of the pizza line—can’t you at least do it somewhere less inconvenient?
Best spot for all involved is the booth directly behind me, so I can eavesdrop on the drama without trouble. That said, just like a real deer feeder, there's live-streamed access to the whole place, so every breakup is a reality show if someone's watching the security cameras! (Creep.)
I haven't even mentioned all the phone calls to hometown sweethearts, the students being somehow shocked that the guy they hooked up at that house party last weekend doesn't love them, and the frequent slew of crushes from class coming to terms with their incompatibility. If I had a million hands, it still wouldn’t be able to count the number of girls who discover from shitty guy dates at the Deer Feeder they’re trans and gay.
Ain’t that just peachy? Ladies, listen: if that’s you, you know where to find me on campus! Professor Yuri’s Journalism class held at noon in room 271B of Edmondson Hall!