The Great IHOP Standoff
Recalling the time my refusal to go along with a restaurant manager's moronic `security' step prompted a swarm of police officers to swoop in.
Today we drove Maggie Rose back to campus for her senior year of college.
On the way, we passed by a memory that predates her birth: the time my refusal to abide by a restaurant manager’s moronic request led to a swarm of police descending on the scene.
It’s got the makings of a sitcom episode--Seinfeld comes to mind, maybe even Arrested Development.
It begins late one weeknight, circa 2001-2002, when Bridgett and I find ourselves both hungry after a business meeting. We’re nattily attired—me in a business suit, Bridgett in her skirt and heels, much like our garb when we walked our way into a Return to Me movie scene.
Although we’d blend right into a fine dining establishment, it’s approaching 11 p.m. so our options are limited. We are lured by that blue-and-white wee-hours beacon: IHOP.
We get our fill of carbs and sugars—pancakes were certainly in the mix—and then I go to the cash register to pay by credit card. That’s when things go haywire.
The gist of my exchange with the manager:
Manager: I need you to write your driver’s license number on the receipt.
Me: Why?
Manager: It’s our policy.
Me: Why?
Manager: We’ve had problems lately with people using stolen credit cards to pay for their meals. It’s just an extra security measure.
Me: I see. Well, I’m glad to show you my driver’s license so you can see for yourself that it’s really me whose name is on the credit card I’m using. But I’m not going to write my driver’s license number. What purpose does that serve?
Manager: It’s our policy. I need your driver’s license number.
Me: I’ve never done that before when using my credit card and I’m not going to start doing it now.
Manager: Then I’m going to have to call the police.
Me (thinking, `This is ridiculous, and this has also escalated awfully fast. He’s gotta be bluffing.’): Go ahead and call them. I’m leaving now.
Bridgett and I, befuddled that this guy actually made it to the rank of overnight manager, walk to our car. I turn on the ignition and we’re about to go when another IHOP employee rushes out and politely, almost apologetically, asks us to stay. Leaving will just make things even more messy, he says, because his boss has, in fact, dialed 9-1-1.
This has officially gone from dumb to dumber to dumberer.
I hesitate for a few moments, by which point a cop has turned into the parking lot, Mars lights aglow. Within the next minute, three additional police cars are providing bountiful backup.
Must be a slow night in Oak Park.
Back inside we go so that the manager and I can replay our dueling points of view for the police officers. A seasoned officer, at least 15 years my senior, gently takes me aside. He agrees with me. I don’t actually have to do what the manager is asking. But won’t I just go along with the request so that we can all move on?
Recognizing that this silly saga has gone far enough, I grudgingly agree.
I go to the counter and scribble my driver’s license on the stupid receipt. As I do so, I delight in making it beyond illegible—the digits are as incomprehensible as all the bizarreness that preceded this moment.
Will the manager make a stink about my final act of rebellion against ridiculousness? He barely glances at it and stays mum about failing to obtain the entire Holy Grail of this exercise—my magical fraud-preventing driver’s license number.
Bridgett and I head home. The overnight-shift cops have another anecdote to share with friends and family. The manager, presumably, resumes his weird obsession with driver’s license numbers.
Epilogue
The incident didn’t sour us on IHOPs generally. If anything, it’s been a recurring source of bemusement and bewilderment. The handful of times we’ve dined at various IHOPs, we’ve never had to fork over anything beyond cash or a credit card.
Most of my interactions with this breakfast-comfort-food chain consist of cruising past and, every time, chuckling at the stranger-than-fiction memories from that night.
This is especially true when I go past the precise “scene of the crime.” This morning, en route to dropping off our daughter, I stopped to take a few photos of this infamous locale.
As you can see below, it’s closed—has been for many years now. This IHOP has become Bye-HOP. And because a security fence encircles the lot, cops don’t even have a spot to park in between legitimate 9-1-1 calls.
Somehow, that seems altogether fitting.
Congratulations on Northern Illinois beating Notre Dame! I thought that called for an emergency "Inside Edge" Substack.
You should have continued leaving and then the cop would have lectured the guy on bothering them with a nothing call. You're under no obligation to do that. Of course they can refuse to serve you, but that wasn't an issue since you were leaving.