www.fusecon.com

[dmw]

Note, there are various versions of this story floating around but this one seems to be the least disgusting suggesting an unwrapped condom. Others also mention the women staying around after the incident consuming complimentary beverages. Also of note is the incident happened in Feb 2002 but the lawsuit wasn't filed until Nov 2002. Hum. You know folks, there is always danger in sending your food back to the kitchen. There is also danger in being rude. Hopefully everyone who reads this site learns that. Your servers and cooks arn't making that much money and like other people you can piss them off, more so on their bad days. It probably isn't that difficult to say "Fuck it, I'm outta here" and leave a nice surprise for their guest. Be careful.

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(This came off the yahoo AP newswire).
SANTA ANA, Calif. - Four women sued an Irvine restaurant after one of them said she found a condom in her clam chowder when they dined there last year. Laila Sultan said she was eating at McCormick & Schmick's Seafood Restaurant on Feb. 26, 2002, when she bit into something rubbery. "We said, `Of course. You're chewing on a clam,'" said Paula Wild, one of her dining companions. When she spit it out, Sultan, 48, said she discovered it was an unwrapped, rolled-up condom.

She said she spent the next 15 minutes in a restroom, vomiting, and has since seen a psychiatrist and taken medication for depression and anxiety. Sultan, Wild, Cindy Hammond and Annamarie Sigala, who were all having the clam chowder that day, filed suit, claiming negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Their case is scheduled for trial Jan. 12.

A lawyer for the restaurant said McCormick & Schmick's has no idea how the condom got into the soup. "It's as big a mystery to us as it is to anybody else," said attorney Patrick Stark. "We are going to argue there is absolutely no evidence to suggest the restaurant was the source of the condom, or any employee of the restaurant." McCormick & Schmick's, a privately owned chain that owns 42 upscale restaurants in 19 states, sued the company that supplied its clams. A judge ruled in favor of the supplier last September.

Sultan, who lives in Stanton, said she had visited the restaurant before and never had a problem. On this occasion, she said, she and her companions ordered drinks, appetizers and soup, but sent the soup back because it was lukewarm. When she got it back she found the condom.

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(This came off the yahoo Reuters newswire - same story but the imagination wonders if the condom was open/used/etc.).

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Waiter, there is something worse than a fly in my soup.

A California woman who found a condom in her bowl of clam chowder has sued the upscale restaurant that served it to her -- saying she has suffered depression and anxiety from the shocking discovery. But an attorney for McCormick & Schmicks Seafood Restaurant in Irvine, California, says the eatery has no idea how the condom got into Laila Sultan's food.

Sultan, 48, and her three companions are suing the restaurant for negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress in a case that is expected to go to trial early next year. "I thought it was calamari or shrimp or something so I chewed one more," Sultan told local KCAL-TV on Monday. "It felt rubbery. I told my friends, 'My God, there's something in my mouth.'"

Sultan said she spit the offending object into a napkin and at first thought it was a latex glove. Then her friend realized what it was. "I said, 'Oh, my God' and ran into the bathroom with another friend of mine and I started throwing up," she said. "I threw up everything I ate there, every single thing, I threw up in the bathroom."

But Patrick Stark, an attorney for McCormick & Schmicks, told the Los Angeles Times that its staff had no idea how the condom got into the chowder, adding: "It's as big a mystery to us as it is to anybody else." "We are going to argue at trial there is absolutely no evidence to suggest the restaurant was the source of the condom," he told the paper. "Either it came from (the four women) or it was thrown in as a practical joke by another patron at the restaurant."