Denny's — Restaurant in Flagstaff

I should preface this by saying, I'm actually quite fond of Denny's. It is, to my mind, a quintessentially American experience: a place where the tired, poor, huddled masses can come at any time of the day or night for a hot meal at an affordable price. The American Dream.

But if this particular Denny's is any indication, the American Dream is in dire straits indeed.

We had an inkling, even as we approached the building, that something was rotten in the state of Denny's. The building seemed...liminal somehow, as though it occupied a reality at right-angles to our own. The entrance overlooked a highway interchange. The windows were dull and lifeless. Everything about it seemed resigned.

When we stepped inside, the sense of futility and discouragement persisted. Only half the dining floor was open, and only a handful of the tables were occupied. A group of high-school students. An elderly couple with yappy dogs. A pair of workers with their eyes fixed on the remnants of their meal. No one stood at the register to seat us, so we stood around uncertainly for a handful of minutes waiting to be noticed. At last, a red-haired woman appeared, and told us we could sit in the second-to-last booth along the south-facing walls.

We sat, and the same woman brought menus and took our drink orders, then disappeared in the direction of the kitchen.

Drinks arrived. The Coke Zero tasted suspiciously of Diet Coke and was sent back.

"Sorry about the yappy dogs," the host-server said, grimacing as if every yap went into her ear like an icepick.

"No worries," I assured her. In truth, I hadn't noticed the dog at all until she pointed it out.

The host-server took our orders and committed them to memory. We each ordered food off the Value Menu: soup and a sandwich for me, a lettuce-wrapped hamburger with a side salad for Loving Spouse. I was informed that the soup of the day was potato, and that it would take twenty minutes to prepare. I said that was fine, wondering even as I said it why it was going to take twenty minutes to produce a bowl of soup. It certainly wasn't because of a dinner rush. The host-server once again disappeared in the direction of the kitchen.

It was a long twenty minutes. The group of high school students got up and left. The owner of the yappy dog must have been asked to leave, because he/she/they did so with a maximum of griping about Teh Rudeness of it. And all the other remaining diners gradually drifted out until we were alone.

I spent the time surveying the dining floor. Nearly all the other tables showed signs of having been occupied. None of them had been bussed, and none of them were bussed while we were there. As far as I was able to tell, there were only four employees on the clock, and only two of them seemed to be doing any work. One, sat in a booth, I assumed on a break, with a Styrofoam cup to hand and a hamburger nearby, which remained uneaten. There was a single head visible in the kitchen. Food was placed in the window and the bell rung, but after another five minutes it still hadn't made it to the table.

"I bet that's our food," said Loving Spouse, casting eyes at the plates in the window.

"I hope not," I said. "Because the burger is on a bun."

I let my attention wander some more, in an effort not to dwell on the dreariness of the place, and the increasingly palpable sense of discouragement that seemed to coat every surface like old syrup. The food arrived, the order correct to the last detail, and was... fine. Uninspired, but fine. We ate without complaint and asked for the bill. The host-server-line cook-cashier offered us a discount. We took it. Price: affordable. Experience: poor.

All in all, I can't help but feel like this whole experience was a parable for the wider American experience right now. Employees overworked and under supported. Everyone trying their best, but too overwhelmed to keep up. Discouragement and disarray. Loss of quality. Increased expense. Dissatisfaction all around.

Please be kind, we're all...

Awful awful time! I didnt get any food but just had to use the bathroom. Employee was extremely hostile and was thinking I had overdosed on "Pills" as he said because I was using the bathroom for a whole 9 minutes and 34 seconds. I THEN went back into bathroom to finish going number 2 as I was interrupted and upon 5 more minutes of use said employee barged into bathroom screaming for me to exit the dennys as he "Didnt know what I was doing in there but whatever it is I need to get out and leave immediately. Maybe my experience would have been different if I had ordered food but the food that is served at either one of the dennys in flagstaff is absolutely atroscious dog food hell I wouldnt dare even feed the food served to the dog of my worst enemy so basically unedible. Do NOT I repeat DO NOT go into either of these dennys in any type of comfortable clothes such as pajamas and if your a manual laboerer please do not take off things that would let people know youre a general laboerer. I say those statments because it seems if you go in either the dennys in flagstaff wearing pajamas or clothes with excess dirt or grim on them they will immediately assume youre homeless and I have no Idea WHY but the intense and extremely hostile socio-economic profiling and prejudice is unreal. I can only imagine what itd feel like for someone who actually is homeless to go in to eat or god forbid have to use the bathroom... especially if they had to go number 2 and use their bathroom for longer than 10 minutes. Lord have mercy on these peoples souls half of them seem to be on some sort of substance or another and honestly I was getting the impression that employee was only stating that he thought I had overdosed as a poor and lame attempt at seeing if I as well use or had substances on my person as he had said this with a weird undertone of compassion and care and I only say it was weird because 1) I do not use substances and 2) I do not look like I use substances. Sorry half of this review became engulfed by how this employee acted and treated me but that WAS my entire...

When you go to Denny's, you don't really set high expectations - even so, this was a terrible experience. Our server, Simon, seemed to be actively competing for the worst server of the year award - he went through the motions of doing his job, but had a kind of "I could care less about your existence" approach to it. I ordered a double veggie burger, and the best part of it was the 7 or 8 french fries that came with it (a sad quantity): it tasted like I imagine paste or stale cardboard might taste - it disintegrated at the slightest touch, was maybe half-cooked, had the wrong cheese, had tomatoes that were the LOWEST possible quality, and was served with no condiments at all. Simon never asked how any of the food was, and when I commented "This was one of the worst burgers I've ever had" he didn't even look up at me - just completely ignored me. When it was time to check out, we ended up standing at the cash register for like 15+ minutes as Simon attempted to cash us out - my party wanted to split the check, and Simon has no idea how to do this - after ringing my card up for half, he accidentally selected a cash option and then asked that we pay the rest in cash - we had no cash, and stood there awkwardly as he called someone on his cell trying to figure out what to do (kind of throwing us under the bus and not owning his own mistake) - he then unsuccessfully tried to do a refund on my card, and explained we would need to contact the manager tomorrow to sort it all out because he couldn't do refunds and we needed to pay the full balance - when I said I wouldn't let him ring up my card again (I paid my half), and when he refused to charge my guest's card for their half, he said in a huff: "Well I'll just cover the rest with my own money!", which, honestly, I was fine with. Of course, as this was going on a group of young women were trying to get his attention to be seated and Simon was rude to them as well, refusing to even give them (or any of us) any sense of how long we would all be...