John and I had carefully planned our 25th anniversary celebration.

I’d researched every restaurant in the area. We really wanted to do more than just go out for a meal, but after calling every place where evening entertainment might be available, we decided we’d settle on a lovely dinner. The two most highly rated restaurants (according to friends and internet reviews) were Jake’s Grill in Old Town Saginaw and Lucky’s Steakhouse in Bay City. We settled on Lucky’s.

Both of us spiffied up. John looked grand. He was dressed in nice dress pants and a comfortable long sleeved shirt, (no-tie). I wore a short black dress with black knit cardigan style top over it.

This was a special night!

We should have been forewarned when the restaurant wouldn’t take a reservation for two on Friday night.

We ran into problems just getting out of our subdivision. The annual garage sale is tomorrow and lots of folks came in tonight to get a jump on the actual sale. We couldn’t get out to the main road. Our streets were blocked with folks parked on both sides of the street and folks coming and going. It was a mess. John is not a patient person, and by the time we got out to M-52, he was angry. (Not a good start.)

We arrived shortly after 6:00 and were told the wait would be about 15 minutes. That didn’t bother us at all. But we felt that we were way over dressed. The other “guests” were in summer casual casual casual… (example: gym short shorts on guys with hairy legs). Very few looked prepared for a nice dinner.

We went to the bar, where loud obnoxious patrons annoyed us. We could hardly hear each other talk.

Within five minutes we were seated in the dining room and our nice server, Stephanie, did what she could to make our evening feel like an “event.” I ordered a filet mignon, Caesar salad and a potato. I’d carefully quizzed her about the restaurant’s definition of medium versus medium rare steaks. She assured me that since I wanted a warm center but definitely pink to red, medium would work for me. But when it came, it was dry and very well-done! Of course waiting for a second filet to be grilled took forever so I filled up on potatoes. John’s prime rib and garlic mashed potatoes were ok but the prime rib was medium well instead of medium.

The dining room was noisy, crowded, and definitely lacked ambiance. Ponderosa Steakhouse, across the street, would have been better, probably quieter, and we’d have felt more satisfied and we’d have spent $20 less.

The filet was good, but much too salty. It was if it had been soaked in soy sauce.

So much for a grand dinner.

We were home by 8:00. That was our 25th Anniversary celebration… very disappointing. Hopefully our fiftieth will be better.