I wonder if our American Landscape of shopping malls and amusement parks would change a bit if they started referring to the food courts as "Grub Street"? It would fit Disneyworld's Frontier Land.

'Grubs up' is a common call down these parts when the foods ready.

I wonder if our American Landscape of shopping malls and amusement parks would change a bit if they started referring to the food courts as "Grub Street"? Nah, prolly just get noisier and visually uglier. Judging by the food courts I've been in here, I am convinced that they are deliberately designed so that customers don't want to stay very long: with not-too-comfortable chairs and apparently no noise-absorption materials at all.

Not possible.

We have a bar(tavern,pub): Grub and Suds: not much better than
any food court.

Gee, it sound rather chique, "food court". Never heard it before and I understand it just means the opposite.

One mall here has a food court on a top floor of the mall.
It is circular and has a dozen or more shops selling their
"wares", all varieties of fast food from national or local
chains. The chairs and tables are in the middle of the circle.
My last (believe me: LAST) visit there, I watched a particular
buss person cleaning tables and chairs over a 15 minute period
never once rinsing nor exchanging the towel/rag being used.
Talk about Grubby- pun intended.

The basic design feature of a food court is that the mall provides a common seating area that is convenient to a large number of fast food restaurant counters at the periphery. It's not that chic, but the one at my local mall is not particularly unpleasant either. One of the big appeals of a food court is that members of a party may each get food from a separate vendor and yet everyone can still sit together at one table.

"food court"

I ate in a "food court" in 1980 in Penang (formerly Georgetown), Malaysia. It was a common seating area with a ring of small, good food booths surrounding it, and the came to the customers and competing in getting your custom. I have also seen food courts here in the States that did not consist of (inter)national chains, but small one-off, locally-owned restaurants.

>it just means the opposite.

the opposite of what?
-joe (continuing an interminable theme) friday

I've been with people who are shopping with children, especially
teens and tweens, and the food court is great for them for
precisely this reason: they can each get what s/he desires, and
some harmony is restored or achieved at least for the interim.

Next time I will pay my respects to Food Court. (thank you both)

Do you have anything equivalent in Netherlands?
Or are all eating establishments local restaurants of whatever
size?

Sheesh. How much is there to say about food courts?

food court n. A designated area in public high schools wherein the inmates can conduct food fights (cf.) without disturbing other inmates; generally funded by the school lunch program.

Having taught in a number of high schools I can verify that.
However the teachers' lunch rooms were little better: they
did nothing but digest students.

Eek! Have we a cannibal on Board?

You say dey be eatin' at Wheaton???

It was almost that bad: I finally refused to eat with the teachers and sat with the students despite the food wars.
The teachers would go in, sit down and proceed with slandering
the kids. ("Do you know what Billy Goat did in class today? Well
let me tell you".)(That's nothing, you should hear Sally Wally
and her discussion with a couple others.) They could not wait
to repeat the gossip. Literally digest kids instead of "getting
away from" them, and letting things rest. It was hard to listen
to. So I left.

Sheesh. How much is there to say about food courts?

More than are dreamt of in your philosophy?

Apparently so. Was that a sling or an arrow, my philosophizing friend?

as that a sling or an arrow, my philosophizing friend?

Neither, just a late-night attempt (ahem) at humor. BTW, welcome to the asylum ...

truly. A whole discussion on Food Courts. Amazing.

To eat, or not to eat. That is the question.
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of lousy service at the Olive Garden,
Or take arms against the gastric pains in the food court
And by opposing them, end them? To dine: to sup,
No more, and by sup to say we end
The stomach ache and the thousand cultural shocks
The flesh is heir to, 'tis a consommé
Devoutly to be dished. To eat; to drink
To belch, perchance to digest, aye there's the rub.
For in that postprandial state what streams may come
When we have shuffled out of this shopping mall?
There's the respect that makes calamity of so long an excursion.
For who would bear the greasy lasagna at Sbarro,
The stale bread at Subway, the paltry portion of fries at Sonic,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bologna sandwich? Who would resist the food court
But that the dread of something after dinner
Akin to that which aflicts the traveller in
The undiscover'd country, whose burn
No Imodium AD can relieve.
Thus we rather bear the gastic pangs we have
Than fly to others that we know not of.
Thus conscience doth make anorexics of us all.
And the native hue of voracity
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action. - Soft you now!
Williams-Sonoma! Sale table, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

Brilliant! Your payment shall be a quarter pound of flesh....with fries...and a coke.

Thank you most humbly, as it appears it was I who was being prickly. My apologies.

@ alex - clap! clap! clap!
A hit! a hit! a palpable hit!

Je tire ma révérence .

Splendide!

Sooner or later, somebody does that on every forum Luke joins!!! Great!!!

Olly! Genial! They are wonderful! love the centre one, crossbred with Eeyore.

leave it to an Aussie...
-ron o.

How true: three forums three artist's renditions of sheep.
I like it.

Thanks olly: I appreciate it. I am with Bran, I like the one in the middle, sort of
kin to eeyore.

Well. I didn't actually draw you a sheep. I pilfered a sheep.
I like the Two legged one myself.

Wow! I did not even notice the two-legged one. Reminds me of
an email that floats around every few months, where a woman
rescued a dog born with only hind legs, rejected by its mother,
and now walking on hind legs. It's name is "Faith", and she takes
it to schools to use in a lecture she gives about living up to
one's potential.

At any rate, thanks, I really appreciate it.

Olly! Did you not notice that you were dealt a deadly insult?? Or were you just using superhuman restraint?

First look; and I liked the cross eyed one - the 8th one. A closer look; and I liked the 3rd one - the one with a floppy ear like a dog. The last one is, of course, perfect. Apparently, the structurally perfect is not necessarily the most attractive.

I hope not by me, if so, it was unintentional.

It wasn't you, Luke. It was tsuwm. He suggested that olly was from West Island.

Oh, I see, thanks,
I see: Aussie as opposed to Kiwi. Thanks much.

oy! I should be ignored for that transgression.

Apparently the structurally perfect is not necessarily the most attractive.

Ha! You hit the nail! I like them all. And I'm going to steal from the thief.

Here's a famous bit of European literature translated from the English into Esperanto. It starts at the bottom of the page. I like Zamenhof's punctuation.

Tja, I'm sorry zmjezhd and Remus , it's not for a punctuation I admire Shakespeare's text. I took this from somewhere else. Often on those pages 'search book' I get totally lost.