shab-LISS

Restaurant servers say funny things sometimes.  Like one time, when we were skiing in Utah, we had a waiter who also skied. He told us he would be in the Olympics one day and we would know him because his name was Kraft. "Like the cheese," he said.

We asked him what the soup du jour was and he said, "I don't know. It changes every day!"

Another time, we were having dinner at a Red Lobster. We were doing so in memory of an acquaintance who had died a year before. He used to treat us to dinner at Red Lobster, mostly because he could eat his own weight in lobster on all-you-can-eat night. He was a nice man and we always remember him when we see a Red Lobster.

On this night, we asked the waitress about the wine list. She recommended the Chablis but pronounced it shab-LISS. We laughed behind her back about the mispronunciation but it stuck. For the past I-don't-know-how-many years, we've pronounced Chablis as shab-LISS.

Then, one day very recently, we went to lunch at a nice restaurant near our town's hockey arena. It's in the clubhouse of a golf course and not only does it have good food and a nice wine list, it has amazing views from its outdoor patio. Without even thinking about it, I ordered a slab-LISS with my meal. 

The waitress said nothing but no doubt she was laughing behind my back.

I deserved it.