Last weekend found me wandering around town like an overmedicated mental patient, confused because I no longer live where I used to live. It’s the same town, but now I’m lost. To stabilize myself, I spent money I didn’t have.

Specifically, I spent money on food. There’s a fancy new restaurant in town I’d been wanting to try. I took my bewildered self there for lunch. That’s when I encountered an annoying but all-too-common situation: I was treated as less important than other diners because I was eating alone.

Does this happen to anyone else? Couples, groups of laughing friends, families with small children arrive after me and get seated first. When I am offered a seat, it’s one that nobody wants, in a back corner behind a cart full of overflowing bus tubs. The waitperson assigned to me is nowhere to be found during most of the meal; it takes forever to complete every step of the process, and by the time I’ve paid and left, I’m already hungry again.

Besides being annoying, this kind of treatment is a blow to the ego. I do appreciate the occasional reminder that I’m not the absolute center of the universe, but that day I wanted to be pampered and reassured. I wanted to spend money, eat well, and feel like a big shot. Or a medium shot. I’d even have settled for being a half-shot, as long as I wasn’t being ignored.

The fancy restaurant wouldn’t give me a chance. I stood in the please-wait-to-be-seated area for what felt like ten years while one waitron after another walked by me without saying a word. Did they think I was waiting for someone else? Why didn’t they bother to ask? Maybe it was one of those uptight joints where only the host/hostess can seat you and nobody else is allowed to even look at you unless they are your designated server. Those places really bug me. My imagination runs away with me and I picture the zombielike employees getting beaten for speaking to the wrong customer.

At last, the hostess noticed me. She attempted to seat me at an undesirable table when there were many better ones free and empty. I decided all of a sudden to take no more guff from such people. I refused her offering. “I’ll take that one, over there,” I announced, already halfway to the table of my choice. I flounced into my seat and started brainstorming. My hostess disappeared without a word. Her next move would probably be to forget about me. How could I conjure up some good service in this place?

That’s when I got the best idea I’ve had in a long time. I wasn’t sure it would work, but I had to try. I pulled out my journal, opened to a blank page and wrote the name of the restaurant in large letters at the top. Under that I wrote the date. Then I started jotting down observations about the décor, pausing frequently to tap my pen against my teeth and peer critically at the food on other people’s tables.

Just like that, the hostess was at my side, asking if anyone had taken my order taken yet. “No, they haven’t,” I answered. “And I’d like to see a drink list,” I added sternly.

“Oh, of course,” she said, scurrying off to retrieve one. When she returned, I was copying phrases from the menu into my notebook. “I’ll get your server,” she said, and she ran off to light a fire under someone’s ass.

My server was friendly, helpful, and clearly intimidated by my page full of comments, which she kept glancing at while she answered my questions about the menu. I ordered and she ran off almost before I was finished speaking. The food arrived quickly. It was delicious, and I was famished. Having gotten totally caught up in my role by this point, I continued to write with one hand while shoving food into my mouth with the other.

I was Secret Critic Extraordinaire, and I made all kinds of ridiculous faces to match. I was delighted by the salad dressing. I was perplexed by the art on the walls. I held my silverware up to the light and examined it for spots. I chewed my food with the same faraway look people get at wine tastings. Occasionally I paused to flip through the pages in my notebook, as if looking to compare my meal to other recent fine dining experiences.

My server and my hostess visited me many times during the meal. Whatever I wanted, I got. After a while I started to feel like a jerk. These women were trying too hard to please me. It was uncomfortable. I also felt like a crazy person, perhaps an undermedicated one, because I’d almost convinced myself that I really was a famous food critic.

I couldn’t stop taking notes on everything. Writing in my journal about the shape and weight of a saltshaker made me wonder what the hell I was doing in an overpriced restaurant when I could be outside walking by the ocean. Everything was fake and weird and if this was the price I had to pay for good service, I wasn’t sure it was worth it.

I finally stumbled out of there into an excessively bright afternoon, with shame and gleeful triumph competing in my drunken brain. And that’s pretty much the only thing I remember from this past week.