If you ever feel like you must be the most unobservant person in the world, remember: I once spent half a year failing to notice that my new favourite restaurant was a money-laundering front for the Ukrainian mafia.
(I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but in retrospect, the fact that it was always dead no matter the time of day – I think the busiest I ever saw it was five people, myself included – well, that should have been a tipoff. Also, the waitstaff kept calling me “Mr. Prokopetz”, which I had assumed was just part of the restaurant’s gimmick, but given that “Prokopetz” is a Ukrainian surname, I’m now force to wonder whether they’d thought I was, you know, in the business. I just liked the pierogi!)
What I need to know is how on earth did OP finally realize his favorite restaurant was a money-laundering front for the mafia.
I’d like to say I put together the clues, but in reality, I just showed up one day to find that the place had been indefinitely shut down, and later learned it was because the managers had all been arrested.
What I really want to know is how good the food was?
Excellent, if your tastes run to the “heavy cream and too much garlic” end of the spectrum.
Every crime front I’ve ever eaten at has had completely amazing food, honestly. I am pretty convinced that if you want to open a front, you don’t choose “restaurant” as your front-business unless you have a relative who loves to cook.
It tickles me that this is evidently a sufficiently common experience that people find it relatable. (Seriously, check the notes!) We should write reviews or something.
did I just read the line “every crime front I’ve ever eaten at” with my own two eyes
Look, I went to college and lived my early adulthood in a town whose entire thing was import/export, and we had a lot of restaurants that were suspiciously empty except when they were closed and filled with very serious men in nice clothes.
They were usually run by someone who was about the right age to be some adult’s parents or grandparents, and in the case of the two Korean restaurants matching this description, they didn’t speak English. Universally though, they were very pleased to see customers, very proud of their cooking, and very very interested in keeping us far away from the aforementioned serious men in nice clothes. And despite having huge dining rooms and never having more than a couple customers, they never went out of business.
Also, because I am very, very stupid and sometimes don’t think before I talk, I once said loudly, over the phone, while sitting in one of these places, “Hey! Yeah if you want to meet us, we’re eating at [place]. You know…[place]? You totally know it. The Front, on Warwick st!”
The looks I got from every single employee were amazing and then I left.
We had a corner store/deli-place near our apartment in college. Everyone knew they were in on something and no one cared because they looked out for their customers and their neighborhood as a whole.
They started stocking my favorites because I mentioned them within hearing range once, would tell their “vendors” to move out of the way if we stopped in. I walked a different route home and got harassed one night and they asked after me. When they found out what happened, they declared “Consider it taken care of, you should never be afraid around here.” Never happened again.
Everyone needs their friendly neighborhood crime lord.
THERE’S A GUY SCALING THE TRUMP TOWER IN NYC WITH GIANT SUCTION CUPS LIKE A MISSION IMPOSSIBLE STUNT AND IM LAUGHING
UPDATE: OKAY SO police are all over and they
sent a window washer platform down from the top of the building but it was too
far above him so then sent it back up and police just shattered a window
slightly above him to try to get him and now he’s moving away from the hole in
the window and continuing up he’s been climbing for like an hour now and they
cant figure out how to get him down this is so incredible
UPDATE: LOOK AT HIM GO
UPDATE: they just inflated a giant inflatable on 56th street a third of nyc is in gridlock bc of this guy climbing the trump tower i cannOT BELIEVE
UPDATE: he’s on the 18th floor this so surreal
UPDATE: we’re approaching hour 2 of the climb and since the last update he’s made it up at least another 3 floors
UPDATE: SOMEONE TOOK A PICTURE OF HIM FROM INSIDE THE TOWER
A HERO
update: apparently his name is steve and he’s from virginia
ASCEND, STEVE
UPDATE: they just used suction cups to pull two panes of glass into the building a few floors above him
you know what they always say. you cant fight fire with fire, but you should always fight suction cups with suction cups
UPDATE: HE’S TRYING TO GET AWAY FROM THEM STILL IM CRYING WHAT THE ENTIRE FUCK IS 2016????
honestly “i’ll do whatever you want” “then perish” is the single most powerful exchange possible in the english language and it’s from some bizarre “hewwo” obama rp
And there was that other post where someone dreamt that Obama said “violence for violence is the rule of beasts” like what is it about Obama that makes people come up with such raw fucking dialogue for him
my mother had a dream where he lived in the forest and she had a cigarette with him and he said “to become god is the loneliest achievement of them all” and put it out and walked into the mist and i’ve never fucking forgotten that
memeotional 