Observation

We had dinner last evening at the Castle Tavern. It's a charming pub and restaurant across from Inverness Castle. We were seated near a pair of young American girls. I'd say they were in their early 20s.  When the waitress brought them their bill they asked if she could split the check for them. The waitress asked them if they were paying with a card. The girls replied that they were paying in cash. I inwardly frowned. Why did they need to split the bill if they were paying in cash? I think the waitress wondered the same thing because she hesitated ever so briefly before telling them she could split it when they paid.

Off the waitress went and the girls sat mulling over their bill. They were having a difficult time determining who owed what. They even debated whether a twenty was too much for one of them to pay without actually reaching a conclusion. The waitress returned and the girls sheepishly handed her their bill.

Now this is where I had to literally stifle a laugh. The girls had spent the better part of five minutes trying to suss out how much each owed, and could not reach an agreement. The waitress picked up the bill, gave it a quick look, and tallied the first girl's order in less time than it took me to write this paragraph. "Yours is eight pounds forty-five," she said to the first girl as took her money. As she took the second girl's money, she started to tally her order but apparently changed her mind and said, "I'll take the rest from yours."

And that's a shining example of the American education system. No child is left behind because they go nowhere.