Outdone and overpriced

Last weekend, the day we feared had finally become a reality. Margaritaville opened its doors in the Westgate center in Glendale. Well, most everyone thinks this to be a wonderful experience. . .but not if you work in a neighboring restaurant like my wife and me. Fox Sports Grill looked like a ghost town this last weekend. I half expected to see a tumbleweed blow across the dining room floor. I know. I know. Why would a tumbleweed blow across a dining room? Well because that's what happens in a ghost town. Anyway, I digress. We are no longer the hot spot at Westgate. And it makes sense. . .We were seriously outdone. Margaritaville is an amazing sight. It's a 2-story, half indoor, half outdoor club-like atmosphere with tiki statues with flames on top, bars shaped like boats and men walking around on stilts. Ok I don't understand the whole men on stilts thing, but it's still a sight. Over the weekend I had to get used to seeing margaritaville pagers and to-go containers on the bar from people waiting to be paged for their table and people who had just finished there. I became the sideshow while they waited for their real entertainment for the evening. And I agree that a man on stilts beats me any day. Even after we cleaned up and were leaving Fox at 1 AM, we could hear the music, laughter, and screaming coming from margaritaville, still packed out. This would worry me more, but I didn't hear many great things about it from people that went there. I heard about extremely overpriced drinks, waiting periods of 25-30 minutes just to get a beer, and not much seating room for an amazingly large restaurant. After visiting it myself, I'm not too worried. Yes it is a really cool place, but probably one of the worst aspects of it is that you can barely hear the person next to you because the music is so loud. The atmosphere was fun and relaxed, but it was also just as annoying. As for the food and service, not impressed at all. The food was slow, expensive, and not very good. Plus it made Natalie sick. The drinks were what blew me away. I paid $7 for an 8 oz margarita. The same type of margarita, but twice the size at Fox would have been $5.75. They even have a margarita there that is $13. No thanks. Of course. . .I'll be over at Fox. Because I work there. . .