I always appreciate Larry's opinion and his refusal to assume that racism is the first (or even the second or third) most likely motive for anything he hears about. The letter writer also shed a lot of clarity on this issue for me.

Wow! I never realized that customers were such an inconvenience to restaurant hostesses and waiters. So, I should put up with a table I don't like because it is too hard for servers to serve another table? Wow! And wow again. Oh, and I know the post is not quite on the topic of the letters. I am just really shocked. "Customers just see an empty table and assume they can sit there." Why not? Unless the table is reserved, customers should be able to sit wherever they darn please, provided the places that please them are not occupied by others. If it is too hard for the server of that section to juggle two tables, they can ask their colleagues with fewer tables to fill in in exchange for an in-kind favor or the tips from the table or whatever the arrangement. I don't work in the restaurant business, but in my work, when the customer should have gone to Associate A and ended up with Associate B, who happens to have too much to juggle, Associate A just steps in and serves the customer, even if the customer is not in Associate A's "section." That way, our customers are happy and they come back. If Associate A sits there twiddling his/her thumbs when Associate B juggles two customers, both customers are unhappy.

You don't make 2.18 an hour. You are not completely dependent upon tips. Unhappy customers tip less.