The Hippo Glass Story

Per Evan's request.

The saga begins when Evan and Jenn went to eat at Whispering Pines for the first time (sometime in 2008 or 2009). They later reported to me about how good the food was and about a particularly interesting detail of the charming decor: the restaurant served wine in Fat Bastard hippopotamus glasses! For those of you who don't know, Fat Bastard is a brand of wine and their logo is a hippo:

At the end of my 2009/2010 holiday visit to Oklahoma, Evan and Jenn took me on my virgin culinary voyage of Whispering Pines:

Here are the three of us pictured at the end of our meal. You can see an example of the famous glasses on the table in front of me. On this occasion, I asked our waiter whether it would be possible for me to purchase a couple of the glasses. He said that normally (especially as I love hippos and live in France) he would just give them to me, but that he couldn't that day as they currently had only the exact amount to set their tables. He said he'd be sure to give me two glasses next time I was back.

Skip forward to November 2010 when I phoned Whispering Pines to purchase a gift certificate for Mom and Mike for Christmas. I was surprised and flattered when the Whispering Pines man (unfortunately, I don't know his name) remembered me and mentioned still owing me the hippo glasses.

Skip forward again to March 6, 2011 when I went out to Whispering Pines to pay for the room for Mom and Mike's wedding night. I still did not say anything about the glasses, but the man asked me if I was the one from France who liked hippos to which I responded in the affirmative. He left the counter for a few moments and came back with a box of six hippo wine glasses for me! (They no longer use them to set their tables. They now have special "Whispering Pines" wine glasses.) And I was able to get all six of them back home to France safe and sound in spite of occasional perilous overhead bin space arrangements on the airplanes.

Now I must say I'm feeling like quite the preferred customer at Whispering Pines. During our March 9 early birthday dinner for Mom, Jenn and I, the waiter kept referring to me by name. It was "Tanya this, Tanya that" throughout the whole dinner! If you don't believe me, just ask Ev. Here is the happy dinner crew: