To get annoyed at people who grab a table in cafes while their friends/partners queue up and order?

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Went to a busy coffee shop this afternoon. Long queue etc. By the time I got mine, I was left waiting along with a few other people who had been served before me standing around with our coffees in our hands waiting for someone to leave and/or ask if they minded someone sitting at their table. What really got my goat was that there were 3 tables that were taken by people who had friends/partners in the queue and therefore did not have their drinks/food yet. I see this a lot. Sometimes the amount of time it takes for someone to queue up, order and get their food/beverages is around the same time someone else could have sat down and finished what they ordered.

Luckily after a short time, a table became free which I was able to take. It just annoys me that people do this. I think if we have a queuing system for food etc surely people with the food should get first dibs on the tables. Would it ever be appropriate to confront someone and turf them off their seat?

Lucozade for a hangover
Or proper coca cola, not diet.

And apologies if this has already been said but what the fuck type of queue are you in that you take someone's table and say to them, I'll be finished by the time your drink/food is bought over by the people you are waiting for?

How long is the queue then? You can drink a hot coffee in the time it takes someone else to buy their own drink?
If you are going to drink it that quick you might as well get a bloody takeaway, that's the most stupid thing I have ever heard.

In my entire life I have never known anyone go into a cafe with someone, all of you stand in the queue and then you all go and see if there is space to sit down.
Why would anyone do that? It's not logical.

And drama if you tried that with me, I would swiftly remove your food/drink from my table and ignore you.

This is why I won't take my son to a cafe/fast food place if it looks busy. He won't go off and save a table, he's too shy, so we are basically one unit looking around - and you don't stand a chance when multiple families of four have split up to cover the entire area.

In my entire life I have never known anyone go into a café with someone, all of you stand in the queue and then you all go and see if there is space to sit down

Me too. Seriously, are there people outside Planet Mumsnet who actually do this? I never realised there were so many things to get offended about till I joined this website.

Tantrums - not everyone is having a hot drink - if I'm getting lunch I'll just have water. It doesn't take me long to eat a sandwich, I just would like to sit down to eat the food I have paid for whilst doing so.

Maybe this is a London thing, but certainly in many of the major museums there are several different food counters, the cafe can be very spread out so your child could potentially be out of sight whilst you, yes, spend a long time queuing. And I'll say it again - if I'm getting several different plated items they would not fit on one tray - how am I meant to carry that by myself? And if it's just me and DD, I am NOT, whatever MN thinks, going to sit her on some distant table whilst I queue up, and if I was by myself I wouldn't dream of leaving my coat or bag on a chair to save it, I might as well shout very loudly 'here's my unattended stuff, feel free to steal it'. Jesus, I can't believe this needs fucking spelling out. I understand that a lot of people in the queue might be annoying, but at least it's not stopping anyone from eating their food that they have paid for, and that the cafe owners have provided tables for.

And going somewhere else, which could easily be just as busy, is not always an option. It wasn't an option the other day when I met my sister in her lunch hour (nowhere else nearby to go), and excuse me for not realising how busy it would be.

And to all of you saying, I've NEVER EVER IN MY LIFE SEEN THIS, NO-ONE I KNOW DOES THIS - you don't know everyone. I know I'm not alone, and I know I'm not lying. And yes, it's a small point in the grander scheme of things but so what? D'you say that on all the baby name threads, or sleb twaddle, or anything else of no real importance threads that people start?

Well I know I do not everyone. That's why I said i have never known anyone that does this.

Not that no one does this-fact. FFS

And are you actually trying to say that the queues in the cafes that you go to are so long, you have time to sit and eat your lunch before the person in question returns to their table?

i have never seen a cafe with a queue that long.
i have never seen it. Not- it does not happen. Just to clarify.

Fucking hell. how can anyone get so worked up over a non issue.
Sit down, stand up, queue/don't queue.
If there's no where to sit go somewhere else.

I think we need a solution to this...

There are too many people in the world and not enough tables.

We could employ all those benefit scroungers to be tables, two birds with one stone.

See, easy.

Shoe on shoe off thread,

Ummmmm hasn't been done for a while....

Tantrum - sorry, just the first bit of that rant was aimed at you. Oh, and try the V&A or the Natural History Museum at the weekend (well, don't, actually, it's a mare), I am neither joking nor lying when I say that the queues can be very long, especially if you have to go to one section for hot food, another for sarnies and a third for drinks - oh, and then queue up to pay.

reeling - you know you don't have to bother with this thread, don't you? If it's such a non-issue for you, why are you here?

reeling - you know you don't have to bother with this thread, don't you? If it's such a non-issue for you, why are you here?

HEAR HEAR MRS O.

I have often wondered at poster be moaning the trite little thread then promptly feel the need to comment on it...

We could put gingham table cloths over the scrounging gits, then we wouldn't have to look them in the eye.

And balance a vase of lovely flowers on their backs.

Eventually the thread will finish and everyone will go back to doing what they always do! I doubt whether anyone has changed their mind.

I have Satin , I will never, ever go anywhere ever again where they don't have gingham tablecloths.

And human tables.

No I wasn't drunk!

It's Irn Bru for hangovers.

I hate Irn Bru, it tastes like girders.

Cripes!

It's true.

Human tables made of orange guurders.

It really irritates me. I got there first yet can't sit own because people that arrived after me bag tables. When there is just you and a child you can't bagsie a table. It makes me cross.

I think it is annoying when people behind you bag tables. Unfair that people who are on their own are disadvantaged. However, it think it is ok to do it with small children, elderly relatives or some other similar reason.

It's also the performance that people make about bagging the table - oh Mary quick go and grab that one - the one you were probably walking towards with tray as they start to queue....