1 MAY 05: LOGAN'S -- RUN?

She wore a plain purple shirt, and stood behind a restaurant desk nibbling on a peanut. She said nothing to me, so I eventually assumed she was waiting on friends to join her for dinner. I didn't say anything to her - because her friend might be a former football player weighing 300 pounds.

I was almost alone in the restaurant foyer, standing near this woman for a couple of minutes. She nibbled a little, then chatted with a couple of other people around her. My dark green shirt couldn't have blended THAT well into the background -- because it was 5:30 p.m., not after dark.

After standing and waiting, a large-sized man walked in the front door wearing a cockeyed dark-blue Atlanta baseball cap. This quite casual-looking man said something unexpected: "Have you been helped, sir?" Since I hadn't been, he led me to a booth for dinner. Perhaps I should be thankful he didn't sit across from me, expecting a free meal.

As I sat at the booth, the woman wearing a purple shirt walked by me several times - escorting other customers to seats for dinner. So she DID work there after all! Maybe my outfit simply wasn't "fly" enough for her to let me in without a big tip.

Where did this curious customer service occur? It happened to me Saturday evening not at some dumpy diner, but at Logan's Roadhouse on Manchester Expressway. If this restaurant can afford fancy electronic pagers for customers, you'd think it could give the staff name tags to identify themselves.

You'd probably never recognize the staff from the customers at Logan's Roadhouse simply by glancing. Employees dress that casually - even wearing a cockeyed baseball cap on the job as greeters. What does it say when McDonald's and Burger King staff members look more "professional" than this?

At least my waiter at Logan's Roadhouse was helpful, even if soft-spoken -- and the dinner I ordered turned out OK. The teriyaki chicken was a bit skimpy on the sauce. But it came with such a large side order of broccoli, they must have thought I was a Texas vegetarian.

(My other side order for dinner was cinnamon apples - and when the dessert menu STARTS at $4.49 and goes up, you look for a sweet value wherever you can find it.)

Saturday marked only my second visit to Logan's Roadhouse. The first one was a Saturday afternoon a few years ago, with a widow woman from church who's now deceased. That old woman adored me so much, she could have put Tom Cruise's romance with Katie Holmes to shame....

The wait for lunch that afternoon was lengthy, and on this Saturday night at 5:30 p.m. a bigger crowd meant the same situation. In time I realized I should have brought something to read inside. But I'd just left a church service, so all I really had was a thick Bible - and the staff may have feared I'd stand up and start preaching.

There were TV sets to watch inside Logan's Roadhouse, of course - but the one closest to me showed a second-tier horse race on ESPN. It was followed by "Stories of Inspiration," which the network didn't feel inspired enough to closed-caption for me.

What about the peanuts, you may be asking? Yes, there was a pail of them at my booth -- but unlike the greeter up front, I didn't nibble any of them. It's been years since I unshelled a peanut, and Logan's Roadhouse didn't provide any "honey-roasted dust" for them.

All in all, my review of Logan's Roadhouse could be summed up this way: Go for the food. Watch your step around the peanut shells on the floor. And if someone on the staff doesn't treat you well, get the best description you can - because you'll need it.

E-MAIL UPDATE: Speaking of alleged mistreatment, we've heard again from Columbus public safety's biggest cyber-supporter:

Is our city safe? Not according to a grand jury committee.

Its just a matter of time before the Police stop answering any types of calls unless they are crimes in progress or motorvehicle crashes. You just wait and see.

If "IsOurCitySafe" is correct with his prediction, Columbus will move one step closer to becoming the "gateway to Alabama" - with no speeding enforcement on this side of the line, either.

And if this prediction is correct, what are Columbus police detectives going to do? They don't tend to respond to "crimes in progress." Columbus might wind up with more "private eyes" than on all cable TV channels put together.

This latest e-mail was accompanied by an editorial from last Tuesday's Columbus Ledger-Enquirer. It disclosed Chief Rick Boren is considering closing the Public Safety Center at 7:00 p.m. to save money. Once again, attorney Richard Hagler could get his way - with both police and suspects at home with their families by 9:00.

For some reason, the e-mail from IsOurCitySafe did NOT mention Mayor Bob Poydasheff's proposal to cut 16 public safety positions. Maybe he's working on an alternative plan - starting with cutting five Columbus Council positions at the polls next year.

Now for other selected shorts from the end of April:

+ A possible tornado was reported in southern Russell County. It knocked down trees, but apparently didn't damage any buildings - except maybe for the illegal moonshine stills no one admits to owning.

(It rained so hard in Columbus that some manhole covers on streets popped open. There's a lesson here for some high school football players - don't practice in the street this summer, especially if you're a lineman.)

+ Missing Georgia bride-to-be Jennifer Wilbanks was found in New Mexico. Willbanks admitted she vanished Tuesday because she was afraid about her weekend wedding near Atlanta. I knew she ran marathons, but this "Runaway Bride" set a new distance record.

(Some people in Duluth, Georgia say Jennifer Wilbanks should pay the bill for all the police officers who searched for her. This shouldn't be a problem -- since "The Insider" paid one million dollars for Mary Kay LeTourneau to tell HER story.)

+ Home Box Office premiered the TV-movie "Warm Springs," about the Meriwether County vacation home of Franklin Roosevelt. Hopefully the writers of this story didn't embellish history - for instance, by having the former President visit Port Columbus....

(WRBL revealed the other day a small part in "Warm Springs" was taken by Michael Jordan, who's the Columbus area's best-known Elvis Presley impersonator. If you're not sure what he looks like, here's a clue -- check the sideburns.)

+ Cascade Hills Church Pastor Bill Purvis said on the "Real Time" telecast God created the world "by fiat" -- which means "from nothing." I may never touch a Fiat sports car again....

(Then again, I'm a bit surprised Bill Purvis didn't illustrate this point by driving a Fiat onto the church stage. He drove a $100,000 Porsche there last year.)

+ Instant message to the promoters of a weekend rap concert at the Bradley Theatre: Maybe my thinking is out of line -- but if you're selling rap concert tickets at Big O's Package Store, I'm much less likely to go.

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