[Pedestrian]

^^The Onion causes me to ROTFL as usual.

Meanwhile:

Some of SF’s most popular restaurants are turning away diners as coronavirus cases surge
Justin Phillips July 31, 2020 Updated: Aug. 3, 2020 9:06 a.m.

At a time when restaurants in the Bay Area are struggling to generate revenue, some of San Francisco’s most celebrated chefs and restaurant owners are doing what previously might have been unthinkable: telling diners to stay away.

Some restaurants are limiting outdoor seating further than required by shelter-in-place orders and turning away countless patio customers as a result. Others are opting to take less money by running as nonprofits. It’s a complicated stance to take as the restaurant industry crumbles, yet in their eyes, it’s a necessary one as coronavirus cases spike across the state.

But turning away dollars, be it through choosing not to expand takeout options or venture into outdoor dining, isn’t without consequences. Some of San Francisco’s best restaurants say they are inching closer to the prospect of permanently closing.

Mourad Lahlou has kept his Michelin-starred Mourad closed during the pandemic and has offered only limited takeout service at his other restaurant, Aziza. All the while, bills are piling up for both locations, investor money has run dry, and rent still needs to be paid, he said.

“I’m broke as f—,” said Lahlou, who canceled his honeymoon this year because of the steep drop in revenue at his restaurants . . . . "I just don’t want to die, and I don’t want other people to die simply to make some money” . . . .

Sharon Ardiana, the chef-owner of local Italian restaurants Gialina, Ardiana and Ragazza, is selling pizzas and salads to go but declined to offer outdoor dining at Ragazza, even though it has a gazebo in back . . . . to do so would mean diners would have to walk through the restaurant to get to it, and her rule since the start of the pandemic has been to limit access to the interior of the restaurant to staff.

A more significant reason for keeping the outdoor area of Ragazza off limits, though, is the thought of her staff having to be what she calls “mask police,” Ardiana said.

“I don’t want to have to argue with someone over their need to point out that they’re sitting outside so they’re allowed to not have a mask on. There are other diners around, and my employees, that I have to worry about,” she said. “People are funny because right now, they really don’t want to be told what to do. I don’t want to have be anyone’s mother. But I can’t help but worry about people.”

San Francisco’s only Guamanian restaurant, Prubechu, moved its Mission District dining room outdoors in June when the city approved such operations. But it’s choosing to serve half the number of diners it’s technically allowed to serve, even while following social distancing protocols. “Doubling our capacity would financially bring us where we need to be, but we don’t want to be a catalyst for the spread of the virus. ... We have to protect our diners from themselves, in some ways” . . . .

https://www.sfchronicle.com/food/art...t-15447783.php