Review of Moon Under Water restaurant in St. Petersburg, Florida

Moon Under Water is a British Colonial Indian restaurant in St. Pete, Florida. It has terrific atmosphere, evoking a sort of clubby Englishness in 19th century India. Gin and tonics all around, what? It has a great reputation. We have had lunch there several times over the past three years. However...

I used to consider going there a Treat Yourself kind of experience, a place one would take guests because after all, they deserve something special that we wouldn't allow ourselves just every day of the week. No more. It is now more a 50% positive experience.

The food is still good, very good, in fact. But it feels like a cost accountant is now running the place. Portions have become smaller. And the menu has become confusing, with base prices for dishes and then additional charges for all sorts of add-ons that had formerly been part of the original dish. For instance, curried chicken $x. Add Tikka Masala sauce, $(x+2). Add naan bread, $2 more. Add chutney, $2 more. It would be far clearer to list two versions of the dish - one plain and one with all the trimmings - at two prices. Period. As it is now, the patron feels like s/he has to ask just exactly what would such and such a combination cost, just to have a sense of what to expect. To mitigate these (quasi-hidden) price increases, the restaurant now offers unlimited servings of rice. That is definitely welcome but does not sufficiently counterbalance the rest.

ALSO, the naan is terrible, which is unforgivable in an Indian restaurant. It tastes like grocery store bought average quality pita - thick, dry and stale. And IT costs $2.75 for a side order of two pieces! (Of course, that is plenty, since you can't eat it anyway.)

If any of you readers has been to Moon Under Water recently, please tell me what you think.

Doctors trending to the female persuasion?

Well, I've got a new theory. And a recent discussion with my (female) doctor more or less confirmed it. But only the manifestation, not the cause. And the cause is what interests me and is the subject of my speculation here.


Okay, plain English, please. It appears to me that a lot of doctors these days are female. Whole practices are made up of females only. And not just OB/GYNs (although the male doctors are evidently complaining that they experience discrimination in this field by patients (women) who - get this - prefer to go to women doctors!) Anyway, back to my theory. More and more women are going into medicine (med school classes that used to be 28-30% female are now 50% or even a majority of women). More and more articles are being written about how the practice of medicine is no longer very lucrative, for whatever reason. And about how male doctors want to have a life - "spend more time with their families," (a politician's well-worn euphemism for wanting to get out).

My theory is that men are getting out of the business because it doesn't pay as well as it used to, and women have historically been willing to take lower-paying work (look at teaching, for example). So as men move away from medicine, the opportunities open up significantly for women to move in.

Just a theory to explain an increasingly obvious trend. Comments, anyone?