Last week in Memphis a couple ate $100 worth of food at Buckley's restaurant and then skedaddled. The restaurant owners promptly sent out an e-mail blast to its electronic mailing list that contained photos taken by security cameras. It turns out that the couple returned the next morning to pay the bill, claiming they'd just forgotten.

But it got me thinking about dine and ditches--I'm wondering if the phenomenon has gotten more common as the economy has worsened. As a waitress I was stiffed a few times--devastating after a couple hours of serious work, but even more so for the restaurant that has to eat the cost.

I do have my own dine and ditch experience to come clean about. I was 12 years old, on a ski vacation with my parents and brother in Cervinia, Italy. We went for a late lunch, during which the waiters all went off duty and stood around drinking and guffawing in their undershirts, while a truck pulled up with its motor running and unloaded crates of produce, exhaust fumes filling the dining room. An excrable lunch and miserable service culminated in being presented a bill that reflected a number of mysterious extra charges. My dad, not a patient, long-suffering man, asked us to quietly stand up and walk to the door without looking back. Outside, when my mother realized what had happened, she bolted, running down the snowy street and leaving me and my six-year-old brother to potential run-ins with the carabinieri.

But that's my only time, I swear.