If you can’t eat pizza, opt for noodles

One of my life codes is pretty simple: Because I live in Spokane, when I go out to eat, I don’t have to wait for a table. That’s not to say I won’t make a reservation at a decent restaurant — Luna, for example, or maybe Churchill’s Steakhouse — and be patient until my table opens up.

But when I go to a restaurant on a whim, a pizza place say, in the early evening and find not only the place packed but lines of hopeful diners waiting to get in, I turn around and go some place else. I don’t care how good the food is supposed to be. In the Spokane of 2012, you can pretty much find any kind of food you want, served well, without having to wait. And I don’t — wait, that is.

I’ve heard, for example, that the pizzas at South Perry Pizza are great. I don’t know because I’ve never eaten any. I went there on Friday and couldn’t get in. It was 5:40 p.m., an early time to dine even by Spokane standards. Even so, all the tables were taken, and at least a dozen people were waiting. My dining-out life code went online: My brother and I turned around and left.

We ended up at the place pictured above: Asia Restaurant , which sits alongside the Albertson’s at 57th and Regal. We got right in, ordered — I had the yaki soba noodle combination, my brother the Mongolian short ribs — and enjoyed ourselves immensely.

In fact, we were probably in and out before a table at the pizza place would have opened up. So, I’ll try South Perry Pizza another time. But if I can’t get in, no problem. I’ll just find someplace else.

It’s good to live by a code. Avoid a lot of disappointment that way.