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I rarely eat out alone, I'd rather stay in and cook for myself! When I do eat alone, I like to read plays, usually comedies, especially Nicky Silver.

The back of the cereal box.

if i'm eating dinner alone, i'm sitting at the bar, and i'm reading the new yorker.

i like eating out alone. do it often and NEVER bring reading material. to me, bringing something to read is awkward. i'm good company alone or with others!

I dont like eating alone at restaurants, but I actually enjoy eating by myself at home. But I ALWAYS have to read while eating, or else I cannot enjoy the meal. I read trashy chick-lit like the shopaholic series, or young adult mind-numbing series like gossip girl and the sweet valley twins....yes, stamp loser on my forehead please.

I usually listen to my MP3 player rather than read nowadays. Usually I listen to the Brian Lehrer and Leonard Lopate shows in podcast form.

I cherish dining alone, since I always have someone or people around me all the time so I do not read, even if I have bought a book or magazine along the way, whether the restaurant is extremely busy, dead, or anything in between.

For me, it would be awkward to read at a restaurant because I become engrossed when I read novels (sci-fi/fantasy), and often find myself looking up 8-10 hours later w/o realizing that much time has passed. The restaurant wouldn't like me. I'm a little better with magazines (MHQ, Giant Robot) and usually come up for air a couple hours later.

Eating out alone is time to read _The New York Times_. It is still big enough that it needs a restaurant table to spread out on.

Harvey

I love eating alone, especially if I've had a rough day. I'll read anything from chick lit to Great Literature, but my favourite treat is a brand new comic book.

I love to eat alone since most of my friends are picky eater. I usually read fiction, travel book, chef books, even magazines. I like a me time!

Engine build articles in HOT ROD, or other car mags.

Since my work requires me to be away from home a little more than half the time, I do have to eat solo in restaurants frequently. I do not particularly enjoy it. Eating out is a social experience; to do so alone is akin to the solo practice of other pleasures best experienced with another...if you understand my meaning.

Other diners have their companions, it would be impolite to intrude. The server is not there to socialize with the patrons -- not to the extent I have in mind for a meal companion -- nor am I willing to be needy enough with a stranger to try to engage them to that extent. Also, I am sometimes in places where most of the patrons and servers have a different primary language than mine. It's lonely, even when the food is superb.

Once I get back home, I need to cook for the family for a few days. I can't face another restaurant and they are clamoring for me to cook (It's not my profession, but I enjoy it and have some skill. The rest of the family...well, they don't starve when I'm away, but cooking is not a priority much less a passion for them.) Once we get past that, we certainly go out and have a great time doing so...then I have to go back on travel.

I eat out alone a lot - locally for lunch and traveling on business. Always with a book, generally fiction [even at home]. I use a really convenient book holder/cover doohickey that holds the book open and makes reading and eating quite easy. Check it out at: http://www.jbcreations.net/
But I'll probably get a Kindle. Hope it's the conversation starter for me that it is for ocarol [actually my jb creations book holder has started lots of conversations].

Life can be boring if you are single, hard if you have family with young children and sad if you have to stay at home all because you don't have friends.

We have worked with families, children and community and feel we are all living in a world of isolation. Its hard to see family disintegration, single parents suffer in isolation and children lost in the wilderness.

Isolated young families of working parents with children lack support are find life harder to cope. We shun single parents and young adults desperate to find a partners and raise children. The social net work sites, dating agency for single and the culture of texting as a method to make friends speaks volumes about our society. The credit crunch, unemployment and crumbling economy are making life harder for people to muscle up the courage to go out and talk.

You will never be alone, Please Check out: http://www.meet-eat.com

I usually go with fiction but something that doesn't require a lot of concentration. Hemingway isn't the best choice when I have to stop reading every two minutes to reassuringly smile at the elderly couple that's about to set me up with their grandson so I'm not so sad.

Playboy, Penthouse, that sort of thing.

My favorite books to read while eating are either foodie books by Anthony Bourdain and Ruth Reichl, or books where the characters eat a lot. Mercedes Lackey is very good for that, as is L.M. Montgomery.

Friday morning is my coffee/pastry/book morning. I go down to the local bakery, have a seat at the counter, swivel around a few times to see if I got one of the good seat (full swivel necessary) and the have whatever the bakeress recommends that morning. She is awesome. She made pumpkin empanadas when I described them as a weekend treat of my childhood. (TRY THEM!) I take with me a book that I read simultanenously. For some reason Right now I'm reading BROTHERS by Yu Hua. Strongly suggest it. This morning I had a Sumatra blend and an almond flaky croissant. Most wondrous.

I find that eating alone allows me to fully employ my five senses in a way I could not if I was eating with friends and focused on side conversations. There's something vaguely secret agent-like in hiding behind a book (remember Wei Tang in Lust, Caution?). I like to dig into a Haruki Murakami or Hunter S. Thompson. Now I haven't had the guts yet to do this, but I wonder what reactions I would get if I opened up a copy of, say, The Kama Sutra (awk...).

Dickens

When I lived in Victoria, BC, I loved eating alone. There were pubs - plenty of them, and some really good ones - and I could wander downtown, stop at a good newsagent, pick up the most recent magazines (Atlantic, Harpers, Scientific American, sometimes Rolling Stone, sometimes Guitar Player, and whatever looked kinda intellectually interesting, like New Yorker, Civilization, etc.) and I'd buy three or four of those and settle into a pub with a stir-fry or a pot pie and some pints of excellent beer and enjoy a wonderful afternoon.

Alas, now I live in LA (the San Fernando Valley, really), and there are no pubs and almost no newsagents, and you have to drive to get anywhere, so an enjoyable four-pint experience is out of the question. I want to move back to Victoria!

Eating alone is one of the things that makes life worth living, and I always bring something to read as my dining companion if I don't have someone to spend time with, which is often. Some selections lately include Monocle magazine, New York Streetscapes, Dark Banquet: Blood and the Curious Lives of Blood Feeding Creatures, and The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality. I tend to read non-fiction more than fiction, but when I read fiction, I often find my food gets neglected a bit more....

Still, reading and eating are best friends, in my opinion.

There are some places I feel more comfortable with eating alone than in others. Cafes and teahouses are ideal. I actually touched on this topic in a blog post of mine: A Food Lover's Book of Days/Dining Alone. Life is Meals: A Food Lover's Book of Days by James and Kay Salter has a wonderful chapter entitled "Solitary Dinners" I really resonated with, and I think those of us who enjoy eating alone may enjoy it, too.

I have a quote from a book I was reading one Saturday, while eating, other solo readers and eaters might find interesting: “In roadside diners and late-night cafeterias, hotel lobbies and station cafes, we may dilute our feeling of isolation in a lonely public place and hence rediscover a distinctive sense of community.” - Alain de Botton, The Art of Travel.

When I eat alone, I make sure I have a small novel and my journal. I think it presents a real opportunity to engage with the food and the meal - it's also a chance to speak to the staff and learn a little more about the place you are eating. While servers and runners typically have no time to chat, I usually ask for the sommelier if I have some decent wine. Anyway, I read my book in between courses and take notes on the meal when I'm eating.