The 'reference' implementation of the protocol, https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lnd is still in beta, with warnings about how users could lose all their money. AFAIK, there's no stable/reliable software out there.

And don't forget, ordinary users need to monitor the blockchain 24/7 in order not to lose their money by a counterparty closing their channel fraudulently.

It's far from ready for use.

> As of this writing, lnd is still in beta and it is considered #reckless to put any life altering amounts of BTC into the network.

Well I will take them by their word.

To get a pleasant experience today you also need to rely on third-parties to manage your channel, the very thing Bitcoin was set out to avoid.

Define pleasant. There a quite a few people happily using umbrel or similar products that allow you on the LN with minimal hassle.

Install app on phone, ready to receive and then send to anyone.

Umbrel and similar aren't even the same playing field here. Even if we disregard the tedious setup, you'll still have to manually open, close and refill channels.

It's disingenuous to suggest LN is even close to convenient without third-party reliance.

We use it at a cafe and receive several orders a day with people paying by lightning

Do you have a feel for whether those orders are cryptocurrency workers or normal people who happen to prefer it to a credit card?

well I'm living in Guatemala at Lake Atitlan. We have quite a movement of crypto enthusiasm so the people that are using it are "normal" people who are part of that crypto group. We also have a Lamassu "cryptomat" for people to exchange the local currency to Bitcoin and the crypto group has been advocating people to use Muun wallet, which is easy for the average person to kind of have on-chain and lightning capability.