Breadcrumbs Belong on the Table, iPhones Don't....

Every now and then I'll spill a fucking gingerale on top of someone's bald head.

Every now and then I'll fucking boot a tray of plates and watch as they hit the ground and shatter.

Every now and then these minimal mistakes happen. Fuck, shit happens every day in every profession. 

Am I sorry for these mishaps? 

No! I don't give a fuck! 

Am I sorry that--in my manic haste to do 1,000 things at once--I spilled your precious martini all over the table, and watched as it flooded the shit out of your precious iPhone?

No! Because--like I said--I don't give a fuck, and I certainly don't have any sympathy for you. 

Because....

Silverware, glasses, plates, and breadcrumbs belong on the table; iPhones don't. 

I mean, customers all too often regard their waitstaff as mindless, stupid fucking assholes to begin with anyways, so I don't understand why they would ever trust their $650 dollar piece of equipment on a table  where the exchange of food and drink is all too often being made. 

Besides, what kind of an arrogant asshole thinks it's okay to have his phone stick out like a malignant tumor? Apparently he is okay with the rude, pompous message that he is sending to not only his company, but the fellow dining customers in the restaurant. And, don't think it's okay to answer that son-of-a-bitch in the middle of the dining room.

I mean, there's a reason why bathrooms exist apart from the dining room; and that's because NO ONE wants to deal with your shit. So, piss off somewhere else. 

Thanks 

Not-So-Merry A Time of Year

While this is the preferred season of the year for many human beings--with the holidays rapidly approaching; gifts, family, friends, eggnog and brandy--it is a time that--because of the restaurant industry--I fucking despise.

Typically, the holiday season brings an abundance of business--and that is good; I am not complaining--but sometimes money isn't everything. You could tell me, right now, that I am going to make 8 grand over the course of the next 2 months, and I still wouldn't give a flying fuck!

As waiters, we are required to work Thanksgiving, Christmas eve, and both New Year's eve and New Year's day. In this way, our lives are forfeited for the happiness of others. I wake up on each holiday at 9 a.m., eat a quick breakfast, make a few obligatory phone calls, then head to the restaurant to work a 10 hour shift. My holiday feasting is usually done on the fly--sometimes not at all.

So with that being said, I think it is fair to speak on behalf of all restaurant employees when I say to holiday customers, "show some fucking courtesy, patience, and respect to those that work tirelessly on holidays to give your family a pleasant experience."


Because....

If it were up to us, we would be home with our loved ones; laughing, joking, pigging out, watching football, catching a sick buzz, and not having a single fucking worry in the world--especially one that pertains to whether or not you received your turkey dinner with ALL dark meat, or whatever-the-fuck.

2 Mass-Ave Bums Chew-and-Screw, Almost!

A couple of Mass-Ave bums came into the restaurant on Sunday night. Now, from the onset of their arrival, it was clear that they were a little misplaced; I mean--fuck--they stuck out like sore thumbs. One--who clearly didn’t graduate from Harvard, although his hooded sweatshirt offered otherwise--had a vicious, grizzly red beard that covered half his face. The other--who had a gait presumably altered by alcohol consumption--sported a pair of wonderful, fingerless mittens; both were decked out in jackets that could dub as parachutes. 

As they sat at the table--hunched over in despair--I approached them with a certain neutrality. Hey, bums gotta eat too! Let’s not jump to conclusions, yet! I kindly took their order, which was 2 plates of stuffed sole, and served them the complimentary bread, butter, and mushrooms. After they devoured the 2 pieces of bread, they asked for more, and more, and more. After they had enough yeast in their stomachs to sustain a distillery, I brought them their soles. The food disappeared in seconds as food debris smattered about in the air. Newburg sauce dangled like tinsel in Grizzly Adams’ beard, while a pool of shimmering butter spewed off the other guy’s chin. 

An ecstatic--bordering perverse--look gleamed in each other’s eyes. This could have been attributed to the vitreous effects of alcohol, the pure gluttony just exercised, or, more pertinently, to the idea that was undoubtedly brewing in their heads. 

I placed the bill amongst the remaining scree of breadcrumbs and saliva, and waited nearby, vigilantly monitoring the tailbones of my bums. 

Bummer!

I noticed the only thing green at the table, was the mutated plaque in between the teeth of bum number 1; the only Franklin being waved around was the one belonging to the batter’s glove bum number 2 was wearing around his right hand. 

Red Flags started to erupt as bum number 1--Grizzly Adams--took off, in a manic haste, towards the front door. Then, it hit me: how ironic was it that 2 creatures, such as those, would be feeding on sole--when in fact there was nothing soulful about their actions. Bum number 1 reached his demise as he smacked into the front door in a cataclysmic collision. Just as he fell to the earth, his pants, likewise, fell from his hips to his ankles. Quickly, he recovered just in time to make a run for it. As he did, I could hear him screaming, “I’m gonna get you!!! Sleep with one-eye open!!!” 

Taking Bum number 1’s lead, bum number 2 tried to escape by running for the front door. However, a phalanx of servers--myself included--tripped him up enough to land him directly on his ass. Wow, what a pain in the bum?! He sat there--in a submissive bow of defeat--long enough for the cops to arrive and apprehend him.

This, surely, had to have been some kind of karmic punishment, punishing my inability--my downright refusal--to give spare change to the Mass-Ave Bums; for if I had been contributing to their alms, then maybe they could have afforded a night out on the town. Damn! 

Schizophrenic Psychopaths

Restaurant waiters are nothing more than schizophrenic psychopaths.

We approach tables with a bullshit facade--in hopes of pursuing that 20% tip--when, in actuality, we retreat to the confines of the kitchen (which is a safe haven) only to verbally bash-the-shit out of the asshole customers.

Yea, we're like fucking guerillas: we'll smile to your face, shake hands, and kiss babies, but it's all smoke and mirrors, people. We're really in the kitchen fucking crucifying you like the schizophrenic psychopaths we are; making fun of your hideous clothing, your ugly fucking faces, your idiotic children, your horrible parenting skills, your fucking lame conversations, your fat, gluttonous eating tendencies.

Speaking of 'horrible parenting skills,' tell your kids that the salt-and-paper shakers are used solely for enhancing taste, and not as fucking musical instruments. Also, tell your kids to sit down and shut the fuck up for once.

But as soon as we conclude our venomous, vituperative tirades--as we kick open the kitchen door with our trays stocked high--it's back to smiles and polite pleasantries.

Thank God for the fucking kitchen.

Another way in which we are schizophrenic psychopaths is that we all bitch-and-moan about not getting tables only to fucking bitch-and-moan when we do get tables. I mean, what the fuck is this all about?

"So-and-so is making all the fucking money! They're getting tables left and right; what the fuck is going on here? I've only had two deuces--fuck!"

"What the fuck? Now they give me a table? I don't even wanna take it! Fuck this shit! I just wanna go home!"

That--right there--is a standard conversation held by a schizophrenic psychopath waiter/waitress.

We're all crazy; take notice!

"We're Gonna Be Here All Night"

I love the table that sits down, looks you right in the eyes, and says "we're gonna be here all night, so don't rush us."

Okay, let me go grab the fucking air mattress, the fucking popcorn, the fucking case of beer, the fucking nail polish, and the fucking Friends DVD box-set.

It is one thing to come in to the restaurant and thoroughly enjoy yourself. Fuck, if you're going to stay for hours that's fine (it really isn't but whatever), but don't fucking make that clear to the entire wait staff as soon as you sit your asses down.

And, if you are going to stay the 'whole night,' you better understand you're going to pay rent for your inhabitancy. What? You think fucking money grows on trees? You think it's completely acceptable to occupy my table all night and get by solely on paying the 15-20% gratuity on the bill?

Well, you got another thing coming to you--assholes!

And, if you're interested in shacking up--go to a fucking resort spa, people! This isn't a Holiday Inn!

And when it's time to pay, don't you dare take that fucking bill and sit on it, or put it under the clutches of your elbows, or completely leave it sitting there for hours without even looking at it. Pay the fucking bill in a timely manner and get the fuck out of the restaurant.

Restaurants: Home to Junkies and Seagulls

Why is it that every restaurant has its surplus of junkies and seagulls?

Seriously, I have worked in the restaurant business for over 6 years now (divided evenly between 2 separate restaurants) and I have dealt with numerous fellow employees that suffer from the urge to junk, as well as the urge to eat other people's left-over junk.

Whether it's the alcoholic employee that shows up to work half-in-the-wrapper; breath, a ferocious mixture of dewars and tobacco, or the drug addict junkie that runs up to the bathroom midshift to get his torpid fix, there never seems to be a shortage of sub-human restaurant employees.

Actually, showing up to the restaurant hammered nowadays seems only to be the recreational, acceptable thing to do. What's more radical is to show up to work in a swirl of Oxycontin-induced lethargy (mostly heroine though because it's vastly cheaper), cheeks sunken in with a dermis made tawny and sallow, and bloodshot eyes that roll like bowling balls into the back of one's head.

These people downright disgust me. And what's worse is that their presence in the restaurant creates a viral hot-zone. Yeah, let me share spoons with a crackhead.

How do you spell hadgojsgpad? I'm sorry-- that was supposed to be H-E-P-A-T-I-T-I-S  C.

I mean do you want some junkie handling your food?? Most definitely not!

And did you ever stop to think what happens to your left-overs when you hand them over to the junkies and seagulls (sometimes one in the same)?

Well, all too often I notice, among my travels throughout the kitchen, the junkie-seagull/seagull gnawing away at the detritus of saliva-drizzled crab cakes, scallops, shrimp, steaks, and lobsters.

Now, the sordid human it takes to engage in this type of pigging-out isn't exactly concerned with etiquette--as you can imagine--and so inhales this delicious fare using nothing other than his grimy, filthy fingers.

Mmhmm, finger-lickin' good!

And because they are in such a rush so as to avoid detection by other normal human beings, they skedaddle out of the kitchen rarely ever cleaning those grimy, plague-bearing phalanges.

Keep in mind those are the same fingers that typically garnish your drinks, handle your silverware, and touch your money! Ah, YIKES!!!

Makes you wonder, doesn't it?

No Strings Attached?

In walks this hooker.

She is six feet tall and blonde.

She is wearing a dress that barely covers her boobs and ass.

She is nasty.

She is accompanying a gentleman dressed in fancy business attire. 

As she is walking towards the bathroom, I am approaching the service bar area to collect my table's drinks. 

Puke begins to foment in the edges of my mouth when I take notice of a tampon string hanging out of this woman's dress.

It would be much appreciated, lady, if you never came back to my restaurant. Also, no one is interested in seeing your period paraphernalia on display, PERIOD!