I was hosting tonight. As I’m always doing during the week.

A man arrives with two teenagers. He tells me his name and he says the fourth will be right behind them.

I ask if they’d like to wait. Or be seated.

He’s says they could be seated. A server arrives at this moment and off they go.

About 90 seconds later a woman walks through the door.

Gives me her name. She’s joining the man and the two teenagers.

She asks how she’ll find them. I explain that I’ll show her to the table.

She then says she needs to use the restroom.

She starts to go in and stops and turns to me and says I’m about to have dinner with my future ex husband. I hope we can make this fast.

I was kind of floored. No one has said this to me before.

In my head I’m asking does he know he’s going to be your ex husband? Do your kids know? Do you need a shot of bourbon? Will this be ugly? Why are you divorcing him?

I kind of laugh and say I’ll make sure the server brings wine as quickly as possible. She laughs and goes into the restroom.

They were in and out in 57 minutes.

I wasn’t at the door when they left so I have no idea how it went.

But I do have more questions I’ll never get to ask.

Let’s talk about the verbal tip.

The verbal tip is when a guest goes out of their way to tell a server how great they are.

Oh. My. God. You were the best server I’ve ever had.

You were so sweet and friendly. Thank you for taking care of us.

You are the funniest server I’ve ever seen. You had us laughing the whole time.

Wow! Please tell us you’ll wait on us next time we are in.

The verbal tip is awesome. Everyone likes to be told they are good at their job. People like to be liked.

Do you know what’s not awesome???

A verbal tip followed by a shitty tip.

Oh my god you are the best server I’ve ever had. Followed by 12%.

You were so sweet and friendly. Followed by 10%.

Will you take care of us the next time we are in? Followed by no tip at all.

Servers loved to be told they are great. But their landlord won’t take a compliment for their rent. Toyota won’t let them pay their car payment with a compliment.

A server I know used to say, don’t sit there sucking my dick for 20 minutes making me feel good, then leave a 6% tip.

So by all means compliment the staff. The host. Me. The server. The chef. The bartender.

But fucking leave at least 20%.

At least.

If your server was that good you might think about 23 or 24%.