Server edition!

A new post!

I wrote yesterday about the French Canadians who visited over the weekend.

A friend commented that a table of British women were her worst nightmare.

This brought back a slew of memories.

When I worked in Times Square there were nights I didn’t speak to anyone from the states.

There were nights I didn’t speak to anyone who spoke English as a first language.

That being said, I was pretty good at getting foreign tables to tip me. Not always 20% but anything is better than nothing.

I was so good at getting foreign tables to tip I taught a couple of classes to my coworkers before I left.

That being said.

Some nights sucked.

One evening I was tipped ZILCH on over $500 in sales. I kept the receipts. Around 10 or 12 tables and nothing. Nada. Zip.

Thank god it was a place known for volume.

Some favorites I remember:

Four girls from away who ordered 4 waters. One order of French fries. And wrote postcards for 4 hours. They left 20% which was $1.

Two men who were from away that kept me running all night. Then tipped .05%. Then asked where they should go for drinks after.

I sent them to The Cock. A gay bar in the East Village.

They came back to confront me the next night. I suggested they tip next time.

My favorites though were:

British Girls With Shiny Shirts.

Go ahead say it again.

British Girls With Shiny Shirts.

And again.

BRITISH GIRLS WITH SHINY SHIRTS.

I coined the phrase.

These were girls from Great Britain who came to our restaurant wearing sequined shirts.

I saw a lot them.

Always nice.

Akways 10% or less.

Anytime British Girls With Shiny Shirts would sit in my section I’d expect the worst.

And usually it came to fruition.

I don’t see British Girks With Shiny Shirts any more.

And.

I’m very grateful.

Server edition.

My feet are fucking killing me.

Enough said.

Attention please. I am finished with my training.

YIPPEE!

I finished up tonight and got approval from the manager to be able to start picking up shifts. Unfortunately, my lovely friend Samantha forgot to put me on this week’s schedule, so I have to go in everyday and hope that someone wants off and lets me work. It’s a fucked up sort of system, but at this point I need the money too much to wait.

As for the evening.

The spawn of Satan were present for two hours in the restaurant tonight.

I’m not kidding.

The worst behaved children (around 7 – 10 in age) I have ever seen (7 of them in total) along with five grown men were seated in an area of the restaurant adjacent to mine.

It started when the group arrived in the restaurant.

The children were all over the place. They were running, and yelling and doing just about everything they could. At one point the manager found them in a closed off part of the restaurant. In the bar, closed off by ropes. They were putting the cola gun in their mouths and drinking from it.

They were caught twice trying to look up the skirts of women in the restaurant.

At one point they purposefully tried to trip a waiter carrying a tray of drinks.

All of this before they were given a table.

After they got the table it was worse.

At no time were all seven children ever seated. They ran around. They continued to yell. The manager had to escort the kids out of the kitchen.

Finally when she’d had enough, she went to the table and told the men they’d have to control their children, because it was a restaurant not a playground.

An argument ensued. They accused her of trying to embarrass them about their children and told her she had no right to tell them how to discipline the kids. She finally told them that if they got hurt or caused someone to get hurt they would be liable, not the restaurant.

This didn’t do much good, but at least she covered her bases.

The icing on the cake.

When the 150.00 dollar check came at the end of the meal. The men decided they weren’t going to pay for it, since the manager had talked to them about their children.

They were on their way out when another manager, Mike caught them. Another argument ensued. This time with all five men and seven children present. It got louder and louder and eventually most people in the restaurant had stopped eating and were watching the festivities.

Mike finally told them that they could either pay the check or he would call the cops. It was really their choice. They continued to argue with him until he pulled out his phone and began to dial 911. It somehow changed their minds.

They paid the bill and left.

Whew.

Of course it took the bussers almost 20 minutes to clean up after them. The kids had dumped drinks on the floor. Most of their food was on the floor, the tables and the chairs. They had poured water into the sugar caddy as well as the salt and pepper shakers.

When it was all said and done every employee present in that part of the restaurant had to fill out an incident report because the men had declared they were going to call corporate and let them know how they’d been treated.

All this and it’s only day three.

How much more fun can it get?

Several weeks ago I turned off the ability to make reservations through Google. They didn’t allow messaging. There were 6 steps to making the reservation and every day someone showed up without a reservation they thought they had.

This was not a problem in the winter. In summer it caused me to get yelled at more times than I can count.

Tonight someone came in with what they thought was a reservation they made weeks ago.

They got indignant and pulled out their phone. They show us a text.

A text that says this is your reservation code. This is NOT a confirmation of your reservation.

Luckily we had a seat for them.

But still.

The text this is not a reservation.