I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Table #37.

Ahhhhh.

Table #37.

8 women.  They were in and out all night.  Going to the parking lot to smoke.  Sometimes with their cocktail.  Sometimes not. 

Around 7:30 all but 4 of them leave. 

The 4 remaining gather in the bar area. 

One of them appears to ask about the cocktail tables by the bar.

It takes the host and myself about 45 minutes to realize she’s referring to the Chef’s tables. 

The host says that we have reservations on those tables. 

The woman points out that there are two tables.  I say, yes, but you can’t sit there for just drinks. 

She’s annoyed. 

I then notice that they’ve gathered at the rail where we store the extra bar stools we used to cap the chef’s table. 

Their server comes by and says do you want me to tell them they can’t sit there.

I say, if you want, why don’t you suggest they go out to the outside bar and they can get cocktails and sit by the fire. 

She does this.  They leave through the back door.

15 minutes later one of the women appears at the host stand. 

She says, I don’t understand why we couldn’t sit in the bar area and have drinks.  There are chairs there, surely they are for sitting.  I explain that it’s where we keep the extra chairs for the bar. 

That’s stupid she says.  She holding a beer and says a few more things and then walks into the bar. 

There’s a woman who’s just exited the restaurant watching the woman, you can tell she is sympathizing with us as the woman is crazy. 

I say to the host, follow her and see what she’s  up to.

The woman in the lobby laughs. 

The host follows her and comes back to say she has seated herself at the bar. 

I go into the bar, walk up to the woman and say, I’m sorry but you can’t sit here. 

She replies that she’s going to have a drink and won’t be long. 

I tell her I’m sorry but we have a reservation here and she needs to get up.

She then says she’s looking for something, she searches thru her purse, finds her lipstick, puts it on.

I say, I’m sorry; I need you to get up.

She turns around looks at me and says, we are never coming back here and spending $800 dollars again. 

I say, I’m sorry to hear that, but you have a good day now. 

She gets up and moves to the end of the bar near stool #1. 

I follow her and say, I’m sorry but I’m going to have to ask you to move to away from the bar.  You need to move to the host area. 

She huffs and leaves, walking out the front door with her pint glass in her hand.

I don’t see her again. 

I go by the bar about 30 minutes later and the guy sitting at stool #1, says hello.  He’s there with his wife, and parents, they are very, very, regulars. 

I chat with them and apologize for the interaction they had to witness.

He says, when that happened I turned to my family and said, Jeff has always been nothing but gracious and kind with us, but I wonder if he has a side we haven’t seen when he is pushed. 

I chuckle and say absolutely.

I tell them about being told I’m a fucking bad manager.

He says, you should write these stories down and publish a book when you retire.

I laugh to myself. 

Yes.  Why yes I should. 

I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Last night was an especially fun night.

We hosted an afterhours, after wedding party. 

We hosted one last year and it was great. 

Not one restaurant in our little town stays open till 1:00 a.m. any more.  Not one. 

We used to have a brew pub and a couple of other places that would stay open as late as legally possible. 

They all changed during the pandemic and they have never gone back to their old hours. 

This isn’t a problem, except that it leaves weddings with no place to go when the reception wraps up at 10:00. 

So, last year we were approached to stay open and host people after a wedding.  And we did it, and it was easy.

This year, we booked one of these parties and it was last night.

It should have been easy…

First, I should say we are not a late night venue.  We are an upscale restaurant which agreed to let people come to us at the end of the night.  We don’t have a dance floor.  We don’t have a fancy sound system.  We don’t have a late night venue. 

So the revelers are bussed in after the wedding.  No one is driving.

The first bus arrived at a little before 11:00.

I’ll repeat that they pay us a lot of money, for a 2 hour party.    They arrived at 11:00.  They have to leave at 1:00 or they are stuck five miles from their hotel as they buses do not come back. 

The bride and groom were the first in the door. 

We say our hellos.  I tell her I’m disappointed she is not in her wedding dress because that’s the best part of wedding events. 

We do all of this, and they go in to the bar.

90 seconds later the groom appears to ask about music. 

They had emailed me a month ago to tell me they’d be having a DJ at the after party and he’d need to be able to set up around 8:30. 

I emailed back and explained that that would not be happening.  First, no one was interrupting dinner service.  And the neighbors would shut the party down if the music was loud.  They responded saying that they’d bring a small speaker and make that work.

Seems that didn’t happen.

So the groom, who is a close talker, is now 3 inches from my face talking to me about our sound system.  He wants to email me a playlist to play.  I keep telling him that that won’t work. 

He keeps insisting that it will.

He emails me.  I log into my email on our I-pad.  But it won’t work, because I can’t access the playlist on SONOS. 

He then wants to plug his phone into our system.  I explain that we use SONOS so nothing is plugged in.  It’s access through wifi. 

He then wants the Wi-Fi password, and I explain that only chef has the SONOS Wi-Fi password and that won’t be happening. 

He literally, spend 25 minute of his after party trying to deal with music.

Finally he gives up and goes into the bar.  

And about 20 minutes later 2 bros appear.  Also close talkers. 

Yo.  Can we change the music?  Can we plug into the system?  Can you turn it up?  Can we, can we, we, in the most broy way possible.

It was when they said that not being able to log into the music system was stupid that I finally lost my cool and said, I’m tired of having this conversation.   They start backtracking, you we are just trying to help, we didn’t mean to be offensive, yada, yada, yada.  They backed off.

10 minutes later one of the same bros came up and said can I get the Wi-Fi password?  I replied we don’t have Wi-Fi (we don’t have public Wi-Fi.  Not even our employees have access to our wifi).  He said no seriously.  I said, I’m being serious.  We don’t have public Wi-Fi.

He replied that’s stupid too.  Saw my face and left. 

Here’s where the story gets fun. 

The bride and groom signed a contract before we agreed to host the event.

There was a liability section about people arriving without ID’s, arriving drunk and bringing outside liquor. 

I sent an email to them reminding them of the policies a week before the event.  They assured me everyone knew about the rules including the ID’s. 

We carded everyone who came in.  Even the people who were older.  My policy. 

The second bus arrives and a couple of people walk in with drinks in their hands.  I ask them to give them to me, and they reluctantly do. 

About 15 minutes later, a new group comes in. 

The host is checking ID’s when I notice a guy is holding a plastic cup.  I walk around to him and tell him I’ll need to take the drink.  He take a big swig thru the straw in a fuck you sort of way. 

I say to him again, I need the drink and he pushes his way outside and continues to drink the drink.  I say one last time, you need to give that to me and he finishes the drink. 

And I say, I hope you enjoyed that because you aren’t coming in now.

(My host pointed out later, he insisted on finishing his watered down drink, just before he went into a party with an open bar.  He could have had 10 more inside).

He looked at me like I was crazy. 

I repeated myself.  You are not coming in.  The bus is right about to leave, I’d get on it if I were you, because you are going to be stuck here and you are definitely not coming in. 

He starts to protest, and I say, you had your chance, and you made a decision not to comply so you aren’t coming in. 

He then tells me he traveled from Europe to be here and he’s coming in and I explain that in fact that’s not happening.

His friend starts to protest, and I cut him off and say, if you want to join him in not coming in you’ll drop it and leave it alone.  He starts to protest again and I repeat, keep it up and you won’t come in either. 

He starts to walk in and his girlfriend appears and she gets involved and I share my message again.  Drop it and go inside, or you can all go back to your hotel.

They move inside. 

The guy with the booze paces back and forth in the parking lot.  It’s clear he’s not used to being told no. 

I think it’s over, when who should appear but booze boy’s mother. 

She’s having NONE of this. 

She starts in. 

Have you told my son that he can’t come in?

I tell her yes.

She asks why.

I explain what happened. 

She says to me, we’ve traveled from Scotland and Germany to be here, it’s a cultural misunderstanding. 

I laugh, and say I’m not sure what that’s supposed to mean but he’s an adult and should know better.

She tries once again to make me understand that it’s because he is from away, that it happened. 

I say, later to my host, that I wish I’d said at this point, he’s acting very American for someone from away.

She’s still not taking no for answer. 

She continues getting louder and more aggressive. 

I finally say to her, I was very clear with the contract the bride and groom signed that if any outside alcohol was brought in, it was grounds to end the party, send everyone home with no refund.

I look at the boy’s mother and say, this can either be over or I can let the bride and groom know that your son caused their party to be cancelled. 

She says something else smart, and I look at her and say, MY PARTY, MY RULES.

She scowls at me and says, YOUR PARTY HUH!

She left and I didn’t see either of them again. 

The only other thing of note was the drunk man who was standing in the kitchen window (we have an open kitchen) and reached through the window and took food off the platter that one of our chef’s was plating.  5 seconds later he did it again and our CHEF told him to knock it off.

I kind of wish he’d pinched him with his tongs which is what he does to the food runners when they lean on the window. 

And with that the night was over. 

I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Update to the single diner woman from the other day.

Seems that after the host told her to she’d have to wait 10 minutes to be seated, she went back to the outside bar and checked in with the host. 

The host told her she could be seated, and so the woman said, will I be able to have my food, eat, and be out in 20 minutes. 

The host said probably not.

The woman was outraged, that it might take more than 20 minutes to get food and eat. 

That’s when she came back inside, to give me her opinion. 

If I’d known this I’d have suggested Burger King out by the highway. 

15 minute drive. 

5 minutes for food. 

And flame broiled.  Just like us. 

’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Let’s start with the good news tonight.

The restaurant has been killing it this summer.

KILLING IT!!!

The numbers we are doing are stupid.

In a good way.

Tonight was the easiest shift I’ve ever had and it we did 30 covers less than our busiest night ever and we could have easily handled many, many more people.

Today was the last day of July.

Chef and I spent some time chatting about the numbers for the month.

After we finished, I started diving deep.

We did almost 1,500 more covers this July than last July. And that resulted in an almost 40% increase in revenue. 40%!

And the people just keep coming.

And I love it. Love it. Love it.