Ok, so there was a misunderstanding between myself and Darby, so I am in fact doing Round Table this week, and here it is!

With the slowed down posting, I’m throwing in some posts from other sites in order to get these guys even more out there than they are already.

Manuel at Well Done Fillet is just like everyone else when they get tired. He gets grouchy and I’m sure wants to tear peoples heads off! He also likes to poke fun at those who are denied entrance into clubs, or get thrown out of them. I do too come to think of it…

At Don’t Tip the Waiter we learn that workers comp just isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially when someone has a broken leg. I’ve been on workers comp before, and it wasn’t all that boring to me, but I was also younger than I am now and spent the time playing games.

Ali at El Vermino Boulevard is spending less time in the bar and more time with other things. I’m considering the same thing in order to keep my sanity. She also tells the time honored story of people who claim they “don’t mean to complain” when we all know they want to when they walk in no matter what it’s about.

Darby at At least call me “Miss” had a fun MLK day last week. She had a flood, and I think she secretly enjoyed telling people they couldn’t eat even more than she lets on!

You have to wonder how Upset Waitress gets to sleep living next to the highway. Her dog already fears for life when he goes to the outhouse, but the horns and shit would just keep me up. Luck be with you, Upset Waitress, and watch out for semi’s!

A new addition to the Round Table this week, even though he was my inspiration to start blogging, the Insane Waiter has told us all about those we love to hate, the Bread Nazis. We all hate giving out complimentary bread in any form, be them sticks, rolls, or toast, but he brings a new elegance to the hatred.

Another new addition, yet a classic of industry bloggers is Lobster Boy at the Red Lobster Blog. Lobster Boy hates tissues left on his tables. Biological waste is nasty, and none of us want to deal with it. Old women who blow their noses in public are just as bad and in his own way, Lobster Boy lets everyone know just how he feels about the situation!

Yet another newbie to the Round Table, yet far from a newbie to blogging, let us all welcome Bitter at bitterwaitress.com!  From Bitter, we have “one from the vault” that teaches us how to care for our pets at work, the Hostess!  I’m kidding hostesses, you’re not pets.  Without you, most of us wouldn’t make money.  Here’s how to care for you anyway!  Don’t forget to check out the Bitterwaitress Forums while you’re there, and sign up!

Our final new addition this week is Restaurant Gal. Her blog is awesome, and this week she’s telling us all about The Palmetto Bug that came to visit. I don’t like their other name, so I’ll let you read this one on your own!

Last but certainly not least, here at RagingServer.com I talk about my new form of service: Complete Assholery. People these days don’t want to tip a nice server who does everything right, so I’m trying out being a huge prick to people in the hopes that they might leave me something. A new level of being jaded has just been reached, people.

That’s it for this weeks edition of The Round Table. Darby at At least call me “Miss” will actually be doing NEXT weeks Round Table. Sorry for the confusion everyone, we’ll be back on track soon. I’ll also have a new schedule up next week, and I’m going to extend an invitation to Lobster Boy and Insane Waiter to see if they would like to host sometime. Restaurant Gal may also host sometime.

I just thought those of you who didn’t know…well…should.

Here’s the deal.  Every now and then, I round up or down on peoples change.  I do not carry a cash register, and on a busy night, the bar is not going to stop what they’re doing so I can get 8 cents.  Or 23 cents, or even 31 cents.  More often than not, I’m rounding up on change.

Springs:  It’s not the restaurants money I’m giving out until the end of the night when I do my cash out.  Then, I turn in an amount that is listed on a financial report, tip out a percentage, and keep the rest.  If I happen to lose a buck or two out of the usually pretty good money I make from giving a bit of extra, then so be it.  I haven’t had anyone bitch about not getting their change.  If it’s 50 cents or so, I might ask around if someone has a quarter or two.  Most of the time that I shortchange people, I make sure to let them know “Hey guys, I haven’t got the 18 cents, but I can get it if you want me to.”  I never just shortchange them and not let them know.   People are not all anal like you are, most people don’t even care.  As long as you let them know that you’re short a quarter, they don’t fucking care.

It’s time for you to drop this shit, honey, because it’s tired.  You repeat the same thing over and over and over again, just like you did the first time you came here, and plain and simple, people are tired of reading it.  Leave it alone.  I haven’t shortchanged you, so stop whining.  Stop trying to be a martyr for every restaurant guest there ever was or will be.  Stay at home if you have such bad times, and learn that you keeping that extra 10 bucks that was given you by accident during a busy shift is just that, an accident.  It’s not a gift, and yes, it is ****************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************DISHONEST************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************** to not return that 10 bucks.

Get off the cross honey, other people need the wood.

Ribeye

EDIT:  Round Table will be hosted at At Least Call Me Miss

Well, everyone, unless At least call me Miss comes back from her sabbatical early, then I’ll be hosting the Round Table tomorrow. If you have any submissions for me then please visit the Contact page, and send them to me by tonight. I’ll either use them or pass them along to Miss provided she’s up for it.

I’m also considering a slight restructuring of this, inviting new members and such. Tony Dine will no longer be participating, citing personal reasons. Upset Waitress may or may not be participating, but I’m going to operate on the assumption that she will be…at least for now.

On a different note, I’ve been disciplined at work again this month. This time it was for my giving out of RagingServer.com pens. One of my fellow servers let a guest use a pen that says “Always tip your server” and beneath that “tip 5 per 25 and 25 on 100″. It was given to a guest that wasn’t dressed all that nicely, and the guest was very offended. The server who did it had a “talking to” as did I. I was given a write-up for giving out “Inappropriate media” at work.

Free Speech will win out on this, I assure you. I told everyone who has RagingServer pens that they cannot let guests use them. It’s not my fault that someone didn’t listen, and I’m no longer going to take the blame for peoples actions. I haven’t now, or ever, let a guest use one of them because of this situation.

The job hunt will go on as planned this week. I don’t want to quit my job, I just want to find another one. I enjoy my place of business, despite all the bad shit going on right now. It’ll change again, just like it did last year. That’s why I’m not just leaving. Things always change there, sometimes for the better, sometimes the worse. I’ve been there longer than a year now and I’m not ready to throw that away yet.

That being said, I may cut my hours to just weekends in favor of a bartending job somewhere.

Ribeye

Weekends at my job suck ass in the beginning of the year.  Ghetto trash, white trailer trash, and redneck trash all swarm us.  They run us like dogs, and we’re still nice to them.  They camp for hours, run up huge bills, and then they leave a shitty tip if they leave a tip at all.  I’ve decided that I’m going to try something new with this trash, knowing that I’m not going to get tipped from them no matter what I do.

All night, I was nice.  I was in an awesome mood, and we were decently busy.  I thought for sure I was going to get some great money tonight.  BOY WAS I WRONG!!!

I had over a thousand dollars in sales, and before tip out I’d only made 70 bucks.  35 of that came from 3 tables, a total of 90 bucks in sales with those 3 tables.  The rest of what little I made was from the aforementioned trash.

The Experiment:  I’m going to start being the biggest asshole to my tables that anyone has ever seen.  I’m not going to be nice to anyone except for my regulars that I know I’ll make money off of.  I’m going to be rude, short, abrupt, and just plain hateful.  I’m not going to let my guests make any special menu requests, I’m not going to let them drink more than 2 drinks per hour.  I’m going to stop short of cussing out every one of my tables, only because I’d like to keep my job.

When they ask me if we have strawberry lemonade? “This ain’t Red Lobster.”

When they ask if they can substitute things on our appetizers that say in the menu no substitutions: “No.”  When they ask why?  “It’s in the menu.  No.”

Bread?  “It’s not O’charleys, you’ll have to pay for that.”

Guest: “Is ya’ll gonna clean dis table?”  “When I get good and ready to, you’re not the only guests in the building.”

Hot water for silverware?  “It’s clean, stop being so anal.”

Absolut, Cuervo Gold, Tanqueray, Grand Marnier, Bacardi, Jack Daniels.  These are MY new house liquors, especially for parties with gratuity.

Milkshake?  “No, there’s no ice cream.”

I probably won’t actually do all that, but for fuck sake, something has got to give!  This trash has got to start tipping!  I’m going out Monday to find a second job, because I can’t handle making shitty tips when I’m doing everything possible with a smile on my face and a great attitude.  I can’t keep running my feet to the bone and not getting paid for it.  I’m so sick of going above and beyond for people that aren’t going to reward me no matter what I do.

If I see any more fucking Heelies, I’m going to pull out what hair I have left.  I hate parents that let their kids run wild, and I’m going to end up being a dick to the kids.  No more running around unattended, this isn’t a playground.  I hate looking at those fuzzy boots with the spiked heels that the ghetto girls wear lately, with their 4 inch and bigger ankle holders on their heads.  I’m sick of looking at fake gold teeth, I’m sick of smelling weed at every one of my tables.  Tonight was like the TSU Homecoming night that I got spit on.  I’m sick of being cussed out by ghetto trash because I don’t let them have any discounts.  And, I’m sick of the new general manager that’s not letting us fix problems without a manager anymore.  I’m sick of his overstaffing, which is costing us money by the bucket load.  We had 6 servers in our area tonight when we should have only had 4.

I just had to vent tonight guys, more than normal.  We had a mother who’s toddler wandered off while she was drinking, and she didn’t even know the baby was gone when we finally found her, half the restaurant away.  The baby was just walking around, not with anyone.  Ghetto momma had the nerve to cuss out the server who brought the kid back, for putting hands on her baby.

I love serving, and I don’t hate the job in general.  I hate the clientele that I’ve had to put up with lately.  I want it to be like it was before Christmas, when we actually made a bit of money.  Sure, we had our trash, but it was only about 10% of the overall guests that come in.  Now, that’s more like 60%.  Nice families don’t want to bring their kids in because of all the trash, and we’re losing that business.

Things have got to change soon, or I’ll be finding 2 more jobs, and dumping this one in the cold.

Ribeye

I don’t know what makes people think that when they get shit-faced at my place of business, they can just puke on their lane and keep on bowling.  I’m not a fucking janitor, and I’m not going to clean it up!

This bitch I was serving tonight, was drinking shots of patron.  And our biggest draft of miller lite.  And more shots of patron.  Apparently, she was also hitting up the bar after I cut her off, and the bartender was out to get a tip so he kept right on serving.

She pukes.  She pukes hardcore, tequila smelling, gut wrenching nastiness.  She then proceeds to bowl, stepping around the puke on her lane, while her friends yell for someone to come clean it up.  I happen to be walking by the lane, and one of them waves me over.  I don’t want to go yet I also don’t want to listen to their hollering.

“Can you clean up this mess on the floor?”  One of them asks me.

“No, I cannot.  Nor would I even if I could.  That’s not my vomit, it’s hers.  Make her clean it up!”

“But you’re the waiter, you’re supposed to clean up after us!”

“I have my limits, and bodily waste is at the top of that list.”

“You ain’t gettin a tip if you don’t clean it up.”  Moron blond heifer, you’ve already paid and tipped me!  About that time, Madame Patrona comes walking, and I use the term very loosely, back from the lane where she’d gotten a ball halfway down the lane, and nearly slips in her own waste.

“Ma’am, you need to clean up this mess, and we have a cab on the way to take you home.”

“But I’m havin fun!”

“Not on my floor you’re not!”

The sad thing about the group is that they tipped quite well.  However, a tip does not a vomit-vacuum make!

Other things I refuse to clean up:

Diapers…some mothers are just trash.

Snot rags.  For fuck sake, it’s flu season!  I don’t want to catch your bird flu or you’re MRSA.  Throw the shit away!

Blood. I’ve cleaned it before, and while I don’t shudder at the sight of it, I just don’t feel comfortable, nor do I get paid nearly enough.  That’s what salaried managers are trained to do!

On a different note, I’m going to have to think up some way to come up with the money to get the Raging T-Bird fixed.  My car is in need of about 800 bucks of work, and I just don’t have it.  I thought about putting up a PayPal thing, but I don’t feel right about it.  I’m going to end up getting a 2nd job, quite possibly another serving job which means more stories and more bitchery.  Then you’ll never know which restaurant I’m talking about unless I mention the bowling alley, so I probably won’t mention it!  Best to keep you all on your toes.  However, if any of you come up with an idea for me to make a bit of extra cash to fix the Raging T-Bird, please let me know.  Problems have arisen that make me really need to have the car running, especially with me about to have 2 jobs and RagingPartner about to have one also, and one vehicle just ain’t gonna cut it.

Come back soon, er’body!

Ribeye