For those who are new to this blog and not clever enough to scroll down to previous posts, I am a server and bartender at a large chain restaurant in a mid-sized Midwestern city. If you have read my other serving-related articles, you have probably detected just a hint of . . . disdain for certain people. By "disdain" I mean "aneurysm-inducing loathing." And by "certain people" I mean "the majority of humanity." But I have never truly delved into the profound depths of my vitriolic ire here, revealing my dark, misanthropic soul.
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| Who needs a muscular infarction to justify being a dick? Serving the general public is much more painful, and Vicodin can only help so much. |
Moment 1
I am serving in the bar alongside the actual bartender, cleaning off tables after our initial lunchtime rush, when a man and his son walk in and proceed to seat themselves. Let me begin by making something crystalline here: if there isn't a sign that reads Please Seat Yourself in a restaurant, don't seat yourself. Crazy, right? This is true in 90% of casual dining restaurants, even if a hostess does not instantaneously appear, like a genie in a puff of smoke, the moment you set foot in the door.
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| "Your wish is my command, impatient dumbass." |
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| "Am I the only one who gives a damn about the rules anymore?!?" |
But I digress.
After I go through the obligatory song-and-dance at the table, talking through my smile-gritted teeth, I get the kid a root beer and the dad a draft Bud Light. The bartender then informs me that these people are regulars, and takes over the table. Fine by me. As I am taking care of other business, I cannot help but overhear the man reject his beer on the grounds that, "there's still beer left in the lines from last night," and this is somehow affecting the taste of said swill. According to this brainiac, the tap has to be run for a minute to purge the leftover in the lines running from the kegs to the bar. Never mind that (1) our restaurant has been open for almost three hours, (2) that the lines are presumably designed to accommodate this, (3) even if they're not, I always run out half a pint worth of foam before I bring a beer to a table, and (4) that I've never heard anyone say this, ever, including bartenders, this guy has a PhD in Yellow Fizzics. First, you're drinking Bud Light. Try not to sound too high and mighty. Second, what precisely do you know about how the beer-lines work? That's what I thought, Bill Nye.
But that was only a minor irritant, a fly in my ointment compared to . . .
Moment 2
It's dinnertime. A group of four come in, carrying an infant in one of those monstrous, fallout-proof car seats, and are promptly taken to a table toward the front of the restaurant by a server, where there is plenty of space to put the Transformer car seat in a nifty folding sling next to the table. But, oh no, that will never do, as anyone with half a working brain would know, because sitting at a table in a restaurant, as opposed to a booth, is one step above being shoved into a gas chamber at bayonet-point in Treblinka. Or so certain guests seem to believe. They then assured the server they did not need the car seat or sling, and would simply "pass the baby around" for the entirety of their meal.
But, since the customer is always right, this charming quartet was escorted to a coveted booth right at the center of the action, just outside the doorway where most of the food leaves the kitchen. There, they proceeded to chat it up and pass the baby around like an opium pipe.
For approximately ten minutes.
Then, one of them went back to the front of the restaurant and retrieved both car seat and sling, asking no one if it was acceptable, and set it up right next to their booth, in the middle of the most high-traffic aisle in the building. During our dinner rush. To give you a clearer idea of this brilliant setup, I have created a diagram:
I saw this happen, but, since it was not my table, I pretended not to care. That is, until I saw their server attempting to set up a stand of scalding food without dumping it on the hapless infant. At that point, I intervened for the sake of child, expediency, and common sense. I said something along the lines of, "I'm sorry, folks, but this isn't going to work. We have servers with hot food trying to get through here, and it's very dangerous for your baby. And if there's a fire in the building, this is a major hazard. It's actually against fire code." All of this was undeniably true. Was my tone less-than-conciliatory? Probably, but that's because all of this was undeniably true. In fact, it was patently, painfully obvious. Anyone, including Wile E. Coyote, could have walked up, looked at the situation, and said, "That won't work."
These geniuses, however, looked at me with a mixture of confusion and offense, as if I had just told them an Aristocrats joke that wasn't blunt enough. I could have been dry-humping an inflatable llama. "You can put the car seat in the booth across from you," I suggested helpfully, "we aren't using it. But your baby can't stay here, sorry." You'd swear I was presenting them with Sophie's choice. Reluctantly, they assented, and I returned to my own section of the restaurant, satisfied that I had taken a necessary step that nobody else wanted to risk for fear of offending. Not Giving a Shit happens to be my specialty, my super-power, if you will. With great apathy comes great responsibility.
Sure as murder will out, these guests left behind a hand-scribbled letter outlining a complaint they directly addressed to neither myself nor their server, let alone the manager. For your reading enjoyment, I have perfectly transcribed their note here:
To the Red-Haired Little Kid:
Your arrogance and tactless pomp would better serve you, I think, as a used car salesman, or a local school board representative. Please reconsider your career choice.
Love,
The people who did not seat themselves.
P.S. Your hair is a fire hazzard.
Seriously? For taking the initiative to actually protect your child, from your own flagrant retardacy no less, you decide to leave me a passive-aggressive hate-note laden with middle-school-level taunts and far more condescension than I could possibly muster on the spot? Wow, I'm crushed. I am so wounded to know that I do not have the approval of four people whose collective IQ barely exceeds that of their combined shoe size. That I should endure the written abuse of people who don't have the testicular fortitude to lodge a complaint in any meaningful way, presumably because they will then have to admit to their own flaming ignorance and gross parental neglect, is more than I can bear. I'd better go hang myself. The fact that I had to point out to you the danger of your child being potentially trampled should make me feel guilty. Perhaps next time I'll just kick your baby over to make my point.
Oh, and hazzard is the county where the good ol' Duke boys live, ye mighty paragons of superlative intelligence and pithy wit. I believe you meant hazard, a danger or risk. Try using it in a sentence, such as, "I'd hazard people like you have a fair bit of incest in your lineage." See, it's even a verb. Biatch.
I feel like there might have been a time when my vastly superior intellect was known as "common sense," but that's probably nothing more than looking back through rose-colored glasses on a past that never was, such as Beaver Cleaver's 1950s America or the reign of King Ataraxes the Triumphant in the Golden Age of Atlantis. Fuck you, nostalgia.
After I go through the obligatory song-and-dance at the table, talking through my smile-gritted teeth, I get the kid a root beer and the dad a draft Bud Light. The bartender then informs me that these people are regulars, and takes over the table. Fine by me. As I am taking care of other business, I cannot help but overhear the man reject his beer on the grounds that, "there's still beer left in the lines from last night," and this is somehow affecting the taste of said swill. According to this brainiac, the tap has to be run for a minute to purge the leftover in the lines running from the kegs to the bar. Never mind that (1) our restaurant has been open for almost three hours, (2) that the lines are presumably designed to accommodate this, (3) even if they're not, I always run out half a pint worth of foam before I bring a beer to a table, and (4) that I've never heard anyone say this, ever, including bartenders, this guy has a PhD in Yellow Fizzics. First, you're drinking Bud Light. Try not to sound too high and mighty. Second, what precisely do you know about how the beer-lines work? That's what I thought, Bill Nye.
But that was only a minor irritant, a fly in my ointment compared to . . .
Moment 2
It's dinnertime. A group of four come in, carrying an infant in one of those monstrous, fallout-proof car seats, and are promptly taken to a table toward the front of the restaurant by a server, where there is plenty of space to put the Transformer car seat in a nifty folding sling next to the table. But, oh no, that will never do, as anyone with half a working brain would know, because sitting at a table in a restaurant, as opposed to a booth, is one step above being shoved into a gas chamber at bayonet-point in Treblinka. Or so certain guests seem to believe. They then assured the server they did not need the car seat or sling, and would simply "pass the baby around" for the entirety of their meal.
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| What's that I smell? Oh, yeah, bullshit. |
For approximately ten minutes.
Then, one of them went back to the front of the restaurant and retrieved both car seat and sling, asking no one if it was acceptable, and set it up right next to their booth, in the middle of the most high-traffic aisle in the building. During our dinner rush. To give you a clearer idea of this brilliant setup, I have created a diagram:
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| *Not pictured: careless fuckwits. |
These geniuses, however, looked at me with a mixture of confusion and offense, as if I had just told them an Aristocrats joke that wasn't blunt enough. I could have been dry-humping an inflatable llama. "You can put the car seat in the booth across from you," I suggested helpfully, "we aren't using it. But your baby can't stay here, sorry." You'd swear I was presenting them with Sophie's choice. Reluctantly, they assented, and I returned to my own section of the restaurant, satisfied that I had taken a necessary step that nobody else wanted to risk for fear of offending. Not Giving a Shit happens to be my specialty, my super-power, if you will. With great apathy comes great responsibility.
Sure as murder will out, these guests left behind a hand-scribbled letter outlining a complaint they directly addressed to neither myself nor their server, let alone the manager. For your reading enjoyment, I have perfectly transcribed their note here:
To the Red-Haired Little Kid:
Your arrogance and tactless pomp would better serve you, I think, as a used car salesman, or a local school board representative. Please reconsider your career choice.
Love,
The people who did not seat themselves.
P.S. Your hair is a fire hazzard.
Seriously? For taking the initiative to actually protect your child, from your own flagrant retardacy no less, you decide to leave me a passive-aggressive hate-note laden with middle-school-level taunts and far more condescension than I could possibly muster on the spot? Wow, I'm crushed. I am so wounded to know that I do not have the approval of four people whose collective IQ barely exceeds that of their combined shoe size. That I should endure the written abuse of people who don't have the testicular fortitude to lodge a complaint in any meaningful way, presumably because they will then have to admit to their own flaming ignorance and gross parental neglect, is more than I can bear. I'd better go hang myself. The fact that I had to point out to you the danger of your child being potentially trampled should make me feel guilty. Perhaps next time I'll just kick your baby over to make my point.
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| You totally thought I was going to go for a South Park image. Naked baby-kicker in your face! |
I feel like there might have been a time when my vastly superior intellect was known as "common sense," but that's probably nothing more than looking back through rose-colored glasses on a past that never was, such as Beaver Cleaver's 1950s America or the reign of King Ataraxes the Triumphant in the Golden Age of Atlantis. Fuck you, nostalgia.
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| Mankind, your collective untelligence drives Carson the Flag Day Aardvark to drink himself into oblivion. Congratulations. |
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