< Don’t be jealous of my huge tip….
I’ve been a mom for 21 years. I’ve been a teacher or caretaker of children for longer than that, so I’ve seen a thing or two in my lifetime but it’s the food service industry that has taught me the most about bad behavior from mankind.
Here are some tips (no pun intended) from a seasoned vet, which if you’re a habitual offender – I’m sure you won’t take the time to read because you are too busy thinking about the most important person in the world….YOU.
I don’t think it’s cute when your kid “Risky Business” slides across the floor at me during a wedding, especially when I’m holding six entrees, a side of gravy and two baskets of bread. Happens once, blame it on the kid. Happens twice and you are taking pictures posting it to You Tube like your kid is the next Tom Cruise, blame it on you.
Teach your kid to say please and thank you. (Hint: the best way to teach is by example.)
I do not respond to snapping fingers and commands from my preschool kids or from my own family so I certainly won’t respond to them from grown strangers, even if you are drunk; correction: especially if you are drunk.
At some point if I am working at the bar and you begin talking to me like we go way back, then I will know you are drunk – at which point I will either cut you off or serve you tonic water disguised as vodka; either way you should thank me in the morning.
If you are talking to me while on the phone, I will act like I can’t hear you because the truth is, I can’t and neither can the person who is talking to you on the phone.
I love it when you ask me if you can put an extra glass on my tray that has 46 glasses precariously balanced because it’s sort of like asking the garbage man to carry a mattress while he’s hoisting a garbage bin over his head.
I did not make the food, so I am sorry if it sucks but I don’t know the recipe and I didn’t hold the pan so while I’m glad to help fix the problem, please stop yelling at me for things I didn’t do. I can no more help that than I can help the fact that your husband is boring you to death or your kids are making you wish you got a babysitter. I commiserate but I didn’t create.
I don’t want your tip that bad. I won’t put up with crap for five bucks or fifty.
If you are nice to me I will give you the world. If you are not nice, you might not even get the state of Virginia — hell you might not even get the city of Richmond. You might just get Broad Street: the ugly part.
When I see you and I am at work, know this. I am not embarrassed to be a waitress, so I think it’s funny that you’re embarrassed about it for me. Thanks for the concern. My parents taught me that whatever you do as long as you do it well, you can carry your head high. They taught me that at the same time that they were teaching me to say please and thank you.
If you act like you don’t know me while I am waiting on you, then don’t expect me to say hello when we run into each other at the grocery store because you have conveyed to me exactly who you are and I’m not interested anymore.
The truth is, I judge people by the way they treat their waitress. It says a lot about you when you are degrading or demeaning to the person serving you, and trust me it’s talking bad about you.
So here’s my last tip: treat the wait staff with the respect you would afford the ones you love, and if you treat your family as poorly as you treat your wait staff then I feel sorry for them because they are definitely getting stiffed.
About Rebecca Suder