Due to the fact that traveling (the to-and-from aspect of it, anyways) always finds a way to royally screw me over, paired with the unwillingness of my 5 year old ipod to function has left me with a significant amount of book time. The flight home from New York was not exactly successful....well at least for a while. Paired with a searing headache and nausea (all thanks to a night out in the, don't say it, big apple) the day was not off to a great start. The hour and a half delay plus the ADDITIONAL hour spent in taxi was brutal. There was that small detail that we were actually not on a real plane that made it even better. AirTran, ever heard of it? Me either. There were two rows of.....well, one row of 2 seats and one row of 3 seats. Never seen that before. As if the plane didn't already look like it was going to topple over from the weight of the abnormally large man who should have purchased 2 seats, the captain came on the radio and announced "I'm sorry ladies and gentleman, we are just fixing a leak in the nose of the plane, and then we will be on our way".
Great.
No sooner had he informed us of our leaky nose, I hear Sara go "uhhhh" and I look over as she's holding an unattached seat belt in her hand that had broken off when she went to buckle it.
Strike two.
Strike three involves the sudden wave of nausea where you're gonna hurl all over the woman's weave in front of you, (imagine washing that out "ooohhh I gah waaasshh it") a feeling akin to the one in our apartment in Spain when I got up to go puke and I run down the hallway in my underwear and Beers of Belgium tshirt with my hand over my mouth, attempting to rip open the first bathroom door only to hear Ivan (our Spanish roommate) in there going "estoy AQUI!" (he would pronounce the aqui 3 times louder than the estoy, he always did that at the end of sentences) and then moving to the next door, and consequently ripping THAT one open - only to find Lorenzo (l'italiano) sittin on the toity droppin' a fatty with his hugely hairy thighs in full frontal view. All he utters is "GAHHHHHHHHHHHHH" and I contemplate jumping off the 4th floor balcony (still holding my hand over my mouth here) and decide I would probably make a bigger mess with my blood and guts spewed over the pavement below than I would if I just puked in the kitchen sink. But alas, my dear friend Emily talked me out of either option by forcing me into a Lamaz breathing exercise.
So snap back to reality (woops there goes gravity) and that whole moment where you go "ohhh God, I'm gonna vomit" comes and I'm frantically searching in the pocket in front of me for a barf bag while breathing deeply through my nose (never works). All I can find is 4 of the same In-Flight Magazine with the covers ripped off and I ding the light above me to signal the flight attendant. She comes over, looking at me like "Oh Jesus, what do youuuu want" and I'm like "Can I PLEASE go to the bathroom, we have been sitting here for an hour" and she, in her most obnoxious flight attendant coo, informs me that we are just about to take off.
Right lady, you said that an hour ago.
"BUT I GOTTA VOM-", she cuts me off. "We are JUST about to take off".
Really lady, I have absolutely no issue with spewing puke on you and fatty McFats next to me, and certainly even less of an issue with puking on you.
That entire story was really to set me up for saying the amount of time I had to finish a really good book I'd started on that trip.
Annyyyywayyyyyys. I read this book called "Waiter Rant" by this server who worked at a high class restaurant in Manhattan. He'd started this blog, choosing to change the names of his restaurant and coworkers to keep them anonymous where he would just rant about awful customers who demand things as if they are God's gift to the planet. Sure, this book is really meant to entertain servers, or those who have ever waited tables as a means to end - but it really is for anyone who has ever worked in a restaurant. Hostessing, serving, bussing, bartending, managing.....but even if you haven't - if you are acutely aware of the preposterous demands people make, or if you are fascinated by anyone's ability to master the art of reading people, you will enjoy this book.
You know when you finish a book, and you feel strangely empty inside - as if something just got deleted from your life. Your best friend moved away, a trip you had been looking forward to for months was over...that feeling. I think that happens when we really connect to something. In this case, I think I really connected to the author, a man whose face I couldn't pick out of a crowd. Something about this book inspired me to keep writing, even when I'm not really sure where it is going.
BUT
I was thinking about this the other night while at work. Seeing as how there was, and pretty much never is, anything worthwhile at TGIFridays to occupy my time, I had lots of time to think about anything and everything. I came up with the following list of things that either fascinate me, crack me up, or annoy the living shit out of me when it comes to being a hostess.
1. Regulars: most regulars think they are somehow entitled to something special as a reward for their loyal customer-ness. ok, fine, I agree. Most servers like their regulars because it gives them an opportunity to establish a relationship with them, thus increasing their tip. but these regulars....oh these are the worst. these 3 guys come in at like 12:00 am and look around awkwardly. one of the weirdos owns precisely one sweatshirt. a grey one that says sdsu across the front. the other always wears a charger hat. and the last one slinks suspiciously behind the other two. they inch their way to the host stand and usually say something like "uuhhh I think we are gonna need a table for 3", as if they are just strolling in at 2:30 pm on a monday afternoon.
*even worse than the fact that these people are obnoxious....is the fact that the servers want to (and will) kill you whenever you sit them in their section because they choose to stay until the restaurant kicks them out. they talk with this slow drawl and take about 45 minutes to decide they want the same thing they get everytime - ice tea.
2. The muttering: i dont know if it is just friday's....or if this is common to restaurants everywhere. but i love when the servers walk by me and mutter something along the lines of "I'm gonna f*&@ing quit this job this time i swearrr", or something to that effect.
3. You know you are sad and/or bored when the most ridiculously miniscule things make you happy. exhibit A being when you randomly have the exact amount of napkins and forks for rollups to not have extras of either one. just like magic.
4. i hate so much when people walk in the door and hold up fingers at me. like, unless ur a mute you can tell me how many in your party, idiot.
5. when you start to take a party to a table and they get lost. are you serious? how do you get lost? then you look behind you and notice they are gone and have strayed from your side somewhere in section 4, and are standing confused and scared as if they just got pushed out of a cab in the middle of baghdad, darting their eyes around nervously.
these are a lot of pointless thoughts, do what you like with this information.
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