last week i moved across the hall to my temporary digs while "my" apartment is being renovated. this place is a dump, but it's free for now, so it's hard to complain. also, in the process i scored two free (nice, old) wardrobes, a couch that's actually long enough for me to fall asleep on without waking up in pain, and an entertainment center that i'll be giving to my brother for helping me move. main drawbacks are living next door to constant construction noise, living beneath the loudest people in the building (i don't complain because -a- it makes me feel old, and -b- their loud music is actually good stuff; today they were blaring the neil young massey hall disc), and not having an end date (i.e. not knowing when i'll suddenly need to pull the new rent out of my ass). bright side is, the money i would otherwise be paying on rent can instead go toward taking classes so that someday i'll allow myself to leave this town that i've been done with for years.
one of these days i'll even go pick up that car i bought months ago. thought it would be this week, but alas, there's a hold on my JSR account that i need to deal with in person. if i go to NY this week, i won't be here to do that unless i only spend a day up there, which is no fun. so that will happen after memorial day, because i will NOT drive I-95 on a holiday weekend unless jimi hendrix rises from the dead to play a show at the knitting factory. even then, really, i'd take the train home & go back for the car later. screw holiday weekend traffic.
meanwhile, i've been working at the cafe. last weekend, i moved furniture saturday, then: mother's day, one of the busiest restaurant days of the year, but alas... people suck. for once, i stayed in an early section, because there were a crapload of reservations & i figured i'd make just as much money. had a 15-top at 4:30... didn't show up. two-top at 4:45? no show. finally dropped the 15 for a ten-top at 5 o'clock? also didn't show. so i spent the first 90 minutes of my shift twiddling my thumbs and left a scant few hours later with $100 less than i expected to make, after taking the week "off" thinking i'd be fine for money... oops. monday was inexplicably more of the same... and then there was tonight.
this weekend is proms, VCU graduation, all manner of family-in-town, big parties, total chaos waiting to happen. such weekends are no fun partly because a lot of the people out & about are those who eat out only a few times a year, and it's always easier to wait on people who *know* how to go out to eat, as opposed to those who don't understand that they need to put down their cell phone when their waitress approaches the table-- especially when it's so busy they had to wait an hour for said table & will wait another hour if they insist on ignoring their server when she approaches. (ahem.)
i'm not one of those servers who predicts tips based on random expectations-- "oh, they're black, they're foreign, they're redneck, they're not drinkers"-- whatever-- i absolutely hate servers who base their service on what they think people are going to tip. it's unprofessional, it's rude, it's just wrong. having said that, i do sometimes predict tips based on how a table is going-- whether they're in a good mood, whether they enjoy the food, how long they wait for a table, etc.
tonight my first large party was all the things that bad servers think will get them a good tip-- drinkers, professionally dressed, blah blah-- and yet they didn't spend much & left me about 16%. fine, no big, plenty of others waiting. (tho they did tip in cash after paying with a credit card-- if you're reading this and don't already know, cash tips are always better than writing it in on the credit card!!) i went to the hostess stand to help brainstorm about where we could possibly fit all the reservations, and scored myself a later 8-top with some creative table rearrangement.
when said table showed up, we had a problem-- first off, we'd squeezed them into a table that was too small for them (skinny people who really like each other are easier to seat, but they're also very rare), and further, they had one more person than they'd reserved for. as it happened, my original 10 top had just left, so we could accommodate them in my section within a few minutes. rather than ignore them while the hosts did their magic, i took their drink order, carefully looking everyone in the eye so i could recognize them & match them up once they moved. once they were at the new table, i got the drinks right but i accidentally tripped over the grandmother's cane that was propped against the wall where i needed to stand to take the order (oops #2), and frankly, they didn't really seem to want to engage me in any banter-- which is fine, i enjoy waiting on people who are just there to eat as much or even more than people who want to have a good time and include their server, but less talkative tables are less likely to overtip. no big deal-- given the reservation list, i didn't expect to make more than $75 or so for the night-- large reservations require us to block off tables at least half an hour prior, which means less money. (if only management understood this!) mother's day was recent enough to remind me of this.
the food came out relatively promptly (and correct-- the kitchen was on point) but one of the desserts they ordered turned out to be unavailable, which is never good-- i'd rather a dinner ran out, because the closer the "oops" to the check drop, the more likely people are to take it out of the tip... but all was well otherwise. i didn't pay the table as much attention overall as i would've liked, because i had three other new tables about the same time, but all in all, i figured i'd get at least 15%. boy, was i wrong.
i'd kept the party on separate seats just in case they needed separate checks later-- too hard to predict that on "family" weekends. on graduation weekend, it's customary that a grandparent or other family "elder" pays for the whole check, and as a result, it's more likely that you'll see 15%. (other times, you get family members together who really don't like each other but are obligated to see each other for this event, and as such you have people who refuse to pay for each other-- i get that.) this particular table asked for one check, and i dropped it after coffee without really knowing who was paying. when i went back to pick it up, i got the "thank you" & nod that means it's cash, and the change is my tip. i have a rule about checking books on the floor-- i don't do it, ever, because we all reveal with our faces, and i think it's unprofessional to show emotion about tips in front of other customers, so i took it in the back to take a look.
and then i counted, and recounted. ordinarily, if i get an unusually good cash tip, i'll hang in the back for an extra minute, til i think the table is ready to leave, so that i can thank them on the way out. in this case, contrary to some of my crappy rude server cohorts, i immediately went back to the table-- i was sure they'd miscounted. the check was $220, and there was $360 in the book. $40 is a completely respectable tip on $220, about what i'm after on graduation weekend... but they were all $20's, so it's not as if two hundreds were stuck together. stilll... i'm good at my job, but damn. i went back and asked "who was in charge of the bill?" and addressed the answer with my theory of miscounting, but he refused to take a second look at the cash inside, instead saying "i counted twice-- you did a great job, thank you" and the woman next to him actually gave me a little clap.
on their way out, the bartender happened to overhear the guy who paid thank me very sincerely again, and the bartender said "ouch, you just got a verbal tip!" and oddly enough, it is indeed my experience that the more sincere the out-loud "thank you," the lower the tip percentage, but in this case i told him he should be thanking them too... because i am a true believer in karma. since the tip was in cash, i could've easily kept it to myself & tipped out on the "expected" amount, given the fact that due to reservation holds, my sales were pretty low, but instead the bartender ended up making $10 more from me than he would've otherwise, as did the dishwashers. everyone wins! i also have a rule that if i walk with more than $200, i buy the kitchen staff their first drinks, but alas... my few other tables tonight were mostly once-a-year folks & only left in the vicinity of 12%, so the kitchen, while they did a fantastic job, is out of luck. ;-)
so i'd just like to send a thank you out to the universe to those very sweet people who completely made my month. they would automatically be my favorite table of may, but i have to say they're tied with the table who, last weekend, very sincerely thanked me for working on mother's day so she could take her own mom out to eat. i don't remember how much their check was or what they tipped-- on very rare occasions, an "oral tip" means as much or even more than a financial one. (very rare! pls don't think your compliment will somehow magically pay your server's rent!)
and one that note, my sleepy pill is kicking in-- fingers crossed that it doesn't do as tylenol PM & give me the knee-jerks. i know the construction noise will wake me up, gotta get to sleep so i can do it all again tomorrow... tho i'm smart enough to expect a much less lucrative night then. |
