Your Server Doesn’t Need (or Want) Your Resume

Honestly? I’ve got to the point where I cringe inwardly when one or more people at the table announce that they are or used to be a server (or cook, or manager, or bartender) at a restaurant. I mean, where do I begin? Oh the humanity! In no particular order, here are the things that really bite about waiting on other restaurant employees.

A.) You expect them to have a little understanding, at least more than the average RC. They walk in to a full house, and they had a 30 minute wait at the door. This is an indication to anyone with half a brain that the place is jumping. The kitchen may be running a tad long, and it may take your server a few extra moments with drink refills and more bread. As a Past or Present Restaurant Employee (PPRE for the sake of this website), you should be able to grasp this immediately. After your initial, expert assessment of the situation, you have three choices. Choice # 1. Leave, and find an establishment that is experiencing less of an influx of business. If it’s Friday night, good luck with that. Choice #2. Stay, realizing that things may be a little slow, and make the best of it, while being polite and kind to your server, who is doing their absolute best to take care of you and the rest of his/her customers. Choice #3. Stay, and berate and criticize your server every step of the way, making sure that the rest of the people in your group, and in fact everyone else in your server’s section realizes how much you think s/he sucks, and what a much more masterful job you would be doing under the same set of circumstances. I hate to say it, but most PPREs go with Choice #3. But hey, be an absolute evil putz to me. See the special note towards the end of my post: “If You Really Are Confident Enough to Dine Alone You’d Be Cheerful About It- I’m Just Saying”. You can complain loudly that you never make your tables wait fifteen minutes for refills- good for you! The rest of the tables in my section won’t wait that long, just you, because you lost your A.

B.) PPREs always want to tell you how they do it (or did it) at their restaurant. Girlfriend (or dude if your a guy), this is not your restaurant! I’m sure your restaurant Burgers and Boobs, or Bros and Brews is the greatest, most magical eatery on the planet, mostly because you have graced them with your employment. If you no longer work there, I’m sure they’ve never recovered. But, let me reiterate, this is not your restaurant. Which means we don’t do things the way you always do them there. Maybe Burgers and Boobs always makes smiley faces out of the mustard on the burgers. Maybe Bros and Brews brings out a sampler plate of every single sauce, soup, salad dressing, marinade, coleslaw and any other condiment or side dish the customers want to sample, just a smorgasbord of cups and ramekins and saucers of this that and the other thing. That’s awesome! We don’t do that at my restaurant, where you happen to be dining right now. And if your cooks can half butterfly, half Pittsburgh char a strip steak like nobodies business, that is definitely one of the coolest tricks any cook could possibly hope to aspire to, and I’m sure our cooks, and all cooks in America go to bed every night dreaming that they can one day duplicate that extraordinary feat. But they aren’t going to attempt it for you today, because our cooks don’t do that at this restaurant. Sorry.

C.) This is similar to the discussion in point A, but I have a particularly annoying trait that needs further clarification. Carrying on a running conversation about how I’m screwing up, and how you would never this and you always that- while I’m at your table delivering things to you is trifling. I can’t say anything rude to you in return because I’m a child of God and I need this job, but people are going to catch me one day on my last week, and I pray to God He helps me keep my tongue then. And just to let you know? The owner of my restaurant gave me permission to stick my tongue out at people who deserve it! He said he would strenuously and vehemently deny the possibility of that ever happening if the table chose to complain. So keep your running commentary to yourself! More on the Play-by-Play Dining Out Announcer in another post.

D.) People who are dining at the restaurant that they work at, or recently stopped working at are the absolute worst. They insist on asking for all kinds of special preparations and substitutions with their meal. They know that we can do it, but they also know that the restaurant prefers not to. Not only that, they hate it when their tables ask for the same thing they’re asking for, but they’ll go ahead and ask me for it anyways. Knowing I have to go to the far storage room behind the back storage room and climb a ladder to pull down all kinds of heavy boxes; then I have to microwave and sift and simmer and whisk before I give the concoction to the cook who is going to cuss me out- and I thought you liked me! Employees from your job will send something back 35 times. And don’t think that you don’t have a reputation at the job. Everyone hates waiting on you. No matter how much they smile in your face. Your 20% tip doesn’t make up for the five miles worth of running you forced them to do, and everyone in the back is talking about you. Just thought you’d like to know.

In conclusion, PPREs are like The Excellent Cooks. If you are such a superstar server, so far above me in the waitstaff stratosphere, then don’t torture yourself with my sub par service. Wait on yourself (and your friends) and that way you all will never be disappointed.