Professor: I have some ink cartridges that have been stacking up in my office.
Me: You can send them back to be recycled. Do you still have the boxes?
Professor: Can you do it for me?
Me: Do you have the boxes? And the labels?
Professor: Yes. If I bring them to you, can you send them back?
Me: All you need to do is put the labels on the outside of the box. UPS will pick them up when they come.
Professor: Can I bring them to you?
Me: Uhm, sure. But all you need to do is put the labels on them and stick them in the mailroom (right beside your office).
Professor: I really can’t be bothered with this. Can’t I just give them to you to take care of?
Me: Sure. But all I’m going to do is peel and stick the labels.
Professor: Great. I’ll bring them down.
--------------
Me: (on phone) Math department. How may I help you?
Dude: This is Mike from FedEx. Could you help me out with something?
Me: Sure.
Dude: John Smith.
Me:
Dude:
Me: John Smith?
Dude: Yeah.
Me: Would you like to talk to John Smith?
Dude: No.
Me: I’m sorry – what is it about John Smith that I can help you with?Dude: I’m downstairs.
Me: Do you have a package for Dr. Smith?
Dude: Yeah.
Me: You can deliver it here.
Dude: Yeah . . .
Me:
Dude:
Me: Do you need the room number?
Dude: It’s on the package.
Me: Is there anything else I can help you with?
Dude: No.
Me: Well, I guess I’ll see you in a few moments.
Dude: Yeah . . .
Me: Have a nice afternoon.
Dude: Yeah.
Me: Yeah.
Dude still hasn’t delivered the package.
Showing posts with label People who need some sense choked into them. Show all posts
Showing posts with label People who need some sense choked into them. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
This is why your server hates you
Friday night my last table just before cuts went up was a four top – an old white dude, his wife, their daughter, and the daughter’s teenage son who wanted nothing but water and biscuits (hooray, please let me refill this glass for you seven times while I run back and forth fetching you free bread and jellies. No, really. Nothing would make me happier). After being informed that junior would not be paying for a meal, I proceeded to take orders for the rest of the table, starting with junior’s mama.
She ordered breakfast, and when I asked her how she would like her eggs cooked, she thought about it for a minute and finally settled on scrambled. I smiled and turned my attention to her mother in the next seat, but before giving me her order, the older woman told her daughter, in a very snotty tone, “Do you want cheese on them? Because if you don’t want cheese on them, you have to tell them, or they’ll just put cheese on your eggs!”
Her daughter looked up at me, non verbally checking the accuracy of her mother’s outburst. I simply shook my head and said, “No.”
Right then and there my tip went down by ten percent.
“Well, they always put cheese on your father’s eggs and he doesn’t want it,” the older woman said to her daughter, as if exposing a global conspiracy between restaurants and the dairy industry.
“We will definitely not put cheese in the eggs,” I said, then, “What can I get for you today?”
She ordered, without looking up from her menu, obviously steaming about oeufs avec cheese, and when she was finished, she pushed her menu toward me, letting it hover in the air in front of her husband’s face. I very slowly finished writing down her order before taking it from her.
When the husband finally ordered his breakfast, I figured out why the old dude is always getting cheese in his scrambled eggs. “I’d like the pancake breakfast with bacon,” he mumbled, “and I’d like the eggs scrambled without cheese.”
So there it is, I thought, the reason dude is always getting what he thinks he didn’t ask for. If my old dude’s wife hadn’t raised such a stink about it, I probably would have served him and charged him for the dreaded cheese in his eggs, just as psychic bitch predicted.
Why? Because guests don’t know how to fucking order and because they don’t speak up. At full capacity, our restaurant seats over 200 people. Add to that the crowd of non-seated, waiting for a table people. And add to that ten to fifteen servers, two hostesses, maybe a couple of busboys, five grill cooks, two managers, two backup cooks, one prep cook, and whoever manages to show up in dish – all engaged in conversation. Add to that the clank of dishes being set on tables, thrown into bus tubs, and dropped on the floor. Add to that the phone ringing and cash registers slamming shut. And add to that three children running and giggling through the restaurant and one screaming baby. Always one screaming baby.
And I, the server, am standing at the end of your table, focusing intently on your every word as you stare into your menu and whisper your order to me as if we’re in hiding and raising your voice too much would let the serial killer outside the door know we’re in here. Even when I ask guests to speak up, using the pretense that I’m just deaf, most only raise their volume a fraction of a decibel.
So when you say to me, in your tiny voice, “Bring me a Coke with no lemon,” all I catch is “Coke” and “lemon.” And because a Coke is not served with lemon, has not ever been served with lemon, and is not listed on the printed menu you are holding in front of your mouth as you try to communicate with me as including a lemon, it can be assumed that the only reason you would mention a lemon is because you want a fucking lemon. Difficult concept to grasp, I know.
She ordered breakfast, and when I asked her how she would like her eggs cooked, she thought about it for a minute and finally settled on scrambled. I smiled and turned my attention to her mother in the next seat, but before giving me her order, the older woman told her daughter, in a very snotty tone, “Do you want cheese on them? Because if you don’t want cheese on them, you have to tell them, or they’ll just put cheese on your eggs!”
Her daughter looked up at me, non verbally checking the accuracy of her mother’s outburst. I simply shook my head and said, “No.”
Right then and there my tip went down by ten percent.
“Well, they always put cheese on your father’s eggs and he doesn’t want it,” the older woman said to her daughter, as if exposing a global conspiracy between restaurants and the dairy industry.
“We will definitely not put cheese in the eggs,” I said, then, “What can I get for you today?”
She ordered, without looking up from her menu, obviously steaming about oeufs avec cheese, and when she was finished, she pushed her menu toward me, letting it hover in the air in front of her husband’s face. I very slowly finished writing down her order before taking it from her.
When the husband finally ordered his breakfast, I figured out why the old dude is always getting cheese in his scrambled eggs. “I’d like the pancake breakfast with bacon,” he mumbled, “and I’d like the eggs scrambled without cheese.”
So there it is, I thought, the reason dude is always getting what he thinks he didn’t ask for. If my old dude’s wife hadn’t raised such a stink about it, I probably would have served him and charged him for the dreaded cheese in his eggs, just as psychic bitch predicted.
Why? Because guests don’t know how to fucking order and because they don’t speak up. At full capacity, our restaurant seats over 200 people. Add to that the crowd of non-seated, waiting for a table people. And add to that ten to fifteen servers, two hostesses, maybe a couple of busboys, five grill cooks, two managers, two backup cooks, one prep cook, and whoever manages to show up in dish – all engaged in conversation. Add to that the clank of dishes being set on tables, thrown into bus tubs, and dropped on the floor. Add to that the phone ringing and cash registers slamming shut. And add to that three children running and giggling through the restaurant and one screaming baby. Always one screaming baby.
And I, the server, am standing at the end of your table, focusing intently on your every word as you stare into your menu and whisper your order to me as if we’re in hiding and raising your voice too much would let the serial killer outside the door know we’re in here. Even when I ask guests to speak up, using the pretense that I’m just deaf, most only raise their volume a fraction of a decibel.
So when you say to me, in your tiny voice, “Bring me a Coke with no lemon,” all I catch is “Coke” and “lemon.” And because a Coke is not served with lemon, has not ever been served with lemon, and is not listed on the printed menu you are holding in front of your mouth as you try to communicate with me as including a lemon, it can be assumed that the only reason you would mention a lemon is because you want a fucking lemon. Difficult concept to grasp, I know.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Letters to my 'guests'
To the divorced dad who brought his children in for dinner:
I was standing at another table when the hostess sat you, and as soon as I finished taking their order, I greeted you. I could tell you did not think this was fast enough. I could tell by the way you tapped your polished leather shoes impatiently until I turned around. I also greeted your children who couldn’t be bothered to look up from their notebook drawings – your daughter’s of a home with two children and a mother in front of it, your son’s of a similar house on fire – long enough to acknowledge my presence or that they had been spoken to. I came right back with the tea you ordered for yourself, and nothing for your children because you bought them sodas which they brought into the restaurant. I smiled while I waited for you to decide what to eat, even though I had other tables to greet, even though you told me you were ready and seemed annoyed when I politely suggested I come back in a few moments. I only tell you this because you weren’t looking at me while you barked your order at me. And I wanted you to know. And when you told me to bring you a plate of biscuits, then as an afterthought said, “That comes with it” almost as a question, but not quite, I told you it didn’t, but I would hook you up. I did not do this because you are entitled to bread. I did it to be nice. And when I brought you the bread, and you said “the kids need some waters” – still not looking me in the eye – and put your arms behind your head, making sure to shake your shiny gold watch behind your head as you stretched and your son picked up the orange crayon to add accent to his flames, I did not “accidentally” drop the plate of bread in your lap. This too I did to be nice. And when I brought the children their water, and offered to top off your glass of tea, I understood that you were too busy staring off into nothingness to acknowledge that you had been asked a question, so I refilled it anyway. And when I brought your food out, including an extra plate so your children could split a meal, and they couldn’t be bothered to move their crayons and notebooks to make room for the plates of food and you said nothing, I only laughed and commented on how we needed to make bigger tables. And when you growled at me to “put that down over there!” even though I could not reach “over there” because your son had chosen that moment to lean across the table and throw the orange slice garnish on the ground at my feet, I did not knock him in the head with the plate, and teach him about being aware of his surroundings as I reached over him. Because I’m nice like that. And later, as I rushed down the aisle with another table’s tray of food and you stretched your foot into the aisle, almost tripping me, I did not scuff your expensive shoes. Even though I wanted to. And after you left, and I came back to bus your table, and I saw the untouched water glasses, the outside soda bottles, the pieces of wet pancake on the table and the floor, and the dollar fifty tip you left me on a twenty dollar tab, I wondered why it took your wife so long to leave your sorry ass.
To the older woman who needed to complain about something, to somebody:
You ordered roast beef with no gravy. Even though it is cooked in gravy. So I stood behind the cook while he put your portion of roast onto the grill and cooked the gravy away. I watched while he added the sides to your plate, and the moment he was finished, I brought it to your table. You might imagine my surprise when I stopped back to ask how your meal was, and you complained that it wasn’t very warm. I was almost as shocked as you were when my manager refused to comp your meal and most definitely more shocked than when you and your husband left without tipping me at all.
To the guests who come in with thirteen of your closest friends and complain to management about my service when your food does not arrive within fifteen minutes during a dinner rush on Friday night:
Go to McDonald's. Or a buffet. Or the real world. Your choice.
To the couple with the adorable little girl and the teenage son, both of whom said “please” and “thank you” and wished me a good evening as you left:
I think I love you. Please dine with us every night. Please.
I was standing at another table when the hostess sat you, and as soon as I finished taking their order, I greeted you. I could tell you did not think this was fast enough. I could tell by the way you tapped your polished leather shoes impatiently until I turned around. I also greeted your children who couldn’t be bothered to look up from their notebook drawings – your daughter’s of a home with two children and a mother in front of it, your son’s of a similar house on fire – long enough to acknowledge my presence or that they had been spoken to. I came right back with the tea you ordered for yourself, and nothing for your children because you bought them sodas which they brought into the restaurant. I smiled while I waited for you to decide what to eat, even though I had other tables to greet, even though you told me you were ready and seemed annoyed when I politely suggested I come back in a few moments. I only tell you this because you weren’t looking at me while you barked your order at me. And I wanted you to know. And when you told me to bring you a plate of biscuits, then as an afterthought said, “That comes with it” almost as a question, but not quite, I told you it didn’t, but I would hook you up. I did not do this because you are entitled to bread. I did it to be nice. And when I brought you the bread, and you said “the kids need some waters” – still not looking me in the eye – and put your arms behind your head, making sure to shake your shiny gold watch behind your head as you stretched and your son picked up the orange crayon to add accent to his flames, I did not “accidentally” drop the plate of bread in your lap. This too I did to be nice. And when I brought the children their water, and offered to top off your glass of tea, I understood that you were too busy staring off into nothingness to acknowledge that you had been asked a question, so I refilled it anyway. And when I brought your food out, including an extra plate so your children could split a meal, and they couldn’t be bothered to move their crayons and notebooks to make room for the plates of food and you said nothing, I only laughed and commented on how we needed to make bigger tables. And when you growled at me to “put that down over there!” even though I could not reach “over there” because your son had chosen that moment to lean across the table and throw the orange slice garnish on the ground at my feet, I did not knock him in the head with the plate, and teach him about being aware of his surroundings as I reached over him. Because I’m nice like that. And later, as I rushed down the aisle with another table’s tray of food and you stretched your foot into the aisle, almost tripping me, I did not scuff your expensive shoes. Even though I wanted to. And after you left, and I came back to bus your table, and I saw the untouched water glasses, the outside soda bottles, the pieces of wet pancake on the table and the floor, and the dollar fifty tip you left me on a twenty dollar tab, I wondered why it took your wife so long to leave your sorry ass.
To the older woman who needed to complain about something, to somebody:
You ordered roast beef with no gravy. Even though it is cooked in gravy. So I stood behind the cook while he put your portion of roast onto the grill and cooked the gravy away. I watched while he added the sides to your plate, and the moment he was finished, I brought it to your table. You might imagine my surprise when I stopped back to ask how your meal was, and you complained that it wasn’t very warm. I was almost as shocked as you were when my manager refused to comp your meal and most definitely more shocked than when you and your husband left without tipping me at all.
To the guests who come in with thirteen of your closest friends and complain to management about my service when your food does not arrive within fifteen minutes during a dinner rush on Friday night:
Go to McDonald's. Or a buffet. Or the real world. Your choice.
To the couple with the adorable little girl and the teenage son, both of whom said “please” and “thank you” and wished me a good evening as you left:
I think I love you. Please dine with us every night. Please.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
I won't post about serving tomorrow, I promise
Uhhm, so, I almost got myself fired last night.
Okay, so the story’s not all that exciting, but here it is anyway.
I had a four table section in the second dining room and, because we were short staffed, an eight table section in smoking. Being Monday night, it wasn’t exceptionally busy, but we got a decent crowd in for dinner. I already had a couple tables down when the hostess seated a seven top in the smoking section. Mostly kids.
Yes, some people think it’s cool to sit with their kids in the smoking section. But that's not today’s rant.
Since there were five small children at the table, I asked the hostess not to seat me again for a few minutes because the presence of small children at the table generally adds two minutes per child to the ordering time:
Mom: (to kid) What would you like to drink?
Kid: I want Coke.
Mom: No Coke. How about chocolate milk?
Kid: I hate chocolate milk.
Mom: Please sit back down in your chair.
Kid: I want Coke!
Mom: I’m not ordering you soda. It’s almost bed time.
Kid: Coke!
Mom: You can have chocolate milk.
Kid: Co. Ca. Cola!
Mom: Let go of your sister’s hair. Chocolate milk or nothing.
Kid: Fine!
Mom: (to me, standing patiently beside the table) He’ll have chocolate milk.
Repeat scenario once per child.
(Here's where it gets boring. But it's called a set-up. Like the long, boring parts in sci-fi shows, where you're just picking up clues and backstory and waiting for the action.)
After I finally got the drink order for the seven top, I swung back by my other section to check on my guests and discovered that the hostess had sat me anyway. And not once, but twice. I picked up the drink orders for the new tables, being informed by one that someone else would be joining them, and headed into the kitchen for the drinks. I asked another server to drop off coffees and sweet teas in the second dining room while I went back to the seven top with bread and their drinks and got their order.
Before I put the order in, I stopped back in the second dining room, dropped off a couple checks, and checked on the two tables just sat. One wasn’t ready to order. The other was still waiting for their guest.
I put the seven top's order in and came back to the dining room where the third guest had finally joined her party. I greeted her, got her drink order, and since they weren’t ready to order food yet, I told them I’d be back. I took the order from my other table (who was ready) and put it in before coming back with the drink and finally getting the order from the three top. I came back out to the dining room with pitchers and coffee pots, refilled all my guests (including the three top) in the second, brought boxes for people who were getting ready to leave, and then went to my tables in smoking, where I had been sat again.
They gave me a drink order, asked about the soup and specials and for bread, but weren’t ready to order. They were ready when I came back, so I took their order and left to put it in. As soon as I was finished, the seven top’s food was ready in the window. I gathered all their requested condiments, asked for a couple followers, and took the food to their table. They needed more napkins and some extra dressings, which I brought right away.
When I came back into the kitchen, someone else was walking out the door with one of my trays – for the two top – but the three top wasn’t up yet, and since this was the first moment since refilling drinks I’d had, I started setting up a plate of bread to take to the three top. Just then my manager came back and said that the three top “requested your presence.”
(So here's the "action." No flying or bolts of lightning flying out of anyone's hand. No bending time - though that would have been helpful)
At this point, it had been at most, at the very, very most, fifteen minutes since I had taken that table’s order (and I refilled their drinks once after the order went in). Here is the conversation:
Woman who came in last: Where have you been?
Me: (setting down bread and plates on the table) Uhm, I’m sorry, ma’am, I have a large part-
Woman: (interrupting) You’ve left us sitting here for thirty minutes.
Me: I’m sorry, ma’am. But it hasn’t been thirty-
Woman: We had to get someone else to refill our drinks.
Me: I do apologize, ma’am. I have several other tables and a large par-
Woman: (interrupting, again, and gesturing toward the manager who is standing at the next table over) He told us you were at a large party.
Me: Yes, ma’am. Their food came up and I was-
Woman: Well, you just walked away and left us.
Me: Ma’am, I had food to bring out and another –
Woman: You didn’t even come back to refill our drinks for over thirty minutes.
Me: I do apologize, but I just took your order fifteen –
Woman: Are you telling me it hasn’t been over thirty minutes?
Woman’s father: I think she is.
Me: (trying to change the subject) Ma’am your food should be up any –
Woman: Are you going to tell me it hasn’t been thirty minutes?
Woman's father: Of course she is.
Me: Ma'am, I have five other tables, including a party of sev-
Woman: I don't know what you were doing, but it shouldn't take you thirty minutes.
Me: Ma’am, I apologize if it seemed like I was gone -
Woman: It was thirty minutes.
Me: I apologize. Can I bring you -
Woman: Are you going to continue telling me it hasn’t been thirty minutes?
Me: Are you going to continue to be rude to me?
Yep.
There it was.
She said, “Excuse me?!” And I walked away before I said something really stupid. Or threw lightning at her. She turned around and grabbed the manager who was still at the table beside them.
In the kitchen, I checked their ticket time. It had been seventeen minutes since I put it in.
When the manager came back, I apologized to him and asked told him I understood he was probably going to send me home.
“Hell no,” he said. “I heard everything. She was being a bitch.”
I calmed myself down, checked on my smoking tables, and came back to the window, where the three top’s food had just come up. I got it ready and ran it out to them.
And I apologized. I didn’t say I was sorry (because I wasn’t), but that I apologized. I asked them if they needed anything else. Perhaps some refills (because for the third time in twenty minutes they had sucked down twenty ounces of liquid). Then I dropped off their check. Showing the time they ordered.
I brought back refills, asked them how everything was, and apologized again. The woman said thank you and for the rest of their meal, they were all extremely polite.
At the end of their meal, I brought them to go boxes and welcomed them to join us again.
The manager said he would back me up if they decided to complain, but they tipped me eighteen percent. So I don't think they will.
Still, I felt bad about it all night. I mean, she was wrong, but I never lose my cool with a guest. And I have had some awful guests. I didn’t understand why I reacted that way. The rest of my tables were doing fine. I wasn’t in the weeds. I was having a pretty good night. I wasn’t anywhere near the end of my rope or the last straw or whatever.
I just suddenly couldn’t take this woman being so incredibly demeaning.
Okay, so the story’s not all that exciting, but here it is anyway.
I had a four table section in the second dining room and, because we were short staffed, an eight table section in smoking. Being Monday night, it wasn’t exceptionally busy, but we got a decent crowd in for dinner. I already had a couple tables down when the hostess seated a seven top in the smoking section. Mostly kids.
Yes, some people think it’s cool to sit with their kids in the smoking section. But that's not today’s rant.
Since there were five small children at the table, I asked the hostess not to seat me again for a few minutes because the presence of small children at the table generally adds two minutes per child to the ordering time:
Mom: (to kid) What would you like to drink?
Kid: I want Coke.
Mom: No Coke. How about chocolate milk?
Kid: I hate chocolate milk.
Mom: Please sit back down in your chair.
Kid: I want Coke!
Mom: I’m not ordering you soda. It’s almost bed time.
Kid: Coke!
Mom: You can have chocolate milk.
Kid: Co. Ca. Cola!
Mom: Let go of your sister’s hair. Chocolate milk or nothing.
Kid: Fine!
Mom: (to me, standing patiently beside the table) He’ll have chocolate milk.
Repeat scenario once per child.
(Here's where it gets boring. But it's called a set-up. Like the long, boring parts in sci-fi shows, where you're just picking up clues and backstory and waiting for the action.)
After I finally got the drink order for the seven top, I swung back by my other section to check on my guests and discovered that the hostess had sat me anyway. And not once, but twice. I picked up the drink orders for the new tables, being informed by one that someone else would be joining them, and headed into the kitchen for the drinks. I asked another server to drop off coffees and sweet teas in the second dining room while I went back to the seven top with bread and their drinks and got their order.
Before I put the order in, I stopped back in the second dining room, dropped off a couple checks, and checked on the two tables just sat. One wasn’t ready to order. The other was still waiting for their guest.
I put the seven top's order in and came back to the dining room where the third guest had finally joined her party. I greeted her, got her drink order, and since they weren’t ready to order food yet, I told them I’d be back. I took the order from my other table (who was ready) and put it in before coming back with the drink and finally getting the order from the three top. I came back out to the dining room with pitchers and coffee pots, refilled all my guests (including the three top) in the second, brought boxes for people who were getting ready to leave, and then went to my tables in smoking, where I had been sat again.
They gave me a drink order, asked about the soup and specials and for bread, but weren’t ready to order. They were ready when I came back, so I took their order and left to put it in. As soon as I was finished, the seven top’s food was ready in the window. I gathered all their requested condiments, asked for a couple followers, and took the food to their table. They needed more napkins and some extra dressings, which I brought right away.
When I came back into the kitchen, someone else was walking out the door with one of my trays – for the two top – but the three top wasn’t up yet, and since this was the first moment since refilling drinks I’d had, I started setting up a plate of bread to take to the three top. Just then my manager came back and said that the three top “requested your presence.”
(So here's the "action." No flying or bolts of lightning flying out of anyone's hand. No bending time - though that would have been helpful)
At this point, it had been at most, at the very, very most, fifteen minutes since I had taken that table’s order (and I refilled their drinks once after the order went in). Here is the conversation:
Woman who came in last: Where have you been?
Me: (setting down bread and plates on the table) Uhm, I’m sorry, ma’am, I have a large part-
Woman: (interrupting) You’ve left us sitting here for thirty minutes.
Me: I’m sorry, ma’am. But it hasn’t been thirty-
Woman: We had to get someone else to refill our drinks.
Me: I do apologize, ma’am. I have several other tables and a large par-
Woman: (interrupting, again, and gesturing toward the manager who is standing at the next table over) He told us you were at a large party.
Me: Yes, ma’am. Their food came up and I was-
Woman: Well, you just walked away and left us.
Me: Ma’am, I had food to bring out and another –
Woman: You didn’t even come back to refill our drinks for over thirty minutes.
Me: I do apologize, but I just took your order fifteen –
Woman: Are you telling me it hasn’t been over thirty minutes?
Woman’s father: I think she is.
Me: (trying to change the subject) Ma’am your food should be up any –
Woman: Are you going to tell me it hasn’t been thirty minutes?
Woman's father: Of course she is.
Me: Ma'am, I have five other tables, including a party of sev-
Woman: I don't know what you were doing, but it shouldn't take you thirty minutes.
Me: Ma’am, I apologize if it seemed like I was gone -
Woman: It was thirty minutes.
Me: I apologize. Can I bring you -
Woman: Are you going to continue telling me it hasn’t been thirty minutes?
Me: Are you going to continue to be rude to me?
Yep.
There it was.
She said, “Excuse me?!” And I walked away before I said something really stupid. Or threw lightning at her. She turned around and grabbed the manager who was still at the table beside them.
In the kitchen, I checked their ticket time. It had been seventeen minutes since I put it in.
When the manager came back, I apologized to him and asked told him I understood he was probably going to send me home.
“Hell no,” he said. “I heard everything. She was being a bitch.”
I calmed myself down, checked on my smoking tables, and came back to the window, where the three top’s food had just come up. I got it ready and ran it out to them.
And I apologized. I didn’t say I was sorry (because I wasn’t), but that I apologized. I asked them if they needed anything else. Perhaps some refills (because for the third time in twenty minutes they had sucked down twenty ounces of liquid). Then I dropped off their check. Showing the time they ordered.
I brought back refills, asked them how everything was, and apologized again. The woman said thank you and for the rest of their meal, they were all extremely polite.
At the end of their meal, I brought them to go boxes and welcomed them to join us again.
The manager said he would back me up if they decided to complain, but they tipped me eighteen percent. So I don't think they will.
Still, I felt bad about it all night. I mean, she was wrong, but I never lose my cool with a guest. And I have had some awful guests. I didn’t understand why I reacted that way. The rest of my tables were doing fine. I wasn’t in the weeds. I was having a pretty good night. I wasn’t anywhere near the end of my rope or the last straw or whatever.
I just suddenly couldn’t take this woman being so incredibly demeaning.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Why the FAA needs to manage the flight patterns of pigeons
Yesterday was a pretty crummy day all around. I was just feeling out of sorts all day, and having that why-is-this-happening-to-me kind of overreaction to everything. I, like much of the Western hemisphere, hate my job and was really feeling it as soon as I got to work. And I let everyone around me know it too, snapping at my least favorite professor when he tried to take over unjamming the copier for me that, "I can do it myself!" I was in this mood most of the morning and it just kept growing as I thought about how much I want to be teaching or doing something else, anything other than answering phones and ordering supplies and directing lost students.
Then I had to hike across campus to pick up a tablet PC from our tech guys, who I already have a secret feud with - secret, as in they don't know we're feuding - because of the fact that they've put some stupid software on our PC's that means we can't update or download anything. Anything. Like I can't even change the time on my clock because I don't have 'administrative privileges' to do such a thing. This of course means no iTunes, which means that my office music listening is limited to Yahoo! Launch, or worse yet, the radio. The radio?! I don't even know how to use one of those anymore.
Anyway, the tech office is located in the basement of the honors' students dorms, and aside from being a half day's hike away, the only way to get into the basement is to have one of the uber sharp RA's let you down. So I had to stand at the elevators with this kid (who by the way had the nosehairs of a decades older man and needed to learn how to prune those babies, lest things get caught up in there) waiting for the elevators to arrive and the students to empty out completely so I could take my ride down to the secret tech fortress in the basement alone. I shouldn't complain. This part only took ten minutes. Finally, one of the elevators empties, Nosehair directs a couple waiting students to the other elevator, he turns his key to unlock the secret floor, he hits the button for me, and I am on my way. Except the elevator doesn't go down. It goes to the top floor, where a group of students gets on. And then it stops on every single floor on its way back down to the lobby, where Nosehair stands, staring at the elevator, completely befuddled. And yes, I just used the word 'befuddled.'
Eventually I make it to the secret fortress in the basement, only to find that the tech guys don't know anything about a tablet PC for my department. I remark about how amusing that is, considering that they called to tell me it was ready just a few hours earlier. Two of them wander around the offices and labs, randomly picking up laptop bags and sort of looking for it and asking me who the laptop is assigned for and when it was dropped off, to which I respond again and again that it was a tablet PC, not a laptop, and I don't know when it was dropped off, only that I was told to pick it up just a few hours ago. After fifteen minutes of this buffoonery, I tell them that they can just figure out what happened and I'll come back later. Upon hearing this, they suddenly find my tablet PC in plain site, sitting on a workbench three feet from where I stand (maybe they do know we're in a feud). I get some bogus explanation that it should have been sitting on another table - the "pick up" table - to the left of the work bench, which would have indicated it was ready to be picked up. Then I find out they tested it and nothing was wrong with it; the instructor who sent it over was just plugging the cord into the wrong slot.
Over an hour after I left my office for a twenty minute errand, I made it back and was immediately met by two professors who needed manila folders (on the top shelf of the supply cabinet - "See? Right here.") and whiteboard markers (also in the supply cabinet). Then the dean's office called looking for the chair, who needed to sign a form, and blah, blah, blah until it was almost three-thirty and too late for me to take the lunch I had planned to take when I returned from the super secret tech fortress.
So at four-thirty, like I do four days a week, I closed my door and changed into my khakis and freshly-ironed oxford shirt to head off for a night of table-waiting. And as I walked to my car, I told myself I had to get out of this funk, that I needed to hustle at the restaurant and be cheery and wonderful and score some big tips, and I was just starting to feel a little better as I rounded the corner into the parking lot and out of nowhere a bird pooped on me.
A bird dropped its load on my clean, pressed shirt and all over one of my shoes.
Then I had to hike across campus to pick up a tablet PC from our tech guys, who I already have a secret feud with - secret, as in they don't know we're feuding - because of the fact that they've put some stupid software on our PC's that means we can't update or download anything. Anything. Like I can't even change the time on my clock because I don't have 'administrative privileges' to do such a thing. This of course means no iTunes, which means that my office music listening is limited to Yahoo! Launch, or worse yet, the radio. The radio?! I don't even know how to use one of those anymore.
Anyway, the tech office is located in the basement of the honors' students dorms, and aside from being a half day's hike away, the only way to get into the basement is to have one of the uber sharp RA's let you down. So I had to stand at the elevators with this kid (who by the way had the nosehairs of a decades older man and needed to learn how to prune those babies, lest things get caught up in there) waiting for the elevators to arrive and the students to empty out completely so I could take my ride down to the secret tech fortress in the basement alone. I shouldn't complain. This part only took ten minutes. Finally, one of the elevators empties, Nosehair directs a couple waiting students to the other elevator, he turns his key to unlock the secret floor, he hits the button for me, and I am on my way. Except the elevator doesn't go down. It goes to the top floor, where a group of students gets on. And then it stops on every single floor on its way back down to the lobby, where Nosehair stands, staring at the elevator, completely befuddled. And yes, I just used the word 'befuddled.'
Eventually I make it to the secret fortress in the basement, only to find that the tech guys don't know anything about a tablet PC for my department. I remark about how amusing that is, considering that they called to tell me it was ready just a few hours earlier. Two of them wander around the offices and labs, randomly picking up laptop bags and sort of looking for it and asking me who the laptop is assigned for and when it was dropped off, to which I respond again and again that it was a tablet PC, not a laptop, and I don't know when it was dropped off, only that I was told to pick it up just a few hours ago. After fifteen minutes of this buffoonery, I tell them that they can just figure out what happened and I'll come back later. Upon hearing this, they suddenly find my tablet PC in plain site, sitting on a workbench three feet from where I stand (maybe they do know we're in a feud). I get some bogus explanation that it should have been sitting on another table - the "pick up" table - to the left of the work bench, which would have indicated it was ready to be picked up. Then I find out they tested it and nothing was wrong with it; the instructor who sent it over was just plugging the cord into the wrong slot.
Over an hour after I left my office for a twenty minute errand, I made it back and was immediately met by two professors who needed manila folders (on the top shelf of the supply cabinet - "See? Right here.") and whiteboard markers (also in the supply cabinet). Then the dean's office called looking for the chair, who needed to sign a form, and blah, blah, blah until it was almost three-thirty and too late for me to take the lunch I had planned to take when I returned from the super secret tech fortress.
So at four-thirty, like I do four days a week, I closed my door and changed into my khakis and freshly-ironed oxford shirt to head off for a night of table-waiting. And as I walked to my car, I told myself I had to get out of this funk, that I needed to hustle at the restaurant and be cheery and wonderful and score some big tips, and I was just starting to feel a little better as I rounded the corner into the parking lot and out of nowhere a bird pooped on me.
A bird dropped its load on my clean, pressed shirt and all over one of my shoes.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Letters of praise
To the administrator who is too afraid of his own employees to effectively administrate:
When my friend scheduled an appointment with you to complain about her supervisor, my former supervisor, you must have been blindsided. I mean, the supervisor had gone through seven assistants in six years, but I was there for almost three years, so it must not have been so bad. And she was often abusive in department meetings, so much so that most people, including your own boss, refused to participate in those meetings, but come on, she couldn’t be that awful. And while she may have had a reputation on campus as a legendary bitch, well, reputations are often built on rumor, not fact. So when my friend came to you, and told you how it had really been working for her, how the woman had driven me away, how she was now abusing the new assistant, how she was ruining my friend’s career with unfair and overly critical performance reviews and personal attacks, how she wandered into the office hours late each morning, reeking of beer, what were you supposed to do about it? Deal with the supervisor? Ask her to change her behavior? Tell her to check into rehab? Ask her to step down? No. Not at all.
You did what any suit would do when faced with such a problem – you offered to reassign my friend to another department. And for not sugarcoating anything, for teaching my friend a cold, hard lesson about life and telling the legendary bitch who has been making my friend’s life a living hell that my friend, herself, requested the move, well, for that, sir, I salute you.
To the couple who came into the restaurant ten minutes before close last night:
I know what you were thinking: they’re not closed yet. Oh, and look, honey! There are no other cars in the parking lot! We’ll be able to get right in, and it will be quiet and romantic, and we’ll be able to sit and talk. But I also know what you weren’t thinking: Oh, they close in ten minutes. It will take us at least ten minutes to order because I don’t know what I want – Do you know what you want? And then it will take them another ten or so to cook the food and we’ll want salads and soup and that will add another ten and then we’ll want coffee after dinner and we’ll talk about our mundane lives for at least another twenty minutes while the waitstaff cleans up the place and then glares and plots our imminent demise, possibly by food poisoning, because by the time we finally get our overstuffed asses up and pay our check we will have held them up at least an hour when, since there are no cars in the parking lot NOW, it probably means they could go home to their beds just a few minutes after closing time, so maybe we should go to the Ihop down the street. They’re open all night.
For thinking the first thing, and not the second, you are my heroes. Thank you. Come again.
To the graduate student who was the last one admitted to the program, after everyone else had turned it down, and who nevertheless thinks she is the shit:
You are my favorite. I know I shouldn’t have favorites, but I do. Could this be because I have only seen the others one time each, and can not distinguish one from another, so you, by default, must be the favorite? Could it be that in the two weeks since you first stepped on campus, you have visited my office no fewer than twenty-nine times, and each time you make yourself at home, dropping your book bags on my floor and sinking back into the chair on the other side of the desk, ready to hang out like we are old friends? Or could it be that you keep me on my toes, that you apparently stay up into the wee hours, thinking up new and interesting ways to ask the same question again and again and again? Could it be because you were the only one with sense enough to complain about the unlockable drawer in the fourth generation desk in the makeshift GTA office space in what was formerly a hallway, when obviously we have so much more to offer you? Perhaps it is the fact that you helped me to be a better employee by going to one of my coworkers and then another coworker and finally my boss when I did not give you the answer you wanted.
Or it could be that today, while walking down the hallway with your employment packet in my hand, I found myself unable to stifle a sneeze, and when I had to use your paperwork to block the spray, I had a secret moment of perverse joy in an otherwise crappy day. For that, I thank you. Really.
When my friend scheduled an appointment with you to complain about her supervisor, my former supervisor, you must have been blindsided. I mean, the supervisor had gone through seven assistants in six years, but I was there for almost three years, so it must not have been so bad. And she was often abusive in department meetings, so much so that most people, including your own boss, refused to participate in those meetings, but come on, she couldn’t be that awful. And while she may have had a reputation on campus as a legendary bitch, well, reputations are often built on rumor, not fact. So when my friend came to you, and told you how it had really been working for her, how the woman had driven me away, how she was now abusing the new assistant, how she was ruining my friend’s career with unfair and overly critical performance reviews and personal attacks, how she wandered into the office hours late each morning, reeking of beer, what were you supposed to do about it? Deal with the supervisor? Ask her to change her behavior? Tell her to check into rehab? Ask her to step down? No. Not at all.
You did what any suit would do when faced with such a problem – you offered to reassign my friend to another department. And for not sugarcoating anything, for teaching my friend a cold, hard lesson about life and telling the legendary bitch who has been making my friend’s life a living hell that my friend, herself, requested the move, well, for that, sir, I salute you.
To the couple who came into the restaurant ten minutes before close last night:
I know what you were thinking: they’re not closed yet. Oh, and look, honey! There are no other cars in the parking lot! We’ll be able to get right in, and it will be quiet and romantic, and we’ll be able to sit and talk. But I also know what you weren’t thinking: Oh, they close in ten minutes. It will take us at least ten minutes to order because I don’t know what I want – Do you know what you want? And then it will take them another ten or so to cook the food and we’ll want salads and soup and that will add another ten and then we’ll want coffee after dinner and we’ll talk about our mundane lives for at least another twenty minutes while the waitstaff cleans up the place and then glares and plots our imminent demise, possibly by food poisoning, because by the time we finally get our overstuffed asses up and pay our check we will have held them up at least an hour when, since there are no cars in the parking lot NOW, it probably means they could go home to their beds just a few minutes after closing time, so maybe we should go to the Ihop down the street. They’re open all night.
For thinking the first thing, and not the second, you are my heroes. Thank you. Come again.
To the graduate student who was the last one admitted to the program, after everyone else had turned it down, and who nevertheless thinks she is the shit:
You are my favorite. I know I shouldn’t have favorites, but I do. Could this be because I have only seen the others one time each, and can not distinguish one from another, so you, by default, must be the favorite? Could it be that in the two weeks since you first stepped on campus, you have visited my office no fewer than twenty-nine times, and each time you make yourself at home, dropping your book bags on my floor and sinking back into the chair on the other side of the desk, ready to hang out like we are old friends? Or could it be that you keep me on my toes, that you apparently stay up into the wee hours, thinking up new and interesting ways to ask the same question again and again and again? Could it be because you were the only one with sense enough to complain about the unlockable drawer in the fourth generation desk in the makeshift GTA office space in what was formerly a hallway, when obviously we have so much more to offer you? Perhaps it is the fact that you helped me to be a better employee by going to one of my coworkers and then another coworker and finally my boss when I did not give you the answer you wanted.
Or it could be that today, while walking down the hallway with your employment packet in my hand, I found myself unable to stifle a sneeze, and when I had to use your paperwork to block the spray, I had a secret moment of perverse joy in an otherwise crappy day. For that, I thank you. Really.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Conversations I wish I could finish otherwise
So it's the first administrative week and the first week of classes, which basically means it's the week that the former occupants of hell escape their fiery grave and drag the brimstone up with them. Okay, it just means the faculty and students are back and the "livin is easy" summertime is over. Either way, I've been busy. Very, very busy.
The first three days of this week I spent helping the faculty get ready to teach. They spent most of their days in meetings, while I spent mine stocking up on supplies, setting up copier codes, retrieving forgotten copier codes, issuing keys, ordering keys, ordering name plates, retrieving passwords, setting up mailing lists, setting up mail boxes, processing last minute hires, re-setting up mailing lists and mail boxes, and moving furniture. Then yesterday, classes began and the students returned. A partial transcript follows:
Lost Student #1: (standing in front of door with signs reading “2079” above and beside it) Can you tell me where 2079 is?
Me: Right behind you.
Lost Student #1: Thank you.
Me: No problem.
Mother of a student: I want to know why my daughter didn’t get into your graduate program.
Co-worker: I can’t give you specifics. I can only tell you that there were many qualified applicants this year.
Mother of student: Well, what am I supposed to tell my daughter?
Co-worker: I imagine you’d say what you normally say to someone who is disappointed.
Mother of student: Well, how many international students did you guys let in?
Really Lost Student: I can’t find my class. It says it’s in 2083, but it’s not there.
Me: Okay, do you have your schedule with you?
Student: (hands over schedule) It says Math 131 in room 2083.
Me: It says this class starts at 9:30.
Student: Right. I went in there, but it was a statistics class.
Me: It’s 8:45 now.
Student: But the people who are in there are from another class.
Me: Right.
Student: They all just looked at me when I walked in there.
Me: That’s because they were in the middle of class.
Student: But my class doesn’t start until 9:30.
Me: Right.
Student: So there’s another class before mine?
Me: Right.
Lost Student #2: I’m looking for 2079.
Me: Right behind you.
Lost Student #3: Can you tell me where room 213 is?
Me: Sure. Do you have your schedule?
Lost Student #3: (irritated) It says “Temple 213”
Me: This is Oliver Hall.
Lost Student #3: Then why am I in here?
Me: I couldn’t tell you.
Lost Student #4: I’m looking for my math class.
Me: Sure, what class.
Lost Student #4: I’m not sure.
Me: Can I see your schedule?
Lost Student #4: I don’t have it with me.
Me: Do you know what course it is?
Lost Student #4: No.
Me: How were you going to get there?
Lost Student #4: (looking through notebook) I wrote down the room number. 324.
Me: That’s not in this building. Did you write down the building?
Lost Student #4: No.
Co-Worker in charge of Science Day tables: Can I help you with anything?
Student: No. I already know everything you’re talking about.
Co-Worker: Great! The line for the Nobel forms on the left.
Me: Can I help you?
Lost Student #5: Room 2079?
Me: Right behind you.
New Graduate Teaching Assistant: I need a key to my desk.
Me: Those are hand-me-downs from years ago. We don’t have any keys. I'm sorry.
New GTA: One of the old TA’s gave me a key for the top drawer.
Me: That’s great. But I don’t have any other keys.
New GTA: But I need one for the bottom cabinet.
Me: Maybe another graduate student has one. We don’t have any. They’re old desks. I don’t even have keys to my own desk.
New GTA: But I need to lock up my purse.
Me: Why don’t you use the drawer you found a key for?
New GTA: I want to lock it in the bottom drawer.
Me: I don’t have any keys for that.
New GTA: Then what do I do with my purse?
Lost Student #6: Where is room 2079?
Me: The door behind you.
Lost Student #6: Oh. Well they should put up signs!
Me: Like that one?
Lost Student #6: Oh.
Student on phone: I need to speak to Professor Smith.
Me: We don’t have anyone by that name here.
Student on phone: Professor Smith?
Me: Do you know what department he or she works in?
Student on phone: Physics.
Me: You’ve reached the Math department.
Student on phone: Right. (Sighs) And I’m looking for Professor Smith.
Me: In the Physics department.
Student on phone: Right!
Me: Let me transfer you to the Physics Department.
Me: (to coworker) I may have to strangle one of my graduate students.
Co-worker: (without looking up from her desk) Do what you gotta do.
Me: Maybe a couple of other people too.
Co-worker: Your call.
Me: Just needed permission.
The first three days of this week I spent helping the faculty get ready to teach. They spent most of their days in meetings, while I spent mine stocking up on supplies, setting up copier codes, retrieving forgotten copier codes, issuing keys, ordering keys, ordering name plates, retrieving passwords, setting up mailing lists, setting up mail boxes, processing last minute hires, re-setting up mailing lists and mail boxes, and moving furniture. Then yesterday, classes began and the students returned. A partial transcript follows:
Lost Student #1: (standing in front of door with signs reading “2079” above and beside it) Can you tell me where 2079 is?
Me: Right behind you.
Lost Student #1: Thank you.
Me: No problem.
Mother of a student: I want to know why my daughter didn’t get into your graduate program.
Co-worker: I can’t give you specifics. I can only tell you that there were many qualified applicants this year.
Mother of student: Well, what am I supposed to tell my daughter?
Co-worker: I imagine you’d say what you normally say to someone who is disappointed.
Mother of student: Well, how many international students did you guys let in?
Really Lost Student: I can’t find my class. It says it’s in 2083, but it’s not there.
Me: Okay, do you have your schedule with you?
Student: (hands over schedule) It says Math 131 in room 2083.
Me: It says this class starts at 9:30.
Student: Right. I went in there, but it was a statistics class.
Me: It’s 8:45 now.
Student: But the people who are in there are from another class.
Me: Right.
Student: They all just looked at me when I walked in there.
Me: That’s because they were in the middle of class.
Student: But my class doesn’t start until 9:30.
Me: Right.
Student: So there’s another class before mine?
Me: Right.
Lost Student #2: I’m looking for 2079.
Me: Right behind you.
Lost Student #3: Can you tell me where room 213 is?
Me: Sure. Do you have your schedule?
Lost Student #3: (irritated) It says “Temple 213”
Me: This is Oliver Hall.
Lost Student #3: Then why am I in here?
Me: I couldn’t tell you.
Lost Student #4: I’m looking for my math class.
Me: Sure, what class.
Lost Student #4: I’m not sure.
Me: Can I see your schedule?
Lost Student #4: I don’t have it with me.
Me: Do you know what course it is?
Lost Student #4: No.
Me: How were you going to get there?
Lost Student #4: (looking through notebook) I wrote down the room number. 324.
Me: That’s not in this building. Did you write down the building?
Lost Student #4: No.
Co-Worker in charge of Science Day tables: Can I help you with anything?
Student: No. I already know everything you’re talking about.
Co-Worker: Great! The line for the Nobel forms on the left.
Me: Can I help you?
Lost Student #5: Room 2079?
Me: Right behind you.
New Graduate Teaching Assistant: I need a key to my desk.
Me: Those are hand-me-downs from years ago. We don’t have any keys. I'm sorry.
New GTA: One of the old TA’s gave me a key for the top drawer.
Me: That’s great. But I don’t have any other keys.
New GTA: But I need one for the bottom cabinet.
Me: Maybe another graduate student has one. We don’t have any. They’re old desks. I don’t even have keys to my own desk.
New GTA: But I need to lock up my purse.
Me: Why don’t you use the drawer you found a key for?
New GTA: I want to lock it in the bottom drawer.
Me: I don’t have any keys for that.
New GTA: Then what do I do with my purse?
Lost Student #6: Where is room 2079?
Me: The door behind you.
Lost Student #6: Oh. Well they should put up signs!
Me: Like that one?
Lost Student #6: Oh.
Student on phone: I need to speak to Professor Smith.
Me: We don’t have anyone by that name here.
Student on phone: Professor Smith?
Me: Do you know what department he or she works in?
Student on phone: Physics.
Me: You’ve reached the Math department.
Student on phone: Right. (Sighs) And I’m looking for Professor Smith.
Me: In the Physics department.
Student on phone: Right!
Me: Let me transfer you to the Physics Department.
Me: (to coworker) I may have to strangle one of my graduate students.
Co-worker: (without looking up from her desk) Do what you gotta do.
Me: Maybe a couple of other people too.
Co-worker: Your call.
Me: Just needed permission.
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