Tales from the Tables: A Wicked Funny Look from the Waiter's Side of the Tables

By D. L. Tracey

The hectic, sad, ever so funny, you have to be kidding me life of a waiter and the day-to-day life of survival in the restaurant industry. Learn how to eat free and truly understand what the wait staff is thinking as they approach your table.
Wait staff are a lot like first responders. We have to be at the tables no matter what is happening in our lives or even on the planet due to, as I like to call it, the Youre kidding me, right? factor. Even in the midst of a global cataclysm, I do not even bother calling work to see if I need to go in today, as I know the answer is always going to be yes.
It can be raining bricks and fireballs, deadly hoards of the living dead can be running the streets, killing at will. A nuclear holocaust of biblical proportions can be imminently poised to strike my city, and still I need to show up, uniform and all. Why, you ask me? Because some wicked stupid idiot and his family will show at the tables up to eat.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Mar 17, 2014
• ISBN: 9781491856888

D. L. Tracey

Creating a new vocabulary for the age-old battle between good and evil. Author D.L. Tracey, an American fiction writer, writes books that run the gambit of life. His main passion is horror, fiction, and suspense. He writes in the style of Alfred Hitchcock, known as "the Master of Suspense", and Robert Albert Bloch, a cheerfully ghoulish genre writer, best known for his mid-century chiller Psycho and its memorable adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock. Donald Lee Tracey was born in Quincy, Massachusetts in 1957, the second son of Donald and Jane Tracey. Donald attended grammar school in Weymouth Massachusetts and then North Weymouth High School. Thrown onto the streets by an abusive mother at the age of thirteen, he survived on the streets of Weymouth, and at times living with friends. Don dropped out of high school in 1974 two years short of graduation. In December of 1975, Don enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. and went off to Marine Corps Recruit Depot, Parris Island, S.C. for thirteen weeks of intensive Marine Corps training. This is where Don first found his talent for writing. He began keeping a personal diary of day-to-day life in Parris Island called Short Stories from the Island. Readers of D.L. Tracey know that Weymouth, Massachusetts, is a place with a deep, dark hold on the author. It reappears in many of his books, including Galilee, Esker, and Lullaby.

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© 2014 D L Tracey. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 01/31/2014

ISBN: 978-1-4918-5566-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-5567-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-5688-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014901262

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

How it all started

Awkward but true stories

You’re kidding me, right?

Wait Staff Lingo

Special Request

So You Want to Eat For Free

Do’s and Don’ts when Dealing with Wait Staff

Trust me, it is not all right!

The Insanity of Co-workers

Getting ready for the Rush

This book is dedicated to Lori

A s I start to write this book, it is important to let folks know a little bit about a typical waitperson (in this case, myself). Left with a small child by a wayward wife who saw no need to raise her dead sister’s child, I found myself one day a single parent of a great eight year old boy who goes by the name of Paul. Moreover, till this day twenty-five years later, I still find him worth more than life itself. Every table I waited on was worth the hardship and hassle to give him a good life. (All my books seem to tell a continuing story of life and I would encourage anyone who finds this book worthwhile to go back and read The Courtship of Paul’s Father. This book will tell you how I ended up in this profession in the first place.)

Dealing with sometimes, hundreds of people in a typical twelve-hour shift can be very demanding. The only constant of this ballet at the tables is the wait staff. During the day, most restaurant guests are under the thirty minute lunch clock, though it is nearly impossible to go out, drive and order a sit down lunch at a full service restaurant, eat, pay, and drive back to work. So as a result the typical response to the boss is (say it with me), the damn server was wicked slow.

I have seen many wait staff brought to tears by a guest who just needed to brow beat someone who they knew would never fight back because it meant their job. Yes, it can mean our jobs just because someone is having a bad day. Most folks have bad days at work but never face the prospect of being fired because of it. Wait staff, however, can be fired because of a guest having a bad day, never mind the fact that the waitperson himself may have been having a bad day. One strike and you are out in this business.

Life in the business world has its benefits, like liberal sick leave. I doubt very much that when you folks in the business world call in sick, you are told find a replacement or get in here or you are fired. That is how it is in the restaurant world. You work sick or not. You work even if your kids are sick. You work even during a death in the family. In addition, if by chance you do somehow get the day off, you find yourself falling behind in life, as you are not paid for that day, as you live by tips and nothing else.

The real world has paid sick days and personal days. The real world has insurance and paid vacations. In the service industry world, you just have worked days. If by chance you are offered insurance, it comes with hefty co-pay and no real benefits. So most wait staff live on the hope insurance plan. Hope I do not get sick insurance is the wait staff motto. In addition, if by chance we do get sick the waitperson just works through the sickness and continues to service the tables, extending the recovery time to weeks instead of days. This master of the tables always wonders how many guests have become sick because this waiter was running a fever and could barely walk, let alone work, but still needed to work and keep a roof over my sons head.

When I train people in this, most glorious of professions, I always recount this example of, as I call it, "The guest is not always right just never wrong". The wait staff could be gathering around the television watching the news about a riot right outside the restaurant. Zombies could be rampaging the street (get them, Prez), a meteor storm could be raining down car size rocks just outside the eatery, yet, yours truly is still working.

Surely, this waiter is an idiot, you say to yourself. Why anyone would be forced to work during such events? All wait staff say this together. Because some idiots will walk through the complete chaos outside just to eat. Yes, guests are not always right. But even at this point if you were to point out how stupid they are to go through all that was going on outside just to sit at this table chances are they are now going to get a free dessert and maybe more because you have pointed out the obvious.

Most wait staff tends to be single parents’ or kids trying to make their way through college. Our stories as to why we are at the tables are as different as each of our lives. Wait staff try to make it through another day, sometimes just try to make it through a table of wicked retarded guests. All in hope of the tip at the end of each meal. Yes, the gratuity is why we work the tables, nothing else.

Bills are never quite caught up; rent always seems to be a bit late. Always working just to make ends meet. Late and shut off notices are a regular presence in our mailboxes. Wishing we could be better parents. The dream of finishing that college degree just so we can get out of this place. Always worried about the next day. Always trying to make it through the shift without a comp, a guest complaint.

Working in the service industry means that one day you could show up to work only to find your place of employment closed for one or another reason, but over the years this master of service has seen two restaurants closed due to lack of paying taxes, with no warning to the crew and no unemployment checks to be found. Just curse, shake your head, and look for another job, and in a wicked hurry, as the bill collectors could care less.

Each server who takes your orders laughs and smiles at the tables, and yes, some even cry, but all have many stories to tell. These are just a few of my many stories of Tales from the table.

How it all started

A fter five eight-hour shifts of training and, one week of classroom instruction, this first time waiter was, finally ready to begin his career at the tables. Now to make my own money and not have to give it to the person who was training this very special waiter, I thought with a smile. It was Sunday morning, a slow start in most restaurants. However, I was glad to start making cash as the bills were piling up at home, so I did not care about the hours. Besides, I needed to buy my son new shoes for school and this was the game plan to do just that after my first eight-hour shift.

Lee, party of one, table thirty five, the host came over and said to me. Great, I am on my way to money I said to myself with a smile and headed for the table. Approaching the table of one, I had my story down pat. Trained by some of the very best; heck everyone told me so. I would do just fine the managers’ looked on as I made my way to the table, a smile on their faces as their newest rookie was about to greet his first customer. Stand back folks, there is a new waiter in town.

"Hi, my name is Lee, I will be taking care", and before I could finish the party of one raised her head from somewhere in her fur jacket and screeched like cat claws being dragged down a black board, Do you have any nibblets? Oh, no what are nibblets? Where were nibblets on the menu? Looking down at my very first guest huddled in the corner of the booth as if she was trying to get away from me. Popping her head back out of the fur cave, she repeated he request nibblets. This time, she also starts snapping her fingers as she waved them in the air back in forth in front of her mouth like some sort or mariachi dancing lobster trying to feed herself, as she brought the snapping claw-like fingers to her mouth.

Looking down at the lobster guest at this point, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. This master of indecision just stood there pen and note pad hanging in my hand wondering if my eight-hour shift was up yet. Thankfully, the lobster started to drag the cat across the black board again as she screeched Brrrreeeeaaadd and butter. I want Nibblets again, the lobster screeched, snapping with her claws pointing to her crustacean mouth in the process of her waving frenzy.

Now we were getting somewhere. The shoes are as good as on my son’s feet. Smiling now, this master of animal whispers asked the lobster woman if she would like a drink with her nibblets. Waving me away from the table with her left claw as the guest pulled her lobster head back into the fur cave the words nibblets echo ever so slowly out of her cave like woolen hood.

What the lobster woman taught me that day was something that for years I would tell anyone I would train in this most glorious profession. ~ Never ever, take it personal. ~

Awkward but true stories

I t never ceases to amaze me that folks in a major crisis will show up at a table to air all of the dirty laundry in such a place as a restaurant. Sure, I know what you are saying right now: Folks will not act out in public so it is a safe place to meet and chat in safety and no chance of embarrassing confrontations. Man, you are so wrong.

Do you think I am beautiful? Without a doubt one of the most awkward and at the same time saddest tales from the table I have ever witnesses. A family of five consisting of Mom, Dad, both in their late forties, two sons and a daughter; all the children were of college age. The family sat at one of our most prized half-circle booths in the back of the restaurant. As I approached, they quieted down a bit. The mother looking down at the table tears running slowly down her face. "It’s always a toss-up to me, what is worse, crying or breast feeding makes me the most uncomfortable approaching a table".

Sitting between her two sons’ shoulders touching as if the young men were offering her protection from whatever was happening at that moment. There was a lot of tension at this table of five. Reading the mood of a table is one of the most important things any waitperson must master in their quest for the tip. This pointed headwaiter had become wicked good at doing so. And this mood was anger and so much sadness.

Evening folks, my name is Lee and I will be taking care of you tonight. Excuse me, mother stuck between the bookend sons blurted out in a desperate quiet pleading tone. Mom, stop it! the left bookend son interrupted. Since the mother was not a child, waitpersons are usually obligated to answer requests from adults. Yes, ma’am how can I help you?" I said. Raising her head, the mother blurted out in a soft tone. Do you think I am beautiful? Looking at the mother you are stunning ran through my head. Long brown hair, high cheek bones, sad blue eyes from her crying and quite a body for any age women. Yes, I checked her out on the way to the table. But this pointed headed waiter is not a fool and just blurted out. Excuse me ma’am. Now the daughter chipped in. Mother, just stop it right now. The father just turned his head, wanting