How To Suck Less

Today's episode of How To Suck Less involves nasty restaurant patrons. I have a lot of names for people who are rude to waiters and waitresses, many of them I will not repeat because my mother reads this blog and will already be vexed with me for saying "suck." I will settle for calling them Nasty People.

In the service industry you learn to pick up on which tables are going to be friendly and which are going to be nasty almost as soon as people walk through the door. Often you are pleasantly wrong: the woman had a sour face on because they had hit a squirrel on the way there; the man was looking grumpy because he bruised his shin on the car door. Or maybe they are just not chatty. These people will be brusque but not impolite. They just want their food and their drinks, please. No problem. These people Do Not Suck.

Nasty People are rude to wait staff, impatient with bussers, intensely particular about their food, and usually above the age of 50. OR they are creepy old men who want to touch the waitresses. Ew.

Everyone deserves a standard of service in a restaurant. Everyone who walks through the door will be treated professionally. This means a smiling waiter, getting the right food at the right temperature, and reasonably prompt service.

So here are the steps you can take to Suck Less and get better service in a restaurant.


1. Be patient with your server.
Look around you. Is the restaurant packed? If yes, then your waiter is probably slammed and will get to you as soon as you can. The phrase "When you get a chance... could you _____" will get you what you want MUCH faster than "I need _______." If you want it right away, show patience. If the restaurant is not packed but the waiter is still not showing up, it is acceptable to say "what was the hold up?" In the right tone of voice this is not a mean thing, and if the waiter knows that he or she was at fault, it could get you a discount.


2. The waiter has nothing to do with the food.
If you ordered a strip steak but got lamb? That is a waiter screw up, send it back. If you do not like the taste of what you ordered? Whatever, send it back, but don't blame the wait staff. We do not cook your food. We do not have anything to do with your food. We take the order and then translate it for a bunch of Hondurans and Frenchmen. It is not easy.


3. Don't lie about knowing the manager.
Personally I love it when this happens, because my boss will actually show up at the table and cheerfully embarrass you. Don't lie to us, we know when you're doing it.


4. Don't skeeve out on the waitresses.
Yes. Your waitress is flirting with you. It comes with the territory. Casually flirting with dads is how we make good tips. This is a business strategy, not a sign of actual interest. There is an old gentleman at my restaurant who we will call Phil, because that is his name, and he is a Class A Skeeveball. The last time I spoke with Phil he invited me to his timeshare in the Carribean, invited me for drinks, asked me to walk with him around the lake, and tried to convince me that my boyfriend lived too far away. When our 17-year-old bussgirl mentioned that she was Jewish to him, he immediately invited her out for drinks, and then said if she needed extra cash, she could come clean his house. If Phil is in the bar she will avoid it like the plague. None of the waitresses will make eye contact with him willingly. He also harrasses the jazz singer.

4a. If you are going to skeeve out on the waitresses, tip well.
Phil tips 15% max. If you're going to try to put your hands on the waitress, tip her at least 20%. It might make her reevaluate her previous desire to poison you.

LUCKILY the people who do not understand these four points make up the minority of restaurant patrons. In fact, the only person who breaks rule 4 on a regular basis is Phil. There are awesome people, and eventually I will post about How To Rock as a restaurant patron. This will probably not be right after work.

In better news, that languedoc BossMan gave me only got more delicious over a couple days. I'm drinking the last of it now, and the basil is really coming through. Also Boyfriend is coming over this weekend, along with Texas, who is my sisters boyfriend. This will be interesting since they are both conservative and my sister and I are very liberal. I imagine they will begin by comparing guns, which seems to be the butt-sniffing ritual of the modern conservative.

MOAR VODKA.

It is time for another episode of STARK MAKES STUFF! Again with the pictures! My god!

Today we are making raspberry vodka and pomegranite liqueur. Let us begin.

Now, raspberry season is so far over that it is not even funny, and pomegranite season really hasn't started yet, so why the hell did I decide to make these? Simple. I had money and the store had pomegranites and raspberries. They also had pumpkins, but the more I think about it the less I want to dig into a pumpkin right now. So here we go.

A big ol' jug of vodka is what you want. Yes, it's ten dollars more expensive than the 750 ml bottle. Yes, that's STILL a better deal. 22 dollars for 1.75 liters vs. 12 dollars for a 750 ml bottle? Is there a question here? Okay, if you've only GOT 15 bucks to spend, go for the 750, but it's almost always worth your money to get a bigger bottle.

Recepticles prepared! Yes, I actually bought some smirnoff raspberry twist. It was nasty. This shit tastes like Red Flavor and smells like Blue Raz soda. Screw it.

Fill that thing with raspberries! Real ones! These were super goopy 'cause they were overripe. Ew.

Now fill it with vodka! HOORAY VODKA!

That's about all we can do with the raspberry for now. It needs to rest. Now let's move on to the pomegranite.

People give Maryland blue crabs a lot of shit for being a lot of work for very little food. These people have obviously never eaten pomegranites before. The ratio of edible material to nonedible material is pretty freaking low. That said, they are delicious and if you have never had one then you are living a sad and deprived life.

Break your pomegranite down, fill the jar with vodka. Easy steps here, folks. Avoid getting any of the bitter pith into the jar. I was super anal about that, and so it took me about half an hour to fully break down the pomegranite. I ate a lot of the seeds. They were DELICIOUS.

What's that? You have vodka left over? WELL HOT DAMN! Thinly slice half an apple and snap a cinnamon stick in half and toss them in that jug! I would usually prefer not to use plastic for an infusion, but hey. When life gives you a plastic jug o' vodka, make an apple pie infusion. Woohoo!

The end results. These are my infusions. Apple-cinnamon, raspberry, pomegranite, apple-botulism, and strawberry. The apple-botulism infusion has been sitting there since June 30, and is really hard to open. I probably shouldn't drink it, but I know I will.

And now time for a snack!

Those of you who are even classier than I am will be asking "Stark, why are you drinking a spicy languedoc vintage with apple slices and chocolate? That is the worst pairing ever." You people are correct, it is a horrible pairing but the picture is pretty so go away. Actually it works pretty well with the tart apples, but the chocolate was a poor decision on my part. The wine was given to me after I waited on a large party of wine reps at the restaurant. I love the wine reps, they are good people.

So I think all of y'all (the three of you who will read this) should make infusions too. They are embarassingly easy, and a good way to turn cheap, nasty vodka into premium, delicious vodka.