everyone has to have a dream

Ten days and no new posts? For shame, for shame. Well, I have some excuses, starting with the fact that not a whole lot has happened. Last weekend was soul-crushingly slow -- usually The Bar is packed to the gills on Friday and Saturday nights, and I walk with at least $120, which, some nights, is not even close to the kind of compensation one would normally expect for having to walk back and forth through a colossal knot of total assholes with a knocked-over appletini festively splashed, Pollock-esque, all over my shirt. Those fuckers are stick-ee.

Ugh. I also got stiffed the other night on a hundred-dollar tab, which I am still not quite over. Seriously, dudes, it was like four percent. The only time I could see stiffing someone that badly as being remotely acceptable is if there were issue after issue after issue, and bringing those issues up with my server got me nowhere. Then maybe I'd do that. But I gave them great service and that's some bullshit.

Also, two nights ago, I was outside The Bar at around midnight, having a cigarette and minding my own business, when this teeny-tiny white dude starts talking very earnestly and very, very cluelessly to my friend Ryan about his "underground political hip-hop collective." Ryan, who fronts a local oi band, was playing enthusiastic: "Oh man, that sounds awesome! Let's put a show together!" I was trying to ride out the tail end of a monster hangover, so I was not in the best of moods, and I guess the effort of not laughing openly at/bitch-slapping this pint-sized dork-on set my mouth in kind of a grimace. So his little rat-faced friend, who had asked me for a light earlier by miming flicking a lighter (which I studiously ignored), looks at me and says, "You have kind of a poo face, don't you? Like, when other people are talking about their art, I bet you always just get that look on your face like you're smelling shit." I just looked at him for a long, long time, not saying a word, until finally I just said "I could give a fuck about your retarded little band. I'm really fucking hung over and right now I'm just concentrating as hard as I can on not throwing up all over you." Not my best, but I suddenly didn't have the energy to methodically tear down this kid's self-esteem. Like, had I the time and inclination, I would have really tried to break up their "collective," which, as far as I could tell, was comprised of three twenty-one-year-old car-wash attendants. They're not exactly a commanding presence in the Seattle political hip-hop community, I'm guessing. Anyway, when we got back inside, Ryan turns to me and says, "Oh fuck, if that dweeb ever calls me to try to set up a show, he's gonna get shut down so hard." Lena and Ryan: Crushing annoying white kids' dreams since 2007. Maybe we'll start calling ourselves an underground dream-crushing collective.

strictly prickly

At work, when I'm busy or stressed out or annoyed or a combination of all three, I turn into the same salty, argumentative bitch that I am in traffic, only without the protective metal casing that keeps me from getting all up in peoples' faces and just dealing on them like I really want to. Without that....um. Smart people know that the scowl on my face when I'm really overwhelmed means "Careful, Tex, there's bullets left in them there pistols," and we don't have a problem. Some people, though, just do not fucking get it, and even though I am relatively wee in relation to most of our clientèle, I can handle my shit and I will get all up in anyone's face if I'm in a bad enough mood.

Case in point: Saturday night, when it was super-crowded at The Bar and I was trying to make it back to the service station with twenty quarter-full glasses of beer, some oversized frat boy wearing suspenders (not kidding) knocked into me and hollered "Woo! Cindy's birthday!" right in my ear, which I did not find nearly as festive or amusing as he did. I looked him straight in the eye, half-crazed because I stupidly wore cowboy boots to work and they were grinding my feet into chuck, and said "Listen, asshole, you yell one more time and I will kick you and your friends the fuck out of my bar."

Maybe I should be more tactful. Maybe I should have said "Please don't yell in my ear, sir," but that fucker trembled every time I walked past him, and he was quiet as a church mouse for the rest of the night.

amateur night #1

I've worked Friday and Saturday night for the past four weekends, which is a mixed blessing. It's not that I'm pissed about having to work when everybody else gets a night off, because whatever, I go out on Monday and Tuesday and I don't have to worry about waiting in line. The problem is, you know how some seasoned alcoholics call New Year's, St. Patrick's Day, Purim, and maybe election night "Amateur Night?" That's what I call Friday. Jesus Christ, you guys, it's like every high-fiving goober from the darkest bowels of Accounts Receivable descends on my depressingly trendy neighborhood, and they all seem to wander into The Bar. Often, these people are very nice, if a little difficult to stomach, cologne-wise. But some of them honestly just don't know how to act in a bar.

Okay, case in point: Last night, a group of about a dozen people came in for a birthday party. They were very nice, tipped decently, and didn't bitch about anything. They did, however, make a couple of really annoying mistakes that meant that I didn't give them very good service.

* No one called ahead to let us know they'd be coming in. Instead, they pushed two six-tops together when they got there, and six people commandeered twelve seats for half an hour before everyone showed up. The Bar gets pretty busy on Friday nights -- we couldn't afford to have that many seats sitting empty because they were reserved for people who, incidentally, did not drink very much.

* At one point, I had seven tabs open for that table, which meant that I had to coordinate seven separate tables on the computer system. That's insane. They all came in at different times, and they all wanted to start their own tabs, and then periodically one person would close their tab, and another person would open one -- madness. I am amazed that I didn't fuck any of their tabs up.

*They all ordered at different times. It got to the point where I'd periodically walk up to the table, holler "Okay, who wants another drink!" and then, if no response was forthcoming, I'd go take care of my other tables. Then I'd walk by thirty seconds later, and someone would want to order drinks or food. And then they'd take, like a minute and a half to order a damn plate of chicken nachos and an IPA, and then the guy sitting at the opposite end of the table would want something, and then I'd come back with everything and somebody would want something else, and I ended up not being able to take care of my other tables because these amateurs just would not let me coordinate them all into a manageable group.

Plus, they brought an enormous cake box full of coconut cupcakes -- ew. The coconut shavings, predictably, got everywhere, and when the group left, the table looked like a tiny snowstorm had hit it. Bunch of jerks.

i'm gonna pop-lock that man right out of my hair

You guys. I have discovered something amazing: It is impossible to feel depressed when "Planet Rock" is playing. Six and a half minutes of bliss, everybody.

slow night

One of the great things about waitressing is that when it's busy, there's no time for reverie. Either you keep moving and don't stop for any reason, or you very quickly find yourself in the weeds. Whatever's bugging you gets hustled to the back of your mind, because you have to remember, like, "Table three: Vodka press, tall, no fruit, two 'kazis with Stoli Vanil and a Bud Light, tab; guy by the pool table: Porter, tab; table six: pitcher PBR, four glasses, Woodford manhattan, chicken nachos, no guac, cash," and there is no room left for "I can't believe he broke up with me."

Conversely, when it's slow, you've got nothing but time to woolgather and, if you're me right now, plot revenge and try not to throw up. The bar is half-empty, and everybody's just sipping their drinks and watching the game, and then it becomes a game of "Okay, what can I do to keep myself busy?" So you clean like there's gonna be a white-glove test later. You bug tables for their empties. You make change in the tip jar. You restock everything. You wander into the fifty-five degree weather outside in your t-shirt and smoke and shiver on the benches. Even when you haven't just been through a nasty, acrimonious final showdown with your ex-boyfriend--which was how I occupied myself Sunday before my shift--it's pretty hellish when it's slow.

I asked the bartender, Monica*, to let me go home early: Most of the customers were regulars who'd come in to watch the Series, and maybe ten seconds after Seth Smith whiffed (heh), they all cleared out. After that, it was either go home, where there is vodka aplenty and Friday Night Lights on the DVR, or stand in the service station like a deer in the headlights, waiting for someone to distract me.

eine kleine jagermeister

Attention, frat douches: Although The Bar charges $5.50 for a shot of Jagermeister, which may make it seem classy, the sad reality of Jagermeister is that, in Germany, it's the equivalent of Boone's fucking Farm. I'd have more respect for you if you ordered a shot of Robitussin, which, incidentally, gets you way more fucked up for much, much cheaper. Plus it tastes better.

Seriously, dudes. Nut up and start drinking bourbon.

the endless appeal of the coffin nail

I defy anyone who has quit smoking to get a job in the restaurant industry and see if they can manage to stay quit. I couldn't do it; the pull back to it is too strong. For one thing, almost everybody smokes. Proportionately, the incidence of nicotine addiction in the industry is absurdly high, and if you're an uneasy quitter, you've got maybe two weeks of willpower and then you're fucked. Because it's the only time you get to take breaks, you see, and maybe you hate it and it makes you nauseous and lightheaded and your mouth tastes gross, but you get to sit down for five minutes and ignore the endless requests for glasses of water (more on my deep loathing for the words "We'll have a round of waters" later) and menus and shots of Jager (see previous parenthetical) and books of matches.

Oh, also: The costume was a hit. Predictably, the short shorts went over very well, and no one tried to blow the whistle. I blew it for last call -- "Last call, bitches!" -- and then I spent five minutes ignoring the customers and dancing with Kai to the Dixie Chicks. Fun, fun night.