Mobile-man-talking-on-his-phone-doing-a-walkabout…and how to stop it!
I was wandering through the restaurant on Thursday night when I felt the familiar and not unpleasant rumble from the iPhone in my pocket. I returned forthwith to the bar to check what the message or email or missed call was all about. I was startled as I pulled the precious from my pocket to reveal a message from The Cousin...
"MALCOLM MCLAREN - HE DEED"
I stood there, amongst the wine glasses and bottles of whiskey and now that I think on it empty chocolate bar wrappers, bottles of Lucozade and half munched bags of crisps reading the message from The Cousin. I emitted a sigh which Waiter Chum Number One heard.
"What's up? Everything okay?", ask she through a mouthful of crisps and chocolate.
"Malcolm McClaren's deed....sorry I mean dead....how awful"
"Who's that now?", asks Waiter Chum Number One as we peered at the message on the phone as if we were reading a note in class from Fonzie McHunky, the coolest boy in school.
I explained to her who he was and why he was significant but I could see she had switched off the moment I mentioned the word, 'punk'. She smiled and said, "Awh...that's eh...sad....is table ten finished yet?"
Sigh.
But dead punk celebrities aside one has to be careful when reading messages, checking emails or in any way using ones mobile phone when at work. Management disapprove of it and customers get really really fucked off if they see you sending text messages when you should be stroking their ego or bringing them finger bowls or something. That's why when you get a message or something you end up holding the phone under a service cloth or whilst lying flat on your back behind the bar or even whilst wrapped in the golden velvet curtains of loveliness. You'll do anything not to get caught by management and guests alike.
It's a pity the guests cant be as considerate.
There was a chap on Friday night who kept getting calls on his cell phone. Very annoying for him I'm sure but so much more annoying for his dinner chums, those poor unfortunates seated near him and most of all for yours truly. I don't like to be annoyed, obviously. The first few calls he took seated at the table with his friends listening in but as the urgency and frequency of the calls increased he decided to do the mobile-man-talking-on-his-phone-walkabout.
I hate with a passion the mobile-man-talking-on-his-phone-walkabout thing. Hardly a day goes by without someone doing it. Sometimes, if you are very unlucky, you get two or three doing it on the same shift. That's always a hoot. They do the walk back and forth thing ignoring all around them - others guests and waiters alike and occasionally bump into each other. And if they aren't doing the mobile-man-talking-on-his-phone-walkabout thing they are plonking themselves down at tables, my tables the cheeky fookers. And for some reason they always, without fail, find the need to move the cutlery out of the way? Why must they move the cutlery? Why? Why? The positioning of sparkly polished knives and forks shouldn't have any effect on your ability to sound like a tosser on the phone.
You know what gets me the most? Their inability to regulate their voices, that's what oh and their inconsideration for others. They move from their own table so as not to disturb their chums or so that they can chat in private but they don't mind both sharing with and disturbing other people on other tables. The selfish shit munchers. But I have a technique that works a treat and is guaranteed to have them either hanging up or going outside. It's very simple, wherever they are I am too....making noise.
If mobile-man-talking-on-his-phone-doing a walkabout is near the bar I'll start polishing cutlery really loudly. If he is sitting on an empty table I'll slide up on the table beside him with the house phone and make a call to the kitchen questioning the authenticity of the ravioli, that always ends in a shouting match. If he loitering on the wrong side of the front door I'll start a conversation right beside him with a waiter chum about the weather or shoes or Corrie. Wherever mobile-man-talking-on-his-phone-doing-the-walkabout thing is I will be beside him doing the-waiter-man-making-lots-of-noise-beside-you-on-purpose-to-annoy-you-you-shit-muncher-thing.
Ah it is so satisfying you have no idea.
Yer man on Friday night took the hump and ended his call with a furious dab of his finger as Waiter Chum Number One and I sang, loudly, along to Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse of the Heart (). He shot us a look that would have killed if he was like a character from a Harry Potter movie or something. It was most fun. Despite singing, loudly, I did manage to catch the last few words of his phone call...
"...oh and don't forget to Sky + Eastenders....no I don't want to watch it on iPlayer....just tape it will you"
Sky +'ing Eastenders? What a shit muncher.
It’s hard to remember how we all managed pre mobiles.
If you needed to talk to someone you rang them at home or at work.
You rang from your home or work.
If you didn’t get them someone would take responsibility for taking a message (but not necessarily passing it on).
Even if things were urgent the process made them not so, people had to manage or wait.
Fuck, I sound old.
Oh I’d ban the use of them in restaurants….not including staff phones obviously…we need something to do when we are ignoring the guests…hehehe
i did the unthinkable today. yes, it’s true, i left the house without my mobile! i was gone for hours, too. i felt free, unencumbered, and yes, i’ll say it disconnected from everyone! (ok, the MITM was with me and he did have his…) xoxoxxo
(wait, i missed the point of the post, didn’t i, sugar?) ;~D
a hahahaha i dont really know either…carry on!
following the offender and slamming chairs around, making noise? that’s got to be either very satisfying, very effective or both.
i’ve taken to talking to the individual directly. if the jabbering fool asks invisible phone friend a question? i answer. what’s funny is that they usually don’t notice…
bwahahahaha nice…. it’s odd how much i can cough when i need to….and man can i cough…
Thanks, I am now picturing you working your way to hawking up a loogie of massive proportions next to some unsuspecting guy on the phone.
I have failed to grasp the concept of people who are on the phone all the time. They generally have nothing interesting to say, and they say it repeatedly. I remember getting lectured at by my parents for using the phone (with a cord, gasp!) the minute I came home from school “What the hell do you need to be on the phone to those kids for, you were just talking to them all day at school!” Yes I must be old, too.
Sparrow: almost all the calls I over hear, and that really depends if they are talking into my good ear or not, are all concerning really dull, really mundane stuff…”take out the bin” “I’ll be home at ten” “no darling I’m working late in the office….tell your mother I said hey”
meh
I dislike hearing other people’s phone calls as they are soooo dull. I think those with bluetooths should be taken to a nuthoose and shown what people who talk to themselves really look like. I dislike fast food workers pretending to clear tables but have a sneaky text instead. I’ve seen crazy people texting while driving and nearly causing accidents.
Devices of the devil and the lazy I say. Go home and blog if you are such interesting people!
old k: aye bluetooth devices make people look even more special than they already are….mooks…
Well he sounds like a right knob. I hate when people in my company take phonecalls at the table but I hate it even more when they get up and walk around because they make you think you aren’t good enough to eavesdrop on their conversation. Pfh. I’ll drop eaves where I please
why must they walk n talk? why rabbity why? meh!!
Not only that, it’s incredibly rude to leave the folks at your table. You may as well say “you are NOT as important.”
Rude, rude, rude.
oohhh and on the bus, i take public transit and HATE when some twat loudly discribes a dr. appt personal matter then glares at me for listening in…while she is sitting beside me!! o m f g shut up! i tend to make mocking faces with finger phone or hum loudly to music or whistle. better i should just fling the damn phone out the window (except she was bigger i’m afraid of pain)
*ring, ring*
Annoying phone user:”`scuse me, I have to walk backwards and forwards over there while talking in a sufficiently loud voice so everyone can hear the most important phone call in the universe”
*Manuel ambles over*
APU:”blah, blah, blah, what? I`m struggling you hear you, some waiter is singing the Macarena
Staff phones? Be careful what you ask for. Wait till you get customers texting you orders, the mobile equivalent of clicking your fingers. Ha!
Oh yeah, them bluetooth heads are just giving themselves cancer anyway as well as looking “special”. I remember one of those US wannabe chef shows it might have been Hells Kitchen and one of the contestants was wearing one in each ear. What a plonker.
Medbh: so very very rude…
Cat: ha, the cheeky feckers….
Sparky: that’s it perfectly….some times I just lift random stuff up so I can drop it loudly…
Mark: “stk and chps pls….lol”….ha…I would not welcome that
Manuel,
let me remind you that “the use of mobile phones is strictly forbidden during service”, your a marked man my son.
ah! jesus! you’ll have to find me first….mwahahaha
I have no answer Manuel m’dear but I can only conclude that they are simply arseholes