“You take all this very seriously don’t you?”
It was Tuesday night and I had just seated two men on the less than perfect table which offers a view of the scrape and bin area and the bar. So that's either a view of waiters picking food off plates or waiters scratching their asses at the bar. Nice, but then again if we don't reserve, we don't get the nice tables. One of them snorted a bit but after taking a quick glance around him decided that this was indeed his best option and by best I mean only. We were stuffed, to the gills or rather the bin area. Heh.
I welcomed them and announced the soup and the specials with my usual aplomb and dramatically waving hand. The snorting chap stared up at me the whole time with a little grin breaking out over his face. So much so in fact that by the time I had explained that the cream of tomato soup had an ever so slight hint of chili in it to give it a gentle kick he was practically laughing. I chose to ignore this, as you do and instead tried to solicit a beverage order form them.
"We'll have wine"
"Ah yes sir, well I'll leave you to peruse the wine list"
"No, no....we'll order it now", says chummy as he puts his gnarly old man hand on my arm to prevent me from leaving his table. What did he think, I was never going to come back again? Sheesh.So after a cursory glance at the wine list he ordered a bottle of the Chilean red. The first one on the list. Sake.
"Ah a bottle of the house red sir, very good." I know what you're thinking, sarcasm right. But no, you're wrong. Honestly I wasn't being snooty.
Anyhoo two minutes later and I was back at his table presenting his wine.
"Yes, yes I'm sure that's it", says yer man not even looking at the bottle.
"I spun off the stelvin cap and poured a half mouthful into his glass. He looked at the glass, then looked at his chum, who had still to speak at all, and then back at me.
"Sir, would you like to taste?"
He stared at me as if I had just asked him to give me a prostate exam. I had not, I was sure I hadn't. I was positive I had asked him to taste the wine.He lifted the wine glass slowly, never taking his eyes off me and took a small sip. He nodded to indicate it was fine and then set his glass down. And like I say he never took his eyes off me the whole time. Did he think I was going to dip his pockets the moment he lifted the glass. Sake. Plus his pockets looked like they contained half sucked boiled sweet and used handkerchiefs. [SHUDDER]
I offered wine to his chum, which he took, and then went back to his glass and poured him some.
"You take all this very seriously don't you?", asked chummy
"Sir?"
"This waiting thing, you take it all very seriously don't you"
Well, you can imagine my horror. Was he really having a go because I put a little effort, a little professionalism into my job? He was!And I wasn't going to apologise for it.
"Well, yes sir, yes I do."
"You'd wanna learn to chill out a bit", says he and turns his head from me for pretty much the first time.
I was a ball of rage, incandescent with anger, fit to slap.
If that's the way he likes it, casual, lazy, surly, that's the way he was gonna get it.
And he did.
He must have waited another ten minutes to order and when he was finished I found many many other things to be doing such as napkin folding, glass polishing, fingernail picking and a long conversation with the Eastern European lady on table eight about fishing, a subject I know nothing about. She told me about three times that she was very "haypee" to be in Ireland on he holidays. It made me giggle every time she said it. Oh yes, when it comes to dicking a guest over I take it all very seriously.
Asshole.
In other news Conan the Barbarian was back in again on Tuesday night. I managed not to turn into a giggling ball of mush or share with him any more of my most private and intimate issues. Win! How's that for professionalism?!
What wankstains!
Pay them no heed, our Manuel!
I think you’re the best waiter in Belfast- I never met another waiter who worked with such finesse and style.
And no, no sarcasm! ^_^
What a jerk! I hate really laid back people who made you feel bad for actually doing your job. The other receptionist in work is like that, and I feel like stabbing him repeatedly when we are on the same shift.
The wine tasting thing makes me really uncomfortable, I wouldn’t know a good wine if it jumped out at me. I usually just pick the best offer Sauvignon blanc in Tesco and drink it with whatever meal I happen to make, be it beef, poultry or pizza.
Having said that, there is no excuse for yer man being quite so rude, professionalism is a dying art. Way to go Manuel!
He had a go at you for being a professional? He obviously goes to a place where the waiter says “Heres yer wine mate, yer can pour it yerself innit”
So after tasting the wine how many can you reject before settling upon the one you like? I suggest you do relax and stop using words like peruse, the class war is alive and raging and collaborators will be the first to get it.
But, how did he take it? And what kind of tip did he leave?
I wonder if he ever made the connection between his remark and your behaviour?
Grrrrr! What kind of asshat says something like that? Implying that your job wasn’t important enough to be taken seriously is a scummy move.
An awesome move on your part!
And congratulations on your successful second Conan meeting!
Very well done.
Yeah I’m gonna need you to text me any time you see Conan again
total twats me thinks
Wow… what a smack in the balls. Professionalism is a rare commodity and should be cherished… if he takes a similar tack with the fella who’s fixing the brakes on his car, or the doctor examining his suspicious lump, I’m guessing he’s not long for this world. Nong.
Some people only deserve to eat in places with plastic cutlery.
I once popped into a restaurant/bar (at about 3pm) because i was absolutely starving and this was the closest place to where i was at that very moment in time…. I waited at the little ‘hostess desk’ thingy at the restaurant side of the place and when they girl came over i explained that i hadn’t made a reservation and asked if she would possibly have a table for two.
She said “unfortunately we are full, but I think the bar may have some tables available…”
i looked around the restaurant… it was empty… completely empty bar one table of three seated by the window….. the bar however was full of diners and happy chappys….
I looked back at the girl… then blatently stared at all the empty tables in the restaurant…. and back to her…
she noticed my stare “we may seem quite empty at the minute but we have lots of bookings coming in very soon”
uh huh….
we went and got a lovely table in the bar and had a lovely waitress, a fantastic meal… and we left her a HUGE tip…..
the restaurant part was still empty on the way out…. the nasty ‘we’re full’ girl still tippless… sickens….
i don’t think she actually took her job very seriously….. she just pretended to… if she had taken her job a bit more seriously she would have had two very happy customers and a big fat tip in her pocket…. instead of an empty restaurant and an empty pocket…
tye scrape & bin area, most places block this off and put a nice pic on the block off area…
Let me have a go at him.
*removes high-heeled shoe and aims*
Oh the temptation to ask if they wanted ‘fries with that’ after every order (including drinks) or to re-arrange their dinners into little genital sculptures must have been immense. Your reserve and stoic committment is a true testicle to your professionalism.
Remember kidz, when out in public, more than one bit of cheek makes an arse!
Did they tip btw?
-Blod.
Perhaps a question for Ask Manuel:
“Nice, but then again if we don’t reserve, we don’t get the nice tables.”
That got me thinking . . . when I make a reservation, do I specifically need to request a “nice table” to get one? Do I need to know the restaurant and request a specific table/area? Or are the better tables allocated to the general reservations based on a first come, first serve basis?
Ah Bless! I’m sure that within his extremely tight circle of friends he is just the funniest coolest guy.Now if only his friends were not as inflated as his ego..
Ha! Good enough for him, the jerk.