I approach my party of two ladies. I introduce myself and ask if they have any questions about the menu. “Hmm, I don’t know,” says one lady, “everything just looks so good. I am starving!” I recommend a couple dishes and go grab their drinks. I return to the table fairly certain that the ladies are going to order some of the dishes that I suggested, which should make for a nice little check. I set down the drinks and one of the ladies looks inquisitively at me and says, “how is your ranch dressing?” The wind in my sails instantly vanishes. “Well it is a pretty standard ranch dressing, nothing too special.” “Mmm that sounds really good, I will have the soup and salad.” Fuck. I turn, defeated, to the other lady at the table and wince as she says, “I will have the same thing.” God why are you going out to dinner? As I turn to walk away, thinking that it couldn’t get any worse, I hear an awful sound. “Can we get some bread?”

- Blair

So I am serving a party of 5 people. Everything is going fine. I get all their drinks and of course some of our delicious free bread. About half-way through the meal, one lady gets up and goes to the bathroom. She is in there a long time and when she comes out she walks right back to her table, grabs her purse, and leaves. Her table informs me that she wasn’t feeling very well and had to go home. About 5 minutes later, one of the other servers goes into the women’s bathroom only to emerge screaming “THERE IS SHIT EVERYWHERE! IT IS ON THE WALLS OH MY GOD!!” Guess that lady really wasn’t feeling very well, but she didn’t have to make us all sick!

- Phillip

It is 5 minutes before we close down the restaurant. Of course a table walks in, a middle aged man and woman. They sit down and I get their drinks started for them. As I am making the drinks I keep thinking that the lady at the table looks familiar. I approach the table and the lady says to me, “hey Danny, how are you?” I quickly realize that she is my neighbor, then I also realize that the guy she is with is NOT HER HUSBAND!! I am dreading running into them at my apartment complex.

- Danny

A man and woman walk in and I ask them the standard: “Would you like
a table or a booth?”

The man then says, “Booth…John Wilkes”.

Haha?

- Princess Consuela Banana Hammock

Why is bread the most important fucking thing in the world when people go out to eat? I had these people that were eating an order of garlic knots ( which is fucking bread) and they asked me for some bread. YOU ARE EATING FUCKING BREAD, HOW MUCH DO YOU NEED? I had another table that got a pizza, right when I put there pizza down, “Um, can we get some bread?” I know it is free and you love to get your free deals, but do you really need all that fucking bread? Is that what you go out to dinner for? Mmmm, lets go out to dinner tonight, and get some free bread. How fucking delicious. People act like the world is ending if they don’t get any bread the second they sit down. No room for an appetizer, but plenty of room for free bread eh? Shocking. FUCK YOU AND FUCK YOUR FREE BREAD!

- Sean

One night I had a group of foreigners who were actually really cool. Through the whole meal they were really polite and nice to me. As they paid the check they even asked me about the tipping standards in the U.S. because they were unfamiliar and wanted to make sure I was compensated properly. They handed me the check and said they didn’t need cash back so I went to process the payment, as I looked at what they left I immediately realized the three fifties they left for payment were all fake. I didn’t have the heart to tell them myself that they had gotten screwed over where ever they had exchanged their money so I sent my manager over. I watched from the wings as my super nice table went through all the cash they had on them realizing it was all fake. I have never felt so bad for a table. We ended up comping the bill for them because they didn’t have the money to pay, I didn’t even care about my tip. 

Carl

Today I had a pretty good section with a eight top table so I was seeing $$$$$$! Then I saw two red hat ladies lurking around my section eyeing the big eight top table, I turned to run and tell the host I’d cut his balls off if he sat them there, but to my dismay they were already en route to kill my only chances of making money tonight. As they were being seated I went to retrieve to only thing that can appease hungry bitches…free bread. As I placed the bread on the table and said “Hi, my name is….” a lady whom I assumed to be the head Red Hat cause hers was the largest and most gaudy interrupted with “We are gonna need waaaaaay more bread!” Usually when this is the first encounter at a table a server can assume for the duration of the tables’ stay they are gonna be needy assholes. So not only did these old grannies sit at my table for 3 1/2 hours and run my ass the whole time, they weren’t even polite about it. At the end of the meal I presented them with a check which was promptly returned to be split 8 ways (they all got the same thing 1/2 sandwich special), they left me a generous 10% tip down to the penny. Lesson #1: A restaurant is not a conference room, I’m pretty sure you can rent those. Lesson #2 The bread is free, simmer down you won’t die if you don’t get free bread. Lesson #3: Simple addition is easy, who cares if you pay a dollar more than Sally May. Bottom Line: Doesn’t The Red Hat Society do charity??? They should work on their manners and realize tipping a server is like donating to charity, all of us are busting our ass to better our lives!!!

-Grrrrrtrude

Check out http://www.bartendingblogs.com/Directory.html! They have some good stuff!

Here is another beverage related pet peeve of mine. I hate when I am in the process of handing out drinks, and before the glass has even hit the table a customer rudely says, “Uh, I need a straw!” NO SHIT REALLY? HOW ABOUT YOU LET ME PUT THE FUCKING DRINK ON THE TABLE FIRST ASSHOLE! I ONLY HAVE TWO HANDS, ONE IS HOLDING A TRAY, THE OTHER IS HOLDING YOUR FUCKING DRINK!

- Craig

 I hate (I am sure we all do) when a customer (like The Camel) pounds the shit out of their drink, and then looks around for the server and glares at them like they did something wrong. Hi, I have other tables, so if it has been 30 seconds since I gave you a drink already and you already finished it, your going to go thirsty for a few minutes. Maybe even more if you are an asshole about it!

- Craig