I’m convinced that food service has to be the first circle of hell.

When I was an undergrad, I worked at a local restaurant for about two years until my manager caught me trying to drown myself in a deep fryer (okay, so maybe not. But I sure thought about it). One night during homecoming (also known as our busiest night of the whole freaking year, folks!) this guy asked me for another set of silverware and I told him very genially that he could grab a set from the very next table. I was delivering food to a huge table now, mind you, so I couldn’t very well bend over, pick up the silverware and hand it to this guy.

He looked like I had slapped him and his wife exclaimed “You are so rude! How dare you speak to a man that way!” In my nicest waitress voice, I said, “Well excuse me, I’ve got to get back into the kitchen, where I belong.” and, under my breath, “Don’t choke on your food, now!”

If only I had known about Bitterwaitress.com then! It’s a website where waitresses can go to share their customer horror stories and list their crappiest tippers. There is often the odd encounter with a rude celebrity recounted on the website, too, like this run-in with Dan Marino, who, according to the waitress, tried to charge kids for his autographs. Read More »

Hooters? Depressing? You don’t say. All I’ve ever had to do was take a look at the horrible orange and white paint job adorning the outside of most Hooters restaurants to know those places are a bevy of bad taste and depression.

Oh yeah, and fifteen year olds.

In my town, Hooters was the place adolescent boys with fake IDs and too much cologne spent their Friday nights when no one their own age would date them.

Hooters was the place high school’s biggest assholes went to feel superior to women who would never look at them in real life, as well as the place a friend’s friend once tried to work at but quit after some perv threw a popcorn shrimp at her boobs.

In conclusion: Hooters is drenched in grossness. Read More »

I was sitting in a diner yesterday with a couple of friends, when two of the guys I was with got to talking about how they were certain that they could hit on/go home with/bang the hell out of their waitress. Apparently, their waitress had been giving them the eyes from the moment they sat down, and, while they didn’t feel that she was most attractive girl they’d ever seen, or even the most attractive waitress they’d been served by this weekend, they both thought it’d be fun to see if they could pull off the pick-up.

As it happens, trying to pick up waitresses is truly one of the fun pastimes for a lot of guys, because the waitress/customer relationship eliminates the potentially awkward and messy scene that often plays out when a guy tries to approach a random girl. In a restaurant, where the waitress typically starts the conversation, a guy will be more at ease, and will usually be much more comfortable spitting the proverbial game

Now, as far as I know, there is no correct way to try and pick up a server. The usual and easiest course of action is simply to get a pen and write your name and number on the receipt or a business card and then hope for the best. I’m not saying that this method is always successful; in fact, it almost never works. But if you’re going to try and pick up the person who is bringing you bacon and eggs, a witty note with a phone number is generally the best course of action. All of which brings me back to yesterday.

One of the guys, who we’ll call Guy A, wanted to write down his digits, but no one in our party had a pen. Instead of simply asking another employee for a pen (because, c’mon, that would have been FAR too easy), Guys A and B proceed to hatch what may have been the most elaborate (and idiotic) plan that I’ve ever heard. Read More »

Forget birth control, forget condoms. I have found IT. And by IT I mean the foolproof way to stop teenage/unwanted pregnancies, stop the spread of std’s, hell–it might even stop you from wanting to have sex (I said might). Okay, all of the above may put Maury Povich out of a job- but I’m pretty sure my idea is like, uh, genius. How come no one has ever thought of this before? Sure all those conservative-good-Christian-political people preach teaching abstinence only education as a way to stop std’s and pregnancies out of wedlock (which is clearly not working in this country) and those a bit more liberal preach the importance of teaching safe sex practices and forms of birth control. I am not discounting that. BUT I do think my idea is a fantabulous new way to put a halt to this “who’s my baby-daddy” nonsense going on in our society right now.

Where did this brilliant idea come from? Wellllll, moving back home for the summer has made my Friday and Saturday nights … different (to say the least). I have traded in shots and bar crawls for yoga class and early bird movies. Partayyy, I know. The past two nights, I have seen Knocked Up and Waitress, both which have given me the inspiration for a new found form of birth-control. Read More »

I am the queen of summer jobs and internships.

I have done everything from chase kids around in nurseries to waitressing to getting covered in dirt in a greenhouse to working in a tiny cubicle in a Manhattan talent office to running errands for a crazy agent to making pizza for one day.

Looking back, there are so many things I wish I could have told my little 19 year old self during her first foray into living alone and interning in New York City. One of those things would be to never eat the coleslaw in any restaurant (they totally reuse that shit), but I would also tell her how to deal with completely psychotic bosses and why it’s okay to lie to certain part time employers. Read More »