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Pinata's bursting, filled with children, crayons and sand...

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Blog

Published: 29 July 2017

Hits: 1238

The last 4 days at the restaurant, crazy, Sunday, running, Monday, unexpectedly busy, children coming up from the dock, blended families of 8 and 12 people, 4 adults, the rest all children, separate bills, crazy again, unexpectedly so, and it goes ridiculously late...it's as if pinatas are bursting in the restaurant filled with children, crayons, sand from the beach, the night's a gong show...

The next night, quiet, much quieter by far, but we've a new cook and things don't go even slightly as planned. A slight rush - busy, but only for an hour. And in that hour the new cook gets 8 orders, more than he can keep up with, he's big, fat, lazy, likes to stand around and work the deep-fryer, came here from Prince George, only he's not working out....the orders are slow, too late, the ferry's here and there's lineups of irate customers trying to cancel food orders that have already been placed, the other waiter, classic sketchy waiter from down east, gets into a shouting match with a rude English lady at the bar, nobody does rude and ignorance better than the British, they're the soccer hooligans of Europe, he's giving her as good back, yelling at her to fuck-off, that if she doesn't pay for the food she didn't get he's gonna call the cops, it's a shit-show...

I stay out of it. I'm busy enough as is, got my own tables to worry about, later on I get the full story. That he said the job was bullshit and it was suggested by the competent chef that he leave, and he did, only he wanted to keep living in the staff accommodations and after numerous attempts to start a fistfight with the owner had to be escorted to Nelson with the RCMP. The other waiter couldn't get the food for an irate woman that wanted to get on the Ferry, hence the shouting match.

This place, restaurants in general, they're a shit-show.

Wednesday, slow in the afternoon, I stay until 3:00, short break, back at 4. At which point it's a bit busy, but we get it under control. At 4:30 we start getting phone calls - "do we have power?", apparently the power's out in Nelson, no restaurants there are open, first 1 call, then 2, by the fifth one I'm answering the phone with "Yes we have power", 20, 40, now a hundred calls an hour, hang up and the phone is ringing, there's a tidal wave of tourists and locals leaving Nelson for the pub, it's 30 minutes away, I can see it on the horizon, I warn the kitchen, the new waitress arrives just in time...

The restaurant has about 40 odd tables, or 200+ seats. 3 servers. We are slammed. Beyond slammed, people walking in, sitting themselves at dirty tables, expecting to be recognized, the entire town has had the same idea...

The other waiter, he knocks off at 10 to start doing his cashout, we're (the new waitress and I) are doing side duties to 11:00, he's still puzzling why it doesn't add up, I help him a bit, cure a few of the errors, help the waitress, then leave, he's still got problems, I'm on to a couple of days off and never have they been so well earned...