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Nephew, Back
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2073
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
Gangly, loping, forever apologizing for shit he knows better, nervous and stuttering, while talking to tables he fidgets, flails a napkin in his hand like a cheerleader having a seizure, talking over-loudly to the customers, (talking loudly the Italian answer to reason...), interrupting you while you speak to your tables, taking orders, telling them the specials, he's a mixed blessing or none at all, our income dropped now by a third and our workload just doubled, braying like a donkey, he's loud, about how hard he's working (he's seated while he tells you this, having a coffee and a cigarette...), instigating inappropriate conversations in front of customers, about the double ended dildo he and his girlfriend just bought, about his membership in the underground political parties of Berlin, about every minority he would like to see exterminated, about how lucky we are to have him...to come here he had to leave a job in Germany, 16 Euros an hour, through connections (the current girlfriend's parents, always, the chance of him finding work without someone calling in a favor are next to none), soon it will be that he was the head of VolksWagon, Vice President, CEO, Chief, Mercedes Benz,
The Owner, he shows me a text message:
"When you are dead, you don't know that you are dead. It is difficult only for the others. It is the same when you are Stupid"
This is everyone that works here, that comes here to eat, this is everyone in the world, but, at the moment, this is the Nephew.
Tonight, needing a glass of Prosecco for a customer, we catch him trying to open a bottle of Dom Perignon...truly a fucking idiot...
...I've come to the conclusion, from his anecdotes, from the too many Italian emigre's that I've met, that Italy is not a country, it's a pasture, an island, surrounded by Donkeys or Goats, filled with people trying to escape, or in the Nephew's case, not trying to escape, merely procreate...
Completely without filters or unifying field of consciousness, merely the percolating well of unconscious thoughts that shouldn't be voiced, certainly not in front of customers...the too quick utterance of every untutored opinion, mental hiccup, burp, fart, every vulgar trope culled from his favorite pornographic movies...sooo offensive, you have to laugh, he mocks, ridicules every customer, a few short feet from their table, their every disability, none too traumatic, strokes, hear attacks, cripples, no disfigurement of color, ethnicity, religion, country not parodied and pantomimed for our obvious discomfort...
Work, well, same as always, it's like paying someone to do it ourselves...
It's almost good to have him back...
The Union
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2601
J**, the hostess, is mobilizing the support crew, with G*** gone she feels it's time to bring some fairness to the tip-out procedure. She doesn't feel well treated. I inquire what she would consider fair. "AN Even Split" she tells me, without hesitation, despite the obvious facts that she's lacking considerable of the skills to do our jobs, and all of us our possessed of the skills to do hers, that she starts 2 or three hours later than the rest of the staff, and leaves 2 or three hours earlier, despite the fact that she gets the same shift pay for a 4, 5, 6 hour shift that I get paid for a 12 hour shift...
I laugh. "Not gonna happen..." I tell her. She's a fucking idiot. She's given this shit to G***, I've heard all about it, she works in a hospital, for fucks sake, as a clerk, there's no way she'd walk in and demand the same salary as a nurse, or a doctor, yet her skills are roughly equivalent here, and yet she's asking the same.
I let the staff know she's forming the union. The other waiters, whom we split with. They're of the same mind, one, reasonably, the other (the Bosses Nephew, himself overpaid) as reasonable as she. I fume over this the entire night.
She's on crack, a fucking lunatic, I've been on every side of this, having worked every role in restaurants, when I started here I was a busboy with 30 years serving experience, didn't question the tip outs, appreciated there was more going on than I knew.
The next night I hold a meeting with her and the expediter.
To clarify, for those of you unfamiliar with the service industry, Hostesses, Expediters, Busboys, these are all support roles for the service staff. They are tipped, but seldom at the same level as the servers, they have less competence, responsibility, accountability. The servers tip them out. Generally it works out pretty fairly, just as it works out pretty fairly that customers tip what they think is appropriate. The whole system is flawed, this is the best we can do.
I confront her with the previous nights work - 5 hours, we tipped her $125.00, her shift pay of $70.00, this works out to almost $40.00 per hour, she thinks this is inadequate? I've made this - as an hourly rate - at this restaurant 1 day in the past 6 years. She thinks we're being stingy, cheating her? She made this on one of the slowest nights we've ever had here, let alone what she took in at the coat check, her business, we don't ask, yet I seriously doubt she's been so well treated here ever, even when we've been twice as busy, and her queries are creating offense...
She backpedals, defensive, bloody hell but I'm mad, I hate this, the vulgar discussions of money, I've always taken-or-left jobs based on what I perceived the fairness to be, that's the rule, if you can do better, than please do, she just wants to know what she can expect to make before she decides whether to come in to work or not...
Fuck that. This is a luxury the part-timers have, they feel sick, hungover, they're not so indispensable they can't take a night off. I've never been sick a single shift in 6 years there, she just finished up 2 weeks off, malingering at home with a sore throat...I'd love to take a night off, fuck what I'll make, I just want a Friday or Saturday night off to go out and party, maybe even on a fucking date. She's not helping her cause...
"No, no, no, I misunderstand..." she assures me... Actually, I don't at all. Not even a little bit. And while she hates it when I say that a certain portion of it's "discretionary" - meaning we - the others - decide how hard we think each other worked (because every one is a shitty judge of their own performance...) she argues this again, who am I - or anybody else - to judge her? Yet our very livelihoods in this place our discretionary, this is hospitality, if it's not coming together for you maybe you need to find another job... And I want to tell her, in our own view, we are all the hardest, most competent workers, but it's only in the eyes of others that we acquire any value...
I offer her the ability to switch roles - all of us, the other waiters, the Nephew, A*****, myself, we'll do their jobs, they can decide the tip outs, what's fair, we'll leave early every weekend night and come in if we feel fairly treated and think the money's worthwhile...they don't like this, I'm being ridiculous, there's no way they can be expected (the expediter, after 20 years here...) to do our jobs...
This says it all, really...
But she's too fucking stupid, and tempers are hot, and there are a variety of moot points now being argued, the expediter arguing that her shorter shifts shouldn't be reflected in her tips (and every waiter knows that the longer you work, the more tables you serve, the more money you make), but these are things that the simpletons will never understand...despite knowing we're salaried and that the longer the hours, the less we make, they're still convinced we should happily stay there 14 hours a day and share the spoils with the 5, 6, and 7 hour part-timers 50-50...
We bring back Stella, a Gypsy, another squeaky wheel soon to be replaced, but the Nephew has some hopes there...And so the Union is busted, for a time, to be shortly formed again.
The San Jose
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Found
- Hits: 2076
Possibly the biggest shipwreck find ever, the San Jose offers potentially upward of a billion dollars in treasure. In only 700 feet of water. And despite the article, the finders face a long battle with the Colombian Government for their fair share of the loot.
Link: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/06/wreck-spanish-galleon-treasure-haul
&& Link: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/06/holy-grail-of-shipwrecks-in-three-way-court-battle
Conservatives in Calgary
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Link of the day
- Hits: 1972
I recognize him, somehow, the bat-shit-crazy-stoner eyes. Don't know from where...
Anyways, he's had a bit of a rough go of it, a day with Alberta Conservatives, (and he lives here, where does he hang out, I wonder?).
Trust me, His day is nothing compared to mine. Every day of my life at that restaurant is like his day in Mount Royal, Times Ten...
I think I should meet him, and buy him dinner...Then he'd have an article, so far, he's had it easy...
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