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Friday 13 - 2011

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Miscellany

Published: 16 May 2011

Hits: 2092

It begins with the old dishwasher showing up to pick up her final cheque. I don't know the details, only that the owner is screaming at her to "fuck off" and "get the fuck out...". It turns out that she's had the audacity to query why she wasn't paid holiday pay for Good Friday.

Now here, at this restaurant, at a surprising number of restaurant's, really, there is no such thing as holiday pay or overtime or any of the "perks" employees have come to expect from their jobs - their other jobs. And the owner has coughed up, he's not happy but I'm pretty sure he's been audited for this sort of thing before and he doesn't want a scene and so he just pays her.

In the 30 years he's been in business he's made - literally - millions on this small oversight. The old ladies in the kitchen, on $12.00 an hour, not one of them has ever received a nickel in overtime or holiday pay, some have been there almost 30 years. It's the way it is.

Now this has tainted the day and the owner goes off on one of his fits, throwing things in the kitchen, no reason but he finds someone to blame, his nephew, the manager, customers sit in the restaurant and smile, pretending they don't hear a thing. One regular asks me why no one has yet clubbed him to death with a frying pan, another jokes that it must be something important, more important than a spilled salt shaker, I correct him..."Not necessarily" and they laugh.

The day has gone to hell, and we're not yet half done. 

The evening, he's still in a foul mood, the nephew, eager to restore his spirits has found outside the restaurant, underneath the neighboring business's tree, a black butt plug, clearly visible from the window where customer's sit. And more customers, our customers, who call at 6:00 on a Friday night and demand the best table, they'll be down in 5 minutes, we make space, people with outstanding reservations are forced to wait or sit at tables behind water heaters and next to waiter stations. "Happy Anniversary dear", but nobody's that happy.

We pander, "Lemon for my water", not a request, a command, followed by "There's a crack in my wineglass" (there isn't), and "No ice in my water" (after you've poured), we pander to the worst of the city, the cabal of owner's friends remarkable in that they have no class, manners, education, but they all have money and the owner is screaming in the back. 

I'm almost done.