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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: People
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She came to the restaurant last year with her mother, father, sister, her mother wanted a job.
That's how they do things.
I laughed and told the owner that they were gypsies, and a couple of the older ladies in the kitchen would catch your eyes and smile, they knew what I was talking about, the owner was dubious.
And while her mother didn't work out, a bit lazy, a bit stupid, as it were, the daughter stayed and helped out in the front of house.
Now at first she was a hard worker - for a hostess, wandering around and pouring water when she wasn't seating tables, but that was merely the first impression, and shortly in to the job she began moderating the work she did and carved out a niche flirting with the bosses nephew, eating buns and stolen desserts, texting away in dark corners of the restaurant....
Her father hasn't had a job since immigrating to Canada. They all arrived about two years ago, and at the beginning the father was careful to get everyone jobs, the wife, his daughter - the one old enough to work, but for himself there was nothing. He wasn't particularly interested in working. What with the government cheques and his wife and daughter's income, he didn't really need to work.
The mother, she was, while she worked there - very friendly with the owner. Friendly in the sense that she'd want to discuss private matters with him locked in his office, and most of the staff caught on pretty quick what she was up to. The owner as well, and so she made her exit.
She found another job, locally in the Italian community, and we heard through the grapevine that the owners of **** were getting a divorce as a result of an affair she'd been conducting, and everyone nodded, they all knew, after all - and here they borrow my phrase - "they're gypsies".
I tease her about being a gypsy, she doesn't like it, argues - poorly, that they're not and she doesn't understand that I'm just winding her up. I stop, less to stop giving offense than because she's beginning to wind me up...
She likes to talk. About school, for someone who had to learn English as a third language she's doing pretty good, in most of her classes she's achieved honors with distinction. One has the feeling that she's teacher's little pet...
Still something's not right.
She tells us how smart she is. She's so smart that her guidance counselor is worried that if her brain keeps running as fast as it's running it could explode, she's that smart. She tells us this with a straight face, she believes every word of it. And if academic performance is everything then indeed she's very smart. I'm not so convinced.
She checks the tips, every tip that comes off the table she checks the amount. She's tipped out, a busgirl, not a server, but she wants to know what we make. Staff don't like this.
She complains about her tip out, she's the last to arrive, the first to leave, her tips, they're discretionary, the waiters agree on what she's to be given but she finds cause for quarrel every time.
I bring in the trinkets - garage sale finds for the waitresses, she coos over them, asks me why I don't bring her any....one day I find her something, she throws it back at me - "not my style" she tells me.
***She wonders why I don't bring her things. I mustn't like her. Can we please talk about why I don't like her? She likes me.
***Now the Nephew, he's probably given her vanity a little too much of a boost, perpetually groping her and trying to pull her into corners, youth is always attractive but she - specifically - is not so. She has the general shape of the A&W Root Bear, and forever you find her snacking on the desserts she's supposed to be preparing for tables, or dipping biscotti into sweetened milk.
***I pick up some ice cream, it's the weekend and I've thought to make a bit of a treat, iced cappuccinos for the staff. And she follows me about, excited as a cat when they hear the sound of opened cat food, telling me I should have bought a different flavour of ice cream, never letting me out of her sight, waiting until I've poured them out and quickly grabbing one for herself before taking a sip and complaining "I hate coffee!!! Why did you have to make it with coffee!!!"
***On Saturdays we all kick in for lottery tickets. When approached with the offer to buy in she excuses herself with "I'm not 18"....
***She catches you at the worst times. Most of her evening is spent hiding in the darker corners of the restaurant or chatting with the hostess, still there comes a couple of times where she has to look like she's doing a semblance of work. She's gotten a dessert order off a small table and is too flustered to undertake both the desserts and the cappuccinos, and so starts with you - "Are you busy?...." And I've a vodka bottle in one hand and 2 bottles of wine on the counter for different tables - she can't handle liquor, she's underage - and you look at her.
For somebody so smart she's pretty fucking stupid.
She's manipulative, she takes to telling me the "Manager wants you to set this table..." when I'm running my ass off. She's the busgirl, but it's a bit beneath her. And, oddly, I know what tables need setting, and do it ASAP, but dead tables are not always the priority. I check with the manageress, she's said no such thing, and we're starting to get a little bit of a handle on what makes this little sociopath tick. It's high-school musical, every day...
These small manipulations, they're not limited to me, I see her playing the same games with the other staff, and they're beginning to catch on.
I collect corks, vague plans for a grand mixed media art project. At the moment, schedule and all what it is, I'm only collecting. But she finds my stash of corks beneath the till and asks if she can have some. "What for?" I inquire, no reason, she just wants some. I tell her can take some, but it's a generous some, and I catch her hand beneath the till on numerous occasions, she pretends it's a game, these petty thefts, but I'm annoyed.
***Everyone else, it would seem, is annoyed as well, and staff is agreed that she has to go. Well, everyone but the Nephew, who's agreed but he has other hopes to consider as well.... We approach the owner, he agrees that she's a bit young, but we decide to give her fair warning...
***She still can't figure out why I don't like her. I assure her it doesn't matter, that all I expect is that she shows up and does some work, she doesn't like to work and instead follows the hostess around telling her tales of her busy social life. Or hides away in corners to snack and text her secret admirers. The Nephew, he's a bit of an obsession with her, her youth, specifically, and he's been interrupted in compromising positions with her in the bathroom during the shift, she'll do whatever it takes to keep the job, as long as it doesn't involve work.
"Your obsession with fucking her..." I tell him "Will end with her fucking you...". He pays no attention, she's wants him to get his own apartment, move out from his girlfriend, then she'll sleep with him. He does all his thinking with his cock.
She follows me around the restaurant, being overly friendly, I'm the holdout, no one else particularly likes her, all would be glad to see her go, but I'm a little more direct in my criticism. Not personal, merely "please do some work", and she doesn't like that, being told what to do, and so seeks to ingratiate herself to me by telling me of a book she's working on and would I like to proofread it for her? and I politely decline, too busy with work, other projects on the go, and really I'm not a critic...
Still she seeks to flatter me, my judgement, it would be doing her the biggest of favours, and I dismiss her, she returns with another favour, compliments me on trifles, these pathetic attempts to win my confidence, chastised when I send her away disappointed.
And there's no doubt in my mind, no doubt whatsoever, she's a gypsy.
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: People
- Hits: 1893
The Nephew is depressed, he's moving out from his girlfriend. He's "moved out" before, or made pretenses of moving out, always changing his mind at the last minute. But this time it's set, he's moving out, and every day he's looking at places in the neighborhood.
He only wants to spend about $300.00 a month for a room, "I'm never home" is his rationale, he's right, but $300.00 a month doesn't buy you much, as he's finding out.
He's got some amusing descriptions of the crack houses he's looked at so far, a little skit he does where the landlord shows him around some depressing hole of a house, then when it comes time to show him his room makes a pretense of opening the door an inch and then closing it...
"I want to see inside" he protests, and the landlord again opens the door another inch, then closes it. He says that he wants to step inside, look around it, the landlord drops the price, originally it was listed at $425 a month, but he can have it for $350, heck, $300 a month, they like him, if only he won't go inside....
In the end he gets inside the room, a urine and sweat soaked mattress on the floor, the landlord stands there sheepishly, looking at the floor - he's black, the landlord, and the nephew uses this prove how bad the room is: "You know what it takes to embarrass a black guy? They don't embarrass that easy...."
Meanwhile he's staying with his girlfriend. They've just had make-up sex, he throws $20 on the bed and tells her he's done and she should get out, It's a grand and empty gesture, this doesn't go down so well, it is, after all, her place, and while she lies on the bed he walks into the living room to scratch his balls and ask her new roommate if she "want's some?"....
He needs a new place.
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: People
- Hits: 2037
He's a regular, of sorts, by which I mean we know his name. Sometimes he's in 2 or three times a week, other times it might be a month or two before we see him.
This week he's been quite regular.
Now, unlike most of our more regular customers he's quite good. Quiet, no special requests, he spends money and tips well. I like him.
This week something's up.
The first time we see him he's with the new philanthropist, a regular customer who's just received some media attention over a sizable donation he's made to a local trade college. They drink Amarone, and chat like old friends, Dr. X pays the bill.
The second time he's with the President of a local University, drink Ripassa, again it's Dr. X paying the bill.
Now it seems coincidental, but I have a suspicion that Dr. X is soliciting the philanthropist on behalf of the President, and I have to admire how he pairs the wine with his guest, feting each according to their expectations.
It's odd, too, how he knows so many of our other customers, it's not uncommon for them to come in and sit on other sides of the dining room and not exchange a hello, but today he's got business with them. A lot of our customers are the same way.
He comes in again - this third guest of his I don't know, appears to be a tradesman of sorts, and with him they each drink juice and skip the appetizers.
Something is up, I don't know what it is, could make a guess but he is, after all, the inscrutable doctor.
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: People
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Predictably the talking waiter didn't show up for lunch today. Or evening.
And we're all speculating what's become of him - the whole situation - to say the least - is odd....
His wife, she didn't call today and she knew he was supposed to be at work. Odd. We try and reach her, she doesn't know what's going on, only that he's left the city to try and "change his luck" - Vancouver, she thinks....
We don't believe her.
After work, when I get home there's a message on my telephone telling me that he's in Frankfurt Airport, on his way to Tunisia, emergency, he won't be in to work (and I gathered that..). But oddly there's nothing on my call display to substantiate this.
The plot thickens and the mystery deepens.
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: People
- Hits: 2452
He likes to talk, this new waiter.
He's new, not to everyone else but to me - he was hired and fired in my absence, my short and unproductive vacation. And now he's been rehired.
"I'm upselling wine" he tells us, as if this explains why he's stood in front the same table for 20, 40, 60 minutes talking nonstop, about anything .
He does bring in the tips, the negligence of a dozen tables will yield fruit upon the thirteenth, me, this style of service offends me, if my waiter stood and talked to me for even 5 minutes, unless I was very regular and genuinely liked him, I'd tell them - politely - to go away.
And his conversation, it comes at a cost, everyone else runs his foods, sets the tables, polishes the cutlery, while he stands there and chats....
"I am an educated man!..This is ... and ... and ...."
He has opinions. Educated, or so he tells us, opinions, "Where did you go to school?" I ask when he's done telling the table how smart he is.
"In Paris" is his reply...
I try for something a little more specific, he can't remember details, only that he was educated.
Me, I don't talk to the tables if I can help it. It's a bad trap, you end up being expected to talk to them when it's busy, the restaurant doesn't work that way, there's too much to be done. Thus I'm silent, I don't know our customers that well, haven't worked there 10 or 20 years, let the other waiter, G, do the talking.
This new waiter, he likes to talk..
He's Arabic, from somewhere in the Middle east, has a wife and kids here, I try to find out where from - Lebanon? Morocco? Syria? He can't answer again, long stories involving his grandparents and inlaws and outlaws and the secret police and immigration, by the time he's done I'm more confused than ever and he'd have me believe he's Italian.
He's adopted a western name, something simple and common we can all remember, the Chinese and Philipino cooks do the same, but I've seen the cheques, he's definitely Arabic.
He is beside himself with laughter, he can't go on, really, finally he wipes a tear from his eye...I'm running the food and he points to where it should be set.
"I will do what my father did when his horse was stolen"...He's laughing in the midst of his own joke, it's so funny he can't finish telling it, finally..."He bought a new horse..."
The table laughs, politely, or perhaps they're genuinely amused, I can't tell, I'm off doing other things.
We're a small restaurant, we can't afford to pay someone to stand and talk to tables. It's his dodge, I've worked with talkers before, it's their way of getting out of doing anything remotely productive. We carry him.
He fucks up orders. Lots. It's because he's too busy talking and waiting, it's the art of listening, but he doesn't get it, he argues with the customers, they just want a laid back meal, and soon they forget and accept his mistakes and are listening to his soothing drivel once again.
There's an iPhone app that monitors the ebb and flow of conversation. I'm pretty sure he would score a 90% or greater. Sad I don't have an iPhone.
The staff, most don't like him, they find his persistent chatting and pretended authority annoying.
What's he an authority on? Why, ask him a question and he'll tell you....
****
Goats produce 50 liters of milk a day. Me, I don't know, but most goats aren't even 50 liters big, the more I doubt this the more he backs his facts, he knows this, a goat is a valuable thing where he's from ("and where is that exactly....?" I ask...), he stand by it, he should know, 50 liters a day...
****
A table of 5 businessmen and a single business woman. He tells us that the woman, she's hot for him. She's probably in her early 40's, attractive, he's convinced - or trying to convince us - that she wants him. We decide to play along. After the table has left we write a short note on the back of the bill telling him how much "she" enjoyed the service and inviting him to call her. We get one of the girls from the kitchen to volunteer her cell number.
We wait until he finds it.
"Of course I would never call her..." he says. "I have a wife and children....still, I told you she was hot for me...."
He can't get over it. He knew all along, told us, what do we think? And still he keeps talking.
****
Of course he calls. Again and again. And the kitchen staff member gets so tired of his calling and playing the role of the excited mistress that eventually - at 3:00 or so AM, she forgets to answer.
He finally gets her answering machine, and begins to figure it out.
****
He was calling to tell her that he had a wife and children, and then when he talked to her he didn't know how to break the news and so wanted to let her down gently....he's explaining this to the kitchen..they're not that stupid....
He's made himself a fool, and for a night he's suddenly quiet. A couple of the staff try to blame his mood on me - I point out that I merely provided him the opportunity, it was him who leapt upon it....
*****
It's a table - large - set menu, business people, they don't want to listen to him and so he's forced to stand and listen to them. He pulls me aside: "I've been listening to them..." he begins "You know, they're not that smart, I could do their job...it's all luck..."
He's right. I've listened to them, there's no great conversations going on, it's all BS.
But he doesn't understand how much more socially acceptable he'd have to be, and I haven't the heart to explain it.
*****
Staff go for drinks. Sometimes we play pool, he has his own cue, it's in his car, we wait while he gets it. And he actually has some talent for the game, which only serves to make him more disliked...
*****
He's seen the little trinkets and goo-gaws I bring back for staff from garage sales. And he wants to tag along, he's convinced that the costume jewellry I've bought for the girls is real, the fake pearls and cubic zirconium and 24 carat gold plate, he wants to buy some for his wife.
***
The staff explain to me that he claims to have lost his virginity at age 8 to a 20 year old babysitter.
He hasn't told this one in front of me, perhaps afraid I might call bullshit. Or query the sex of the babysitter....
****
He's forever trying to ingratiate himself to the owner, ridiculous stories, guessing games...the owner shows him an old passport photo...
- "I know exactly when this was taken....1978? 1979?" he says. The owner shows hime the date. "74! You see, I was right!...."
He's grateful for this job, prospects for him weren't that great, while he was fired from here he sold cars, 2 in 4 months, he was hired back when his wife came and plead for his job from the owner.
And he's borrowed money from him, as has his wife, ostensibly to help with immigration costs....
****
He's bought a book of fruit jokes, dumb-ass jokes for kids that he bought off of someone who came in the restaurant, reading the look upon my face he continues to tell them to me: "Why is a banana never alone? Because it's always in a bunch..."
***
It's one of our wine tastings and he's managed to corner the host in a corner.
"We are old hands at this business.....I used to serve Jean Chretian....and Brian Mulroney...and...."
We're waiting on the customers and the host is too polite to escape the conversation, I think to rescue him but I'm subject to this every day of the week....Later I can corner him and tell him about how I used to serve Adolph Hitler and Jesus Christ....
****
He's talking to his wife on the phone. It's all Arabic, babble babble "Bitch" babble babble "Asshole",...
The nephew's curious, don't they have words for these things in his language?
He, too, is annoyed at all the patter, at the way he "upsells" the Ripassa, one of our cheaper wines, "And this is the ... Ripassa, second press of the Amarone...."
The nephew has his own version, simpleton that he is even he, on occasion, has some wit...
"And this is Ginger - Ale, second press of Coca-Cola....and this is butter...second press of milk...."
****
"They have yet to invent something that works to trim nose hair...."
- "scissors"? I suggest
"No way!".
****
He's the knack of doing you a small favour, like brushing an imaginary piece of lint off of your lapel, then telling you it was nothing. It's shit, but he does it with the customers as well, exaggerated laying of the napkin across the lap, other trivial services that by his emphasizing the triviality actually make them seem bigger than they are. He doesn't clear tables, it's beneath him, or take dessert orders or - if he can help it - polish cutlery.
***
He's telling us about how he won a million dollar on the slots at the Casino, was cheated out of it, he was surrounded by drunks and little old Chinese ladies patting him on the back and congratulating him, when the final lucky gold brick shifted on the video wheel and he found himself out of luck. And so he calls the manager over and has her check the machine, where's his winnings? and she tells him he's not a winner, he tells her to check again, she does, he's still not a winner, he's not convinced, he demands justice and the drunks and elderly Chinese, they're behind him cheering him on, demanding that he be paid....
Security comes, he's surrounded "You touch me and I'll be forced to defend myself, and I'm not paying the surgeons to put you back together again....AND I have a heart condition.....I'm not some bum off the street that you can push around, I'm a businessman....and your breath stinks...stay away from me..."
He doesn't get a million dollars, not that night, ejected from the casino, yes, but he's got a number that he can call to have things fixed.
He's finished polishing the glasses, polishing them again as he tells the story once more to all who care to listen..."I've filed a complaint, I think they'll try to settle..."
****
Today his wife called the restaurant, he didn't come home last night, was he out with G?, well, eventually he did come home, 6:00 AM, now she's missing all the money in the house and her jewelry has disappeared, she's convinced she's been robbed, it couldn't have been him, there are more calls throughout the day, the police are over investigating the theft, G is calling him on his cell but it's disconnected, G's day off is at stake and he's pissed, we speculate - gambling? another woman?