There is Lois, a waitress and Paul her boyfriend, who is a
line cook. Paul and Lois moved here two years ago from Colorado because they
were looking for a change. There is no bigger a change I can imagine that
trading Colorado for Colonie New York.
Lois is in her early 50s and Paul is in his mid 20s. She
tells me that she used to be his babysitter but I don’t know if she is joking,
or saying it just to get a rise out of me.
As a couple, they have a great dynamic but Paul clearly
thinks that he is working at a four star restaurant. He will refuse, by yelling
at the top of his lungs to any substitutions that I might try to slip in
unnoticed. Lois can substitute her heart away.
“Geoff!” Paul will scream while bringing the back of his
spatula down on the “pick up” bell. “Ting, Ting, Ting” it chimes. So if I
didn’t hear Paul yell at me the first time, the constant “ting, ting, ting’ of
the bell should clearly get my attention.
It does get everyone’s attention within a 5 mile radius of his
cooks line.
“Yes Paul?” I will say before I pivot over to him. I will
actually act as if I don’t know why I am being called over and take my sweet
time walking.
Paul will huff and puff but wait for me to be standing
directly in front of him. He will shake the order in my face, his face turning
a light crimson and scream “You can’t substitute Pancakes for Grits!” “Go back
to that table and tell them!” Then he will ball up the order and bounce it off
my head or face for effect.
So now, I have to walk back to the only table that I
currently have, un-ball the check and tell them they have to change their order.
Every time the table will try to reason with me “But we are the only ones in the
entire restaurant!” “Uh-huh,” I grunt.
Paul will scream back at the table from the cook’s window.
“Geoff is new here, he is just learning the rules!” “Don’t baby him!” I
suddenly become the asshole. It gets old fast.
Another oddity on the team is Jason. He is the official
Graveyard Busboy that we work with. He stands about 6’3, he’s bald with dark
framed glasses, a hulking build and a strange crooked stare. Clearly he has had
some sort of head injury because he tends to stand and stare at women customers
he thinks are pretty. He does this to the point where they become alarmed.
When this happens, he try’s to be cool by staring at them
from a distance and from behind things. He will hide behind a potted plant or
the register until the patron freaks out, usually screaming for a manager. Then
one of his will have to calm down the customer that is complaining. We have to
explain that Jason is a bit odd and clearly has a head injury. Then we try to
make her comfortable while Jason will go to the kitchen to calm his nerves by
eating something from the bus tub. He will stay there until the customer
leaves.
Everything at Denny’s is done by seniority. Open shifts have
to first be offered to the people who have worked for the company the longest.
So even though the Breakfast Crew, who will not work a Dinner or Graveyard
Shift, still have to be offered the open shift first. If they say “No” then it
gets trickled down to new people. If someone from the Graveyard Shift goes on a
vacation, one of the women from the Dinner shift will work their original
dinner shift and cover the Graveyard Shift. It is so hard to work an additional
shift.
One of the woman with the least amount of seniority on the
Breakfast shift has been working at this particular Denny’s for 35 years.
I can never pick up any available shifts, since I have been
here a couple of weeks.
Also the rule I learn the hard way is to “Never ask any of
the girls (as they refer to themselves) from the Breakfast Shift if you can
either cover their shift for them.” It’s bad enough that they barely talk to
you and that their customers show up at the end of our Graveyard Shift sit in
our seats but refuse to order because they are waiting for the Breakfast Shift
Waitresses to take over.
It’s cool that some of their customers have been arriving every
day for the past ten years and it’s a little like family. Unfortunately, these
customers want nothing to do with me waiting on them.
I get called Fag, Homo and Queer by customers on a daily
basis and not even behind my back or mumbled into a napkin, but right to my
face. If I complain, the boss tells me to “Ignore it,” and that there is “Nothing”
he can do.
I remind him that “Its is illegal to discriminate, even if
its discrimination by a customer.”
He just laughs, shakes his head, and then asks me, “Well,
why don’t you just quit?”
To be continued…
Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writing "A Day in the Life/Down the Rabbit Hole". It cannot be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.
Geoffrey Doig-Marx holds all written and electronic rights to his writing "A Day in the Life/Down the Rabbit Hole". It cannot be reprinted in part or whole without his written consent.
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