annoying people – It's Been Real!

God Save the Teacher (& Me)

It’s been a while since I wrote anything about my class, or what we’ve been doing so far. At the moment, we’re in our third module, which we will complete officially tomorrow. It was a little rough; we had a different teacher, but she was a gem, and took pity on us when it came to the work. And I must thank God for her patience, for the stupid questions did not cease.

There is one girl in my class who has about as much brain between her ears as a politician has a heart in his body. Nunce. Every single time she hands in something to be graded, she asks our teacher, “Am I failing?”

Our teacher will say, “Yes, you are… just kidding!”

“Oh, NO!” my fellow student will moan in a sing-song fashion before my teacher can say she’s joking. And she’s done that since day one of class. Sometimes twice in the same day. Finally, last week, I had enough. My teacher was grading her test, she asked the same question, got the same answer, and proceeded with the same response.

I asked, “Why do ask the same question when you know she’s going to mess with you?” She got no retort or defense back. We’ll be staying with this teacher for the next module which begins next week (Thanksgiving week). Thankfully, the class they are starting out with is one I transferred out of, so I don’t have to make an appearance at all next week. Yay! And then I got out of another class and lowered my tuition some more. Which means when those classes arrive, I can either have extra free time, or work a little more. Which sometimes, I would rather do than share the same classroom with her.

And on that note, it’s been real!

Disorder in the House!

This past weekend, I legitimately and truly and really wanted to kill somebody. Not my coworkers, but the customers (as per usual). Friday night, I arrived at 5:00 for my shift and we were already pretty busy. I got situated and then I had Granny and Paps come up and say they had eight people. All my big tables were already taken, so they asked me to push two tables (in two different sections) together to seat them. Now, if you work in a restaurant, joining two tables belonging to two separate servers for one party is a b*tch. Why? Who the f*ck is going to get it?! So, I got my manager’s permission and pushed them together. They brought in five noisy children, and one of the tables near them, moved to a different one. This irritated me and threw the server off. From there, everyone kept coming in and nobody was leaving.

I soon found myself on a wait and people couldn’t grasp that it was almost forty minutes. Then, I got the Incredible Bulk dragging himself through the door. I told him the wait time and he really gave me a hard time. He wanted to go at the end of a long table, which was occupied at the other end. I told him we could not do that and that I had a reservation going there. “But I’ll be gone in twenty minutes.” I just gave him a look and told him I couldn’t do that. “Well, I want to speak to a manager because I don’t understand why.”

“Yeah, because you’ve got blubber for a brain,” I muttered to myself as I walked behind the bar to grab the floor manager. I grabbed him and explained the situation to him. He raised his eyebrow and affirmed what I already knew. “Well, can you tell him that? Because he doesn’t seem to want to take no from me.”

“Alright. Where is he?” my manager asked.

“Turn around. You can’t miss him,” I sarcastically responded as I started to walk away. He looked, caught sight of him, faced me and mouthed, ‘what the f*ck?!’ I just nodded and went back to my post. The rest of the night, people kept saying they didn’t see the sign in the atrium, so they sat themselves at dirty tables, and I didn’t bother with them. I got angrier as the night went on and people kept being idiots.

My coworkers all said, “Wow! You’re really pissed off. I’ve never seen you this pissed off.” I was. It hadn’t even really cleared out that much when I was let go at a quarter to ten.

Saturday night, I was semi-hopeful, but definitely not optimistic. Not long after arriving, I got a walk in eleven top and a seven top. I guess calling to check if we even have room is out of the question. Then, one of the servers was late, so I had to divide her section between the other (already busy) three. Needless to say, I was not interested in taking shit from people after Friday night. Thankfully, Saturday night was not as bad as Friday night. My coworkers commented on that, and how I didn’t look like I wanted to decapitate somebody. That was good. We’ll see how this weekend goes.

And on that note, it’s been real!

Costumed Craziness

This past weekend was a like a masque affair at my restaurant. We had all the staff dress up on Friday night, which was fun. I dresses up as Worick Archangelo from the anime, Gangsta. A few people thought I was Uma Thurman’s character from Kill Bill, but I had to correct them. We had one of the waitresses, who is very good at makeup, did her face like a clown from American Horror Story. She also did our manager’s face and made him look like a voodoo skeleton man. We had a mermaid sort of server, a kitty cat (she was a little lazy), and a 50’s greaser girl. One of the bartenders was Goose from Top Gun, and the second one was a rebel pilot from Star Wars. In a sense… he was basically wearing a pajama onesie that looked like a rebel pilot on the front, but made him look like a Telly Tubby from the back. We were all dressed up on Friday and we had fun. Except for my lack of depth perception. My character has an eyepatch, and I was doing my best not to bump into everybody.

On Saturday, we had several large parties make reservations, and one of them was an eighteen top costume party. They kept standing up instead of sitting down at the tables we assigned them. The servers couldn’t wait on them until they sat down, so that the two servers could know who they had. My manager had to go over and tell them that they had to sit down in their seats to be served. They sat down, but decided to occupy two extra tables as well as the larger two we had given them.

That was the first annoying aspect of it. The second was an obnoxiously loud six top that was right next to me. One of the women was obviously under the influence, and kept talking about certain, slightly off-color topics in a loud voice. She mentioned the ‘LGBTQIA’ repeatedly and so loudly that I thought she really did want the whole restaurant to hear her. They were there from almost the start of my shift to the very end of my shift. They were there for literally four hours. Anyway…

The costumes this weekend were pretty interesting and I could tell who put time/money into their costumes, and which ones had not. Being a costume connoisseur, it was easy. Halloween didn’t used to be a big holiday for me. As I get older and older, it has changed along with me.

And on that note, it’s been real!

Stupidity Abounds

This past weekend while at the restaurant, I was once more amused by the stupidity of humanity as a whole. From where I am in the restaurant, I can see quite a bit of what goes on, so I can watch people doing all kinds of weird things. That, and I can exchange looks with my fellow coworkers as they wait for their drinks at the end of the bar. As I believe I have mentioned in the past, we found a place to put the sign so people can see it when they come in. When I arrive, I turn it from ‘Please seat yourself’ to ‘Please wait to be seated’. It’s right there and the only way you can miss it is if you failed to pass elementary reading.

This weekend, I had several people come in, look around, see me, and ask, “Can we sit anywhere?” or “Can we seat ourselves?” I don’t know… what does the sign say? It says ‘Please wait to be seated’. Some people are good, and they wait by my little area while I clean tables. Other people are bad, and they just wander around and plop down wherever they feel like. I love it when people ask me if they can sit at a table that is currently dirty.

I always say, “Give me a second and I’ll clean it up.” I go to clear it and when I get back to actually clean it, they’re already sitting there in the company of crumbs and spills. I almost wanted to walk away and let them sit there in the mess. I said clearly and anybody with two brain cells between their ears would understand that I wanted them to wait until the table was ready. Another funny thing that happened was I was cleaning up and two people walked in. I stopped what I was doing and walked over. “Can I help you?” I asked and they walked right by me. I muttered to myself and watched them go off into our little lounge area. I finished with my table and sat back up at my post, not bothering to bring them menus or inform the server. I would always claim ignorance if they complained. ‘Oh, but, they didn’t see me.’ The server came up a minute later to get menus.

She said, “Two people sat in my side of the lounge.”

I widened my eyes, a smirk played on my lips, and I said in a mocking voice, “Really?!” The server laughed. She knew I wasn’t directing that at her; I was directing that at them. I love it when people walk over to a place, and then they happen to see me.

One of them will walk over and say, “Oh… were we supposed to wait for you?”

Let me think… kind of, yeah. The sign is a dead giveaway, but apparently, you’re a few marshmellows short of a s’more.

And on that note, it’s been real!

The Fault in the Faculty

Today, we have to give five minute demonstrative speeches for our class. I used to be a member of Toast Masters International, so I’m fine with giving a speech. However, we’ve got one of the school’s big shots trying to sit in on our speeches today. She smiles at us whenever she comes across us, but she’ll tell our teacher to dock us points for attendance (we left like ten minutes early, big whoop), and not to give us 100% on our speeches, because it’s impossible for somebody to do that good a job apparently. I declare!

I’ll have you know, madam, that I am a very good speaker (if I like what I’m yapping about). Our teacher told us that she said not to give us 100%, we were all affronted, and started planning like little minions. One girl actually thought we were supposed to have our speeches yesterday, so she had all her supplies. She gave it already, but the rest of us are going to have to give ours today. This executive doesn’t know when we’re giving these speeches; just that we’re supposed to do them today. We’re all evil; we want to sneak them in before she arrives at the school. That way, when she does stick her head into our classroom, our teacher can tell her we’re already done.

Sorry, lady. But when you try to tell a teacher to take points off for things, and not to give 100% scores, even though they are rightfully earned, is pathetic. Thanks, but no thanks! And I fully intend to wow people today with my speaking. Like I said, I’m a chatter box if it’s something I enjoy.

And on that note, it’s been real!