Your Ad Here

Monday, January 11, 2010

Rules and Engagements

As some of you may have thought, I did NOT give up blogging as my New Year’s Resolution. No, I have just been on hiatus from the very drama-filled Brady’s for three weeks, enjoying my own bar-hopping in Disney World; mixing drinks in my own home for family event after event after event (requiring strong drinks and plenty of them); and designing our very-own basement bar, which hopefully will be a place where I can mix drinks -- like I like to do, and avoid the bar-drama, which I wish I could. Then again – what would I blog about?

So although I had not been mixing up mojitos and martinis at Brady’s, I had not been completely away from the scene either. And when I did venture back this past weekend for my usual Friday/Saturday shift, it was as If I had never left.

As usual, the whiteboard was full of not-so-subtle tips from Jason on how we staff should behave:

1. If you cannot keep your voice to an undetecteble[sp] wisper [sp], then there will be NO TALKING AT ALL in the dining room.” (I never did find out if Jason went to college -- or even passed remedial English in High School. How can I adhere to a rule that was made by someone who cannot even spell the rules CORRECTLY?!)

Hey, the “dining room” is not the “bar” so I was free from that ridiculous rule. Though sometimes, I wish I were not, and could enforce this mandate, at my very whim, on the most egregious barstool offenders.

Then I would be able to turn to Annoying Cling-on Claudette, who would tell every single person that sat down anywhere near her that she was “Suddenly Single” and out to celebrate that fact tonight; and tell her that she needed to keep her high-tar cigarette-voice DOWN?!. Could I actually stifle her male-bashing pundits, before she then acted as if the person next to her was inviting her into conversation about the last 10 years of her “horrible life” that she had just “escaped from” today, simply by responding “Oh,” to the “suddenly single” tidbit? Interesting…

And then I would be entitled to “Shhhh” the 4 past-their-prime one-time-socialites, all divorced now and talking of “promise rings” and “sex after 60” over in the corner. Ick. They actually made Bar Back Chris leave the room by loudly discussing their thinning hair, hot flashes and botched botox jobs, while ever-so-slowly sipping their social drinker cocktails – no mojitos or old fashioned’s for them. These mimosa- and madras-connoisseurs would need all the time they could get to nurse their drinks and make eye contact with every “eligible bachelor” that walked past, before finally assuming their seats in the dining room, having taken just long enough to block the bar from actual interesting patrons that left for other places because these Cougar-Wanabees took up far too much space and much too much time. And not nearly enough of their money.

And I would totally be within my rights to tell the obnoxious “in-the-middle-of-a-nasty-divorce-and-looking-for-a-good-woman” roofer that, No, I did not find it appealing that he works on Bill Belechick’s roof and will be “pulling in hundreds of thousands of dollars” from all his fancy neighbors and rich friends because he is so skilled at what he does. Then, when he leans in and says lewdly, “If you know what I mean,” intimating that his bedroom skills and not his construction talents are what landed him these jobs, I could say “Sorry – the rule here is 'No Talking.'" And, before he tells me I "barely look 25” and like I would be a “great dancer”, and that he knows of a nice hotel bar with live jazz music, I would have been able to use my white-board authority and told him to “Shut Up.” Damn that I don’t work in the “Dining Room."

But I don’t. And it seems that Jason has gone White-Board Crazy since I have been gone. Oh well – just as I have to put up with the Uninterestings, the Overentitled’s and the Can’t-Take-a-Hint’s, so do I have to deal with White Board Rules. Or at least, note them and make fun of them later in my blogs.

Funny how "No having affairs with married coworkers or bosses" doesn't appear on the list at all. I guess Jason must feel the same way I do sometimes -- that rules -- whiteboard, or otherwise -- are meant to be broken.

Numbers 2, 3 and 4 were just as ridiculous. Let’s see who will break those first NEXT weekend.