I Apparently Like to Steal Things

Someone from Nevada thinks I’m a hardened criminal.  The type of criminal that isn’t above stealing things and ruining lives.  In fact, they think I’m so much of a criminal that they actually called my work to ask about my comings and goings.  Watch out, I’m on the effing loose and I’m doing naughty things.

For the first Saturday in ages – besides my time in Miami – I actually didn’t have to work.  This was due to the fact that I was attending one of those awesome types of bachelorette parties that lasts all day and all night.  Yes, I was drunk for a lot of it and yes I also asked for Sunday off so I could have a ridiculous hangover and not feel even the least bit guilty.  I call that planning ahead.

So I had a weekend of totally awesome fun that was much needed and entirely appreciated.  After allowing myself plenty of sleeping-in time, I headed to Hooters to check my schedule and relish in having to not wear nylons.  What happened next was a real treat.

Manager:  “So I got the strangest call this morning.”

Because I totally look like that, John Smith.  CREDIT.

This opening was followed by my manager telling me that a customer, I had apparently served on Friday, called that morning regarding some strange activity on his credit card.  Apparently, he had all sorts of weird charges on his card and he thought that I had stolen his card number and caused each and every one of them.  The best part is that most of them occurred far from Montana.  In fact the majority were overseas.  Yes, this man actually asked my manager if I was currently out of the country.

Because it makes fucking sense that I would work on a Friday, steal your personal information and leave the country the next day to totally destroy your credit score.

But of course it’s the only way it could be possible because the only place in the entire state of Montana that this card was used was at Hooters Missoula.  And I was the Hooters Girl.  Honestly, do you expect this Hooters Girl to believe that the ONLY place you used a credit card in the fourth largest state in this great United States of America was my Hooters?  Sure thing, pal.

Naturally, he wouldn’t believe my manager that I am an honest person and said he’d be handling this matter legally since she wouldn’t do anything.  Newsflash, dude, I spent my Saturday afternoon sipping sangria in my bikini while maintaining my killer tan.  And for the record that happened in Missoula – Not Bora Bora or wherever.

For the sake of having a brain though, lets take a step back and think about this.  Even if you did only use your card at my Hooters, it doesn’t mean that your information was stolen there.  Perhaps it happened somewhere like – I don’t know – the damn Internet.  Maybe once upon a time you bought some inappropriate thing from a less than credible site.  Is it possible that something like that could have compromised your information?  I’d say it’s a heck of a lot more probably than a Hooters Girl in Missoula, Montana stealing it and taking a whirlwind world tour before she has to be in class Monday morning.  But maybe that’s just me.

I look forward to hearing from the authorities and telling them an alibi that is full of alcohol, party games and penis-shaped straws.  Or – most likely – I look forward to not hearing from anyone because your detective work is totally unreliable and utterly laughable.  Either way, bring it on! 

Evolution of Bathroom Graffiti

Among the many things in life that I think are incredibly stupid, scrawling words on the walls of bathroom stalls has to be near the top.  It just seems like an incredible waste of time.  I mean, I realize that given the situation you might find yourself in the bathroom for a somewhat lengthy amount of time, but it would never occur to me to use all that excess to write random shit all over someone else's property.  Lets get real here, way back in the day my mom told me that writing on walls was inappropriate and after what I imagine was several incidents involving brightly colored crayons, egg shell white walls, timeouts, and no dessert I got the idea.  Apparently some people missed out on that lesson.

Long ago at Hooters someone decided to leave their mark on one of our bathroom stalls.  Now to paint a mental picture, our stalls have tiled walls and rather heavy wooden doors.  These aren't metal walled cans, these are some nice bathrooms.  This however didn't stop one person from grabbing a pen and stating the obvious.

Really?  You're going to spend all that effort leaning forward while you drop a deuce to write Hooters?  Congratulations, you have the supreme mental skill to point out where you are.  Now originally this gem was not so carefully written in pen; thanks to whoever had the time to make sure we could read it by highlighting it in beautiful blue Sharpie.  We really needed that.

Then a few months later, this showed up.  Notice that the blue highlighter got to both.

Congratulations on your ability to not rhyme - I assume that's what you were going for.  I also appreciate your potty humor - pun obviously intended - in it's glorious lack of any real comedy.  I bet your friends only pretend to laugh at your jokes.

And then, more recently, someone decided to just go ahead and point out how lame these people are.

Of course by adding "FUCK OFF," you're really no better than the original defacers.  You're making a point about how dumb something is by doing it that something dumb.  That's some messed up, circular logic my friend.  Why don't you keep that pen in your pocket next time.

So next time you stop into Hooters Missoula be sure to check out the growing dialogue in the women's second stall.  I've got my fingers crossed for a graphic novel or an epic poem. 

How to Get Fired for Idiots

CREDIT

I’ve never found myself in a position where I needed to worry about being fired.  Not only is doing a job poorly not in my personality, but being the daughter of two bakers/business owners who have dealt with their share of shitty employees I know what not to do.  However I imagine that if I ever was going to do something fire worthy I’d be sure to go out with a bang.  I’d throw shit and punch a couple customers in the throat and scream obscenities in the most profane combinations.  I would be fired, but I would be a legend.

The following – which happened last week – is what I definitely wouldn’t do:

One of our newest girls had just gotten off shift when she decided to stop at the bar.  Sitting down and talking to a regular, he kindly offered to buy her a drink, which she readily accepted.  At this point the bartender – who had never worked with this particular girl – asked if she was old enough.  Well of course she was old enough!  She was 23 after all, she pointed out.  She was soon enough sipping a sugary blended margarita full of body warming tequila.

Just about then the manager walked by.  Though this manager had never worked with this new hire either she was pretty sure she was not 23.  In fact she was pretty sure she was under 21.  So she asked a few girls and finally went to the employee files.  You know, where important things are kept like Xeroxes of IDs.  It didn’t take long to find what she was looking for.  I’ll give you one guess who was 19.

The manager approached the girl and a bit of a commotion began.  Just as the drink was being taken away our owner, who happened to be sitting directly behind the underage employee in question having a few drinks with friends, overheard what was going on at the bar next to him.  After he heard what had happened he fired her on the spot.

Yes, that actually effing happened.  First off, how dumb do you have to be drink underage at a place where you’re employed?  After all they have all your information readily available for cross-referencing.  That’s just down right stupid.  And that’s before you account for the fact that the man who owns the restaurant is close enough to smell the tequila on your lying breath.  I’m sorry, but that’s pretty much one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

Of course as the story began to spread around the restaurant like wildfire it became apparent that she’d not tried to drink at work once before, but twice.  She went from plain stupid to downright slow as shit.  I’m still amazed at the IQ deficiency that sort of decision-making would require.

And as far as the bartender goes, who wouldn’t believe a fellow employee who so adamantly claimed she was old enough?  Honestly, I think I would have served her too in that situation.  It would never have crossed my mind that she’d lie with two managers and our owner milling around.  My guess is she probably didn’t even think about it.  Or didn’t care.

So that’s this week’s top way to get fired.  I’m sincerely hoping no one tops it.  For this week at least.

We Have Paper Towels

How kind of you to ask, creepy-mouthed towel roll

If you’ve been to Hooters before, you’re probably familiar with the fact that we conveniently place a big roll of paper towels on every table.  Being that pretty much every menu item does or can come with sauce those paper towels are very, very necessary.  It’d just be evil of us not to have them there for our guests.

Of course we sometimes don’t make it easy to find them.  By this I mean that they sort of hide behind the menus in the caddies.  Really not hidden at all.  Since the world is self-involved and unobservant, I always make a point of referring to the placement of the paper towels just to cover my bases.  Or, if they’re at a table where I can access the paper towels, I’ll actually turn the whole caddy around obviously positioning them for easy access.

It goes a little something like this:  As I’m placing the set-ups on the table (as many Hooters goers will know, we have no place settings on the tables before hand), which involves some creative, overachieving folding on my part, I gesture to the paper towels.

Sauce:  “And just so you know there is a whole roll of paper towels behind the menus just in case you run into big messes.  We like you to be prepared.”  I always through in some cute statement.  How Hooters of me!

If that doesn’t make the location of the damn towels clear I don’t know what does.  Even with that obvious warning, all too often the food will come out and people will be left thinking I’m a total bitch who only left them with one paper towel.  This is probably because – yes, even at Hooters – as a server I totally blend into the wood paneled walls.  After all I’m just a waitress and as such say nothing of consequence or real meaning.  Doing that would imply intelligence.

Perhaps next time I’ll put a strobe light on top of the towels with a sign that says, “plenty o’ towels for your dirty face.”  That way if you don’t notice the towels and turn the strobe light off you’ll risk a seizure.  Or I could take that nice soft roll of industrial style paper towels and bop you over the head with it.  But then again you probably wouldn’t notice that either.

Hey was the light fixture just talking?

Hooters Kiss AKA I'm a Huge Douchebag

While I find it mildly impressive that you can drink a beer that quickly, I still think you're a super douche.  Obviously, college taught you two things: how to chug and how to be an asshole.  You must have been in a frat.  So continue your douchery and stealing kisses from poor Hooters Girls.  You get extra fucktard points for posting them on Youtube.  Oh, and I dare you to come to my Hooters.  I effing dare you.

That being said, the first part of video actually made laugh (though under my breath and most ashamedly).  The rest of course made me feel sorry for you...and your poor mother.

Dine and Ditch

"Crap, it looks like I only have $15 in my wallet."

His bill was $27.85.  Not an extravagant or even remotely expensive bill, but apparently more than he'd bargained for.  Looking at him my first thought was about having to explain this to my manager.  My second thought was that if you only have fifteen bucks wouldn't you be watching your spending and stop a pitcher and an appetizer ago?  My third thought was how do you have less than twenty dollars between two adult men?  And why had I given you such effing good service?

Suddenly he interrupted my spiraling train of thought.  "I got some cash in my car."

Sure thing, buddy.  I watch him stand and stride towards the door before I can even protest.  As much as I don't believe him, I leave the table to take an order nearby and give him the benefit of the doubt.  After all, his friend is still at the table.  So I smile and start taking the order a few tables down.  Just as I'm asking "breaded or naked?" I see the man's friend get up and head for the door.  I'm in the middle of the order and there is nothing I can do.  I have just been dine and ditched.

As I'm about to tell my manager what happened I make my way past the table.  Glancing over and shaking my head I notice something below one of the stools.  A wallet.  With wallet and receipt in hand I approach my manager.  Handing him both I explain the situation as he opens the wallet.  He finds the usual information, an ID, credit cards.  But he also finds $90 in cash.  Not only did he have enough to pay, he had three times the amount of his bill in his wallet.  The wallet he dropped when he attempted to skip out on the bill.  The wallet that told us exactly who he was.

Rather than keep the wallet in the safe and make a phone call to its owner as we'd usually do, my manager called the police.  Yes, the bill was less than thirty dollars and that may seem extreme, but as a total dumbass he deserved it.  So the police came, questioned us and took the wallet to the station.

The next day the phone rang.  "You'll never guess who called," giggled the bartender. 

A few hours later our freeloader returned to pay his bill with wallet in hand.  He left me a fifteen dollar tip.

Girl Returns to Singledom

Probation didn't go to well with the boyfriend. Once again the issues with distance proved too much for him and made no sense to me.  I won't go over all the reasons why we finally broke up (you can read most of them a few entries down) but basically it comes down to the fact that he can't be with someone when any distance whatsoever is involved; no matter how much he likes me it can never work when we live apart in his eyes.

The worst part is that neither of us could say goodbye.  In a tear filled, three hour conversation at 2 a.m. we came to the realization that both of us are in very different places when it comes to our relationship and as much as I would do anything to make it work he just thought that it couldn't.  In the end we never said goodbye, but simply goodnight and it was done.  

I miss him dearly, but that was part of the issue for him - he missed me too much to be with me.  This point makes no sense to me because I'd rather miss him and be with him then miss him and be without him (a point he couldn't see).  I guess I just have to get over missing him and move on as impossible as it may seem. 

Right now I'm trying the good 'ol "give him space and he'll want you back" trick but if it doesn't work at least it's the first step in getting over him.  I'm also using this to write music (he always called me 'pretty girl' and this is turning into an amazing song: "guess your pretty girl isn't so pretty anymore") so maybe one day he'll be so lucky to hear me on the radio - now that's a nice dream!  Perhaps I should also call my old roommate, he plays for the Dolphins now and I'm sure he knows lots of single, athletic men (hmmm...another nice dream).

But don't worry, I'll be fine.  I'll just eat lots of ice cream and all the chocolate in the cute Easter basket I made for him - I knew there was a reason I got all my favorites.

Things Overheard

I am one of those nerdy type people that reads pretty much anything she can get her hands on from classics to historical fiction to chick-lit. As an avid reader I have found several things I have in the last few days utterly depressing.

First off, one of my guy friends and I were talking and I was saying how I've spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars on books (actually it could be far more than that but I'm scared to even really think about it).

Without flinching he said, "I've only read on book. It was Hatchet and I'm pretty sure that was 4th grade."

First of all when I read Hatchet as a third grader I thought it was awful. Second, of course I figured he was joking, but no he was in no way joking. Logically my first question was how does one get through something like, say school without reading and he promptly admitted to cheating his was through the entire 13 year process of his public education. Does your diploma say, 'General Studies with Emphasis in Cheating' on it because it probably should. I feel bad for his poor underutilized brain.

The other thing I heard this week is actually hilarious while being depressing at the same time. Last night, before my boxing class (please insert word badass here), I made a quick stop at my favorite store, Barnes and Nobel (I think I get a high from the smell of new books...seriously). As I'm casually shopping I come across a young couple in the stacks. While the girl is looking at the books her boyfriend/fiance/husband starts looking at prices (a scary proposition).

In horror he says, "These are so expensive, why don't they have a place where you can just rent books?"

Dear Lord, you did not just say that. Once again he was totally, completely, disappointingly serious. I'm not sure if you've heard but they came out with this amazing invention a few years back called a library and it's pretty legit - I highly recommend it.

I mean I'd tell these people to go read a book and get a clue, but it's pretty apparent they wouldn't read it; more likely they'd just get the Cliff's Notes and still not really get it.