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Tuesday, December 30, 2008

How do I excel at being a waiter?

Waitering or waitressing is has been called an art by waiters and waitresses. They refer to it as a skill that has helped them connect with people, enhanced their prioritizing skills, and also put some extra coin in their purse (with exceptions to the few non-nancy boy waiters.) While they may feel that having this life skill is completely unique to them after spending years in this profession, The Survival Guide offices feel we have a pretty good grasp on what makes a good waiter/waitress based on our restaurant observations.

We have scowered the city's many Famous Daves for the most authentic serving experiences, taking notes and making graphs out of crayons and placemats we demanded. Here are some tricks to the trade we observed.

Always be entertaining
People do not go to a restaurant to eat, they go to enjoy the decorations and to watch the lesser-fortunate families. Above all, they go in hopes that their waiter/waitress is equally excited about jackshit. Your success in waitering/waitressing is dependent on how well you can rile up a party as you take orders for some stupid drinks and entrees. Have a joke that's clean enough for an entire family, so you can really get'em rolling on the floor*. I suggest a Pollack joke, because it's something everyone can enjoy, and it serves them right. Damn Pollacks.

*People rolling on the floor might be a blatant disregard for health code and fire code. Make sure to know your restaurant's limites before telling a filthy Pollack joke.

Don't be a stranger
When you are waiting on a table, your customers do not know where you are whenever you are not with them. Sure, you could be busy with other orders, but it is equally possible that you are hunting down their distant relatives, armed only with a bow and your street smarts. Remove these fears by being in eyesight constantly. That way, they do not have to fear for their relatives the same they did for mine in the Poland-England War of 1953.

So many arrows... Everywhere...

Forget things
From my time observing waiters/waitresses, the biggest relief was those few times that the check came when an item we ordered was not listed. As a server, you must realize that these are hard times for anyone, and if you could just give someone a little break every once in awhile by glossing over the check, you can make a big impact on lives. You do not want to seem bourgeoisie by making people pay for EVERYTHING they ordered. We are all part of the working class. You can't simply expect people to pay for all the things they ordered without seeming like a tool. Hell, unnecessary price gouging is what started that whole war anyhow, and thank God it took England to level out those filthy people.

Be hittable
As a customer, we like to imagine things. Things that we could not ever tell you about, like how we'd imagine us, riding pegasus above hellfire while boning majestically as lesser imps and demons nip at the hooves of our winged stallion. You should come into work knowing that you might be seen juxtasposed into this famous England-Poland War imagery.

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