So. Waiter Rant. Kind of like customers_suck, except it's only one person posting ("Waiter"), and it's usually wank-free. Usually.

The waiter that writes the blog recently started working in a new restaurant, and has become . . . slightly bitter. As a result, he posted first "50 Signs You're Working in a Bad Restaurant," then "50 Signs You're an Asshole Customer." The first doesn't garner much attention, but the second . . .

Four hundred comments later, people are still wanking over:

-Whether it's acceptable to bring your own tea (look for Desert Princess, misspelled as Dessert Princess).
-Whether it's acceptable to leave a tip on a credit card that ends in a weird amount ($2.51 on a tab for $10.49).
-If you should tip on takeout.
-If asking about the music is okay.
-Why saying that you're allergic to an ingredient in order to get it taken out of your food is evil.
-How bitter "Waiter" has become.
-What is a 'normal' tip—fifteen or twenty percent.

Namecalling and accusations of elitism abound, and perhaps 1/4 of replies become non-wanky.

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aposiopetic
2007-03-26 01:37 am UTC (link)

JF thing

About the tea bag (and outside food/beverages as a whole, and let me say up front that I've never worked food service):

First off, the restaurant has the right to make money any way they can. If you bring your own anything (except for maybe random condiments or something), you're cutting into their profits.

Secondly, the restaurant is held accountable for what you consume on their premises, even if you brought it yourself. If you happened to buy a sketchy box of tea and get sick from it at the restaurant, you could sue and win, so they're covering their asses. In a similar vein (although admittedly a bit more far-fetched), what if there's another patron that's allergic to something that someone else brought in? The restaurant is now unable to say "No, there's no ___ on the premises" with absolute certainty and could misinform someone.

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	aristaea 2007-03-26 02:07 am UTC (link)
	If you happened to buy a sketchy box of tea and get sick from it at the restaurant, you could sue and win Whut? Has this ever happened? Please say no; I like the remnants of my faith in the justice system! (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

aposiopetic
2007-03-26 02:33 am UTC (link)

Well, it seems that I may have mis-spoke a bit. Five minutes of googling for such a lawsuit didn't turn up a result, but I did find more than one reference to the venue in question not allowing outside food to insure that the food handling policies of [region] board of health were followed. So in a roundabout way, that implies that the venue/restaurant is at least somewhat liable for all the food consumed therein, if they're concerned about it.

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	perletwo 2007-03-26 02:39 am UTC (link)
	I've seen notices on, like, the Borders cafe window about the Board of Health regs banning outside food and drink. So maybe it's a licensing thing more than a lawsuit thing? (Reply to this)(Parent)

	onyxnoir 2007-03-26 10:13 am UTC (link)
	TRUFAX! I actually did get sick from a dodgy bottle of pre-packaged iced tea once. I got them at the local discount store though, so who knows if they sat in the sun/were opened at some point/lived well beyond their expiration date. I have to admit I didn't even think of checking the date on the bottle until after I had thrown it out. Duh 'oh. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	stinksap 2007-03-26 02:28 am UTC (link)
	I can see that. Myself, I don't mind being charged for tea since I'm using their cups and hot water, but the stale tea most restaurants have on hand is really disgusting. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	perletwo 2007-03-26 02:41 am UTC (link)
	Yeah, it is. And what about the women on those weird diets where all they'll drink is stuff like hot water with lemon? Myself, if I'm making a weird request like that, I got no problem with being charged the price of a regular serving of hot tea. (and yay for having a wank-appropriate icon, even tho I loaded it in for the Mindy Clark factor!) (Reply to this)(Parent)

khym_chanur
2007-03-26 03:58 am UTC (link)

Huh, interesting. I've never had a problem with bringing my own softdrinks into restaraunts (for health reasons, I need a drink that has neither caffeine nor sugar, and leaving me to choose between drinking water or bringing my own drink). I even asked the waiters if I had to pay a "corkage" fee for it, until I was told "no" so many times that I just assumed that restaraunts just generally didn't care and stopped asking.

Or, actually, only once did I have a problem, and in that case it was that having a can of soda sitting on the table conflicted with the "classy" image of the restaraunt, so they just asked me to keep it out of view until I could pour it into a glass.

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