Waiting In Vegas

Tonight started off slowly. One person called out and wasn’t replaced. Another person left pretty early. We didn’t get busy until 10 p.m. or so. 30 minutes later all of the computers went down. The problem was with the network itself. We could technically ring new tickets in and recall them on the same computer. The main problem was that access to the server wasn’t available, therefore all the existing tickets simply disappeared. We scrambled to create new tickets for our existing tables, since everyone wanted to leave at once as usual.

Approximately 45 seconds before the computers crashed I had volunteered to pick up a 13 top that had to be sat in a closed station. I didn’t actually want to do it but someone had to. Had I of known what the future held for me I definitely would have made these assholes wait at the door until a table was available elsewhere. I took the table to benefit them, not me. I am not a table whore.

Half of the party arrived first. The second half arrived right after I had finished closing my other tables out. The party already had water and a few ordered drinks. One lady insisted they order right away since her child was falling asleep. She also wanted to make sure that her child’s food came out first. I rang in the food, requesting the child’s food to come out first. Three minutes later the woman demanded to know where her child’s food was. To her “first” meant “immediately.” I politely explained the difference between the two.

Note: When the computers go down the kitchen automatically crashes. This is an unavoidable and often unexplainable fact.

Five minutes later the lady asks about the meal again, at this point all the children are asleep (and had been asleep since 14 seconds after I took their order). I return two minutes later with the child’s food and she replies “She’s asleep now so just forget it.” The bitchiness in her voice was completely unnecessary. Also, her fucking kid had been asleep for 10 minutes. Two of the times she asked about the food her child was asleep. Why put me through the trouble of begging the kitchen for your sleeping child’s food if you are just going to refuse it when I get it? This is when things with this party quickly started to unravel.

Several minutes later the entire table’s food arrived- Just in time to avoid a riot. Everyone was getting pretty surly. I instructed the food runner to verify everything before placing the food in front of someone since they decided to play musical chairs once their order was placed. He verified each item as he placed it. Some people switched food around. Others just didn’t pay attention and got burgers with wrong cooking temperatures. They complained once they had started eating them and didn’t want to wait for new ones. A couple of people complained that their food was cold – It was. No one had been happy with the wait for the food. All of these complaints were voiced to the manager. None of them involved me or was related to service in any way what-so-ever. I was nice, polite and apologetic. None of this mattered to these fuckholes who were getting ruder by the second.

The manager took $90 worth of food of off the $200 check. I knew these people would only bitch if I added gratuity to their check (even though the service wasn’t the problem) so I opted to leave it off and knew I was screwing myself. Most of the people paid with cash, after being instructed that each credit card would take 5-10 minutes to process because the cashier had to call for authorization. One guy didn’t have cash so he had to pay a portion of the bill with a credit card. It took 5 minutes or so to bring the credit card slip back. He didn’t leave a tip and neither did anyone else.

My advice to parties who arrive at a restaurant where the computer have just crashed:

You should know what you are getting in to.

Take your sleepy fucking children to a quick, fast place to eat – Like a fast food restaurant in one of the many food courts located on the strip and within hotels. Be considerate – just get them some food and put them to bed already.

It’s not my fault that you didn’t have enough common sense to feed your child at a reasonable hour or to pick a dining establishment that specializes in fast food. I know your kid has only been alive and in your care for 9 years or so – It’s completely understandable that you still don’t know when to feed her.

Don’t penalize your server for things that are simply out of their control. Take your free food and shut up already.

BTW, you should really consider not ordering burgers extra well done if you want them to come out in a reasonable amount of time.