Hello! It's Sunday, Mother's Day (shoutout to all the beautiful mothers!), and really the one day off I'll have in a while. If I lived near my wonderful mom, I would probably be taking her out for breakfast, but since I don't I'm taking this lazy Sunday as a day to do literally nothing.
If you've been reading my blog at all, you'd know that I'm going to be moving soon. I haven't really started packing yet, but the stress of an impending pack-fest has gotten me feeling pretty tightly wound. Also, to make up for the while that I'll be unemployed while getting my move sorted and my new house settled, I've been working nonstop. I don't work every day like the average 9-5 Jane; I have days off throughout the week. Bartending really takes a lot out of you though, and the days I do work, I work all day with no breaks and don't get home until after everything and everyone is asleep. Then, on my days off, I'm so busy rejuvenating my energy for the next shift, I don't feel I have it in me to blog!
Today I wanted to just write a really relaxed post about what's been on my mind lately, how work has been, and what's been going on in my life. If you're not interested in any of that and would like to click away, I won't be offended in the slightest. However, if you're a bit of a Nosey Nelly like me, maybe you'll find this post appealing & somewhat satisfying.
Work has been great and last night I had one of the better shifts I've had in a while. I work a lot during the week, and at my particular bar, it doesn't get very hoppin' from Monday to Thursday unless there's an event or a party. Lately there have been none. Weekend shifts are where it's at, and it's hard to give everyone those shifts because there are only so many good hours in a weekend, and too many bartenders to cater to. Oh, woe is me, right? Anyway, last night (Saturday) I worked until 2am, and the place was wild.
The particular establishment I work at has multiple different bars & event rooms to rent out if anyone should need to host a wedding or a birthday bash, or what have you, but we keep those closed when they aren't being used and our main sports lounge is where the majority of us work most of the time. Well, last night, every single one of our rooms was rented out. We had a wedding, we had a dinner & dance, we had a battle of the bands, and we had a DJ in the sports lounge (my bar that night). The ceiling was pounding from the music above us, the wedding guests were everywhere; it was a lot of fun. I wish I'd enjoyed every part of my night, though,
If you've ever thought, "man, I'd love to bartend" and you think about what a blast it would be to dance around to the music behind the bar, chat with guests, serve shots to your best tippers... it's a lot of fun, but there are some negatives to it as well, and ones I didn't think would affect me so much until they did. I had a hell of a time jamming out to the DJ, he played some good music, but there were a few parts of my night that I did not enjoy in the slightest.
Right near the beginning of my shift, I had to not only cut off, but kick out, one of my regulars. It's one thing to cut someone off, have them cause a scene, and then shrug it off because you could care less if you ever saw them again, but it's a whole other thing to have to refuse service and kick out someone you see daily, and someone you know you'll see again.
It started with a bad mood, a forgotten bit of change, and a line up. I don't mind when people sit at my bar and wait for me to walk over to them for service, but we don't do tabs at my bar, so people line up to pay for their drinks as they order them, and I have to serve them first. So if you insist on sitting at the bar, then you insist on waiting for me to clear my line before I get to you.
This particular customer prides himself on being a bit of a jokester, so when he came in and sat at the bar, he started babbling about wanting to buy a drink for another customer of mine. He slaps five dollars on the counter and says he doesn't know what to order. I tell him that five dollars won't buy him two drinks, and to let me know when he knows what he wants, and I go back to clearing my line up. Apparently that made him angry, I guess he wanted me to stand there and wait. I would have, too, if I hadn't had other customers.
Anyway, he ordered his can, and gave my a five dollar bill. A tall can of normal beer is $4.50, so his change was $0.50. Normally customers will leave that fifty cents as a tip, but I never like to assume, so I took his change and put it next to me while I finished serving my line up. After I'd served the 5-or-so customers that had come up to pay for their drinks, I'd forgotten to bring my regular's change back to him, and he promptly, and angrily, reminded me to. Inside I was thinking "You're really going to piss over the fifty cents I forgot to bring over to you when you know I live off my tips anyway?" but outwardly, I smiled and brought it over to him like I had every intention of doing.
Once the bar slowed down a little, I went over to chat to him, and made a joke about the swear jar. I'd heard him chatting to another customer while I was at the other end of the bar, and when I approached him I jokingly asked if I heard a little swear earlier. We have an ongoing joke between the regulars that if you use profanity, you put a quarter in the nonexistent swear jar. (That sounds stupid in a bar, I'm aware, that's why it's a joke).
He ended up getting extremely riled up and angry at my supposed accusation, so I quickly apologized and told him I was only joking, as I do every single time I see him. I was later told that the whole fifty cent tip/change fiasco was the reason for his anger, and had I known, I would've avoided him like the plague and not bothered to joke around. But I didn't know, because I always assume if you're sitting at my bar, while everyone else is dancing, you don't mind talking to the bartender. My mistake, I guess. He got very angry, started raising his voice and yelling, and I told him that the drink he had in his hand would be his last. I'm a nice and patient person, but I do not put up with rude customers. If you're being an ass to the person who is wiping your counter space, opening your bottles, pouring your drinks, and staying until 2am to clean up your mess, you're going to get cut off. That's just how it is.
That made him even angrier, and he told me to walk away and leave him alone. Gladly, had he not been sitting at my bar. Where do you want me to go, the kitchen? No, if you're angry, you leave. I can't leave. It was too much, and my patience had run out. He went out for a smoke to cool off and I had one of the duty officers escort him off the property. Apparently he was not pleased and was cussing me out outside. I was afraid he would come back and egg my car. Luckily, he hadn't.
Anyway, in summation: If you're ever thinking that bartending must be the bee's knees (I don't know why you would), keep stories like these in mind. It's a lot of fun, but being a hardass to rude customers can be difficult. I don't like cutting people off, I don't like kicking anyone out. I avoid it if I can, I will drive anyone home at the end of the night if they've had too much, I really don't mind. It honestly takes a toll on me when I have to refuse service to someone who is normally very nice.
I wish I had an amazing life to rave about, but outside of work, I sleep, eat, and watch Netflix with my boyfriend. Our schedules are so different and we see each other a few days a week, at most, so we hang out as much as we can. I mean, we see each other in the mornings when he gets up for work, and I wake him up to tell him I'm home when I get back from work at midnight-2am, but if we don't both have the day off, we're basically passing ships. I live for the lazy Sundays and fun Fridays where we can just sit around and have whatever little Netflix dates we've been waiting for. As I'm writing this, he just brought me a hot French Vanilla from Tim Hortons. He's the best.
Aside from all of that, I'm still stressing out about moving. I live, currently, about a 20 hour drive from the place we're moving to. The next two months for me will consist of packing, more packing, cleaning, driving back to Ottawa to stay with my parents for a little while, packing again, more driving... lots of driving. My boyfriend has to drive up to our new place and get the apartment settled before I can drive up, so it's a lot of hopping stones until we get everything sorted. I'm not looking forward to all the driving, the cleaning, and packing. Definitely not looking forward to the living out of a suitcase for a good while.
I know this post was a little unstructured, and very off the topic of beauty, but I wanted to write a post and needed to just chat about what's been going on with me lately, as I've been scrambling around everywhere.
Thanks for reading, and I hope you're having a wonderful lazy Sunday. If you've got your mom close by, I hope you're showering her with flowers and gifts, and if you're a mother yourself, I hope your day is filled with breakfasts in bed and lots of love.
Until next time, sunshine!
C
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