Why are bar staff so slow?

[Annasfield]

djfitz Wrote:

> Do you work in a pub at present? Even part time?

>

> If you do and can take an order for six or eight

> drinks in one go without having to ask me "Two

> gins, a coke... what else was there..?" then I

> will gladly drink in your establishment for the

> rest of my days!

>

> In fact, if anyone can recommend a pub with

> bar-folk like this in/about ED please tell me.

No, but perhaps I should look in to taking over a pub. Could you alone keep me in business? I don't have time for bar work on top of my normal job, however I used to do it all the time. You get a night out and you get paid. Could do with some spare cash so might look in to it again.

[HonaloochieB]

I find as well that the younger bar staff can get on my thrups with their niceness and enthusiasm.

Don't get me wrong, I like kids, I went to school with them, and am the very proud owner of a latish twenties model.

But the shiny-faced, titsy, low-slung, matey, ridiculous-T-shirt-wearing approach can grate after a while.

I'd quite like laconic, even a little terse. Someone who's combed their hair perhaps.

Or am I just being a sentimental old fluff?

[LuvPeckham]

All this reminds me of a wee 5ft scottish barmaid in Glasgow (the Cotton Club) who was serving a customer and when some big fella came up and yelled "When you're ready love" she stopped serving the customer, went over to the big fella, grabbed his lapels and pulled him down to her level, looked him in the eye and gently (well as Gentle as a Glaswegian woman can) said "When I am Good and f*ckign ready to serve you, I will come over, look you in the eye and say I am good and f*ckign ready to serve you now, but until then just f*ck off out of my face" and then threw him backwards onto the floor...

I have to say, from that point on I have never, ever complained about slow barstaff ever again... (I also told her rather meekly that I would wait until she told me I could get served that night)

Now that is the sort of barmaids we need here, ones that don't take prisoners when it comes to larey customers... and it may well make the average night out somewhat more entertaining ...

[HonaloochieB]

LP, didn't this get developed into an episode of Taggart?

The big yin was found battered to death in an alley near the pub.

His battered pizza and carry-oot beside him untouched.

Initially this lead the investigating officers to be thrown off the scent, as they thought it could not possibly then have been the work of a male Glawegian.

Herself was then accused, and in the performance of a lifetime by Wee Jimmie Krankie went through the rigours of the justice system, until they discovered overlooked CCTV footage that showed the crime was committed by a pissed-up teenage ned.

I'm sure I saw it some time.

[Annasfield]

"There's been a merder"

Know what you mean, but some of the best banter I've had has been when I've been behind the bar.

Ended up helping out a mate for the 2004 Rugby World Cuop final as he had no staff. These two fellas came in and blocked my view of the telly. I politely asked them if they could move along so I could watch the match too. Was told in no uncertain terms to "eff off". I reminded them that if I couldn't watch the match from behind the bar, they wouldn't get beer. They soon saw reason.

:'( This has just made me realise how much I hate my job. Still here now having been in since 8.30 and with no lunch break. I think I'm going to go to the pub.

[LuvPeckham]

HonaloochieB

Either that or you used to drink in the same run down bars in Glasgow I did .... In which case you still owe me a pint of Heavy.

Also isn't Jimmy Crankie actually a little boy who plays a grown woman playing a little boy.... something like that...

[HonaloochieB]

Annasfield Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> "There's been a merder"

> :'( This has just made me realise how much I hate

> my job. Still here now having been in since 8.30

> and with no lunch break. I think I'm going to go

> to the pub.

Hope you get served by a barkeep with the same high standards as your good self.

Sorry you hate your job, don't know what it is, but maybe tomorrow'll be better. Hope so anyway.

Do go and have a drink, I've just raised a bottle of Perroni and toasted your health.

I like to catch little moments around me, just to lift the spirits. Today in Woolies in Brixton there was an elderly couple some way in front of me, he was in an electric mobility cart, she walking beside him with the shopping basket. I was too far away to hear what they might have been saying to each other, but suddenly she just leaned down, and in a not too gentle fashion grabbed him round the head and planted a kiss on it. A lovely iterlude for the three of us.

As Ringo Starr puts it, Love And Peace.

Regards.

[Annasfield]

Ahhh cheers HonaloochieB. I am home at last and have decided to stay off the beer - that was my downfall last night.

[HonaloochieB]

LuvPeckham Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> HonaloochieB

>

> Either that or you used to drink in the same run

> down bars in Glasgow I did .... In which case you

> still owe me a pint of Heavy.

>

> Also isn't Jimmy Crankie actually a little boy who

> plays a grown woman playing a little boy....

> something like that...

Though I've never been in the run down bars of Glasgow, should we aver meet, I'll happily stand you a pint of Heavy on the basis that you come across always as a thoroughgoing gent.

However those Krankies need some closer scrutiny. Of course it's always been understood that between consenting adults in the boudoir, a litle license can be given. A lady may purchase a schoolgirl's uniform in order to what the tabloid agonistas will insist is 'spicing things up in the bedroom'. So far, so tawdry.

But that Krankie fellow. What can his foul desires be a symptom of? I shudder to think.

He gets his wife to dress as a schoolboy, in public. And charges people to come and see the perverse 'dance'.

How he's never been banged up in the slammer, and Wee Jimmie taken into care, I just don't know.

[djfitz]

I was in "the lounge" of a pub in the arse-end of Endinburgh once. A really horrible kip where you were served your pints through a small hatch that communicated with the public bar. The seats were all ripped up, the walls dented, and the air heavy with a recent death (I'd call it An Unkind Warmth - a little bit when you go into a small lavatory that's been occupied by the same person for over twenty minutes having a poo).

Anyhoo, this hagard old crone came in, all pissed up and mouthy. She stuck her hed into the hatch and barked at the keep for some Tennents. The guy on the other side of the wall shouted at her to get out "You're barred since last night, you stupid *****" he yelled.

I looked at my mate and thought "F*ck! What the f*ck did she do to get barred from this dangerous kip? Kill someone?"

Needless to say, we did not hang around to find out. I am a coward.

[VeryBerryCherry]

I agree with a MP about how it should be a vocation. But as it stands, bar staff DO NOT get paid enough, nor do we get that much training, come to think of it.

As to the Aussies and Saffers in the bar industry, my only thought would be that they seem to have higher bar wages back home and they get more tips (according to those I've worked with). I think that perhaps the slide in standards might have soemthing to do with not getting the recogition for the work they do (tips/decent wages) and even I wonder what's the point. I know it's not rocket science. However, you get paid a pittance for standing on yor feet serving for up to 12 hours straight with 6 deep at a bar when you manager has put on only 3 staff when you should have 6 (money saving genius!). And the most thanks you get is some guy who is so pissed he's demanding that the cocktails he's drinking don't taste the same, when you have been serving him the same amount of cachaca in his Caipirinhas all night.

There was a brilliant article in one of the London free papers about all the different kinds of annoying customers that bar staff have to put up with. My personal favourite was a guy who came back with his old pint glass, asked for a new pint and while I was pouring, spent his time vomiting in the other glass and slamming it on the table!

Here's something I found quite amusing:

The ABC od Bartending: Annoying Bar Customers

My, erm, favourites:

...And possibly the biggest asshole of all: World Revolves Around Me Guy.

WRAMG walks up to the bar, ignores all the other patrons, has no concern if the bartender is in the middle of making 42 different shots from memory, and orders, de facto, sans a "What'll it be?" or so much as eye contact. Even if the bartender is facing away, he walks up and orders into thin air, as if the bar is a giant drive-thru window.

Picture a busy bartender, running around, gathering liquors, liqueurs, cordials, apertifs, 17 types of glassware, 3 types of ice, all from memory, trying to appease Serial Orderer on a busy night. He also has the past 3 order memorized as he hasn't entered them onto the respective guests' checks utilizing the finicky Point Of Sale software the restaurant has just installed. His back faces the bar because he's lined up the glassware and gathered the boozes and mixers. He?s starting to pour when all of a sudden, his concentration is shattered by a voice from the darkness?

WRAMG: ?I'll have a double frozen Margarita, light on the salt, heavy on the limes...?

Note: WRAMG?s vocabulary lacks the word please, along with phrases such as ?May I,? ?Can I,? Would you,? and ?How about a?? He has mastered ?Give me,? ?I?ll have,? ?I?ll take,? and ?Make me a??

WRAMG also has a knack for interrupting you any time you are counting anything over 20. Money, liquor, ceiling tiles, anything. If you are ever short of business and want him to appear, just find something to count.

He has a close relative, who I call, ?Pay Attention To Me Guy.?

PATMG arrives right before the rush and strikes up a friendly conversation. He will keep on talking and keep a fierce eye contact, making it entirely uncomfortable for you to break away to take care of the thirsty (and more interesting) customers approaching the bar.

PATMG has a sad home life, but is always cheerful (and slightly pitiful) in conversation, making it as impossible to say "hold on a second" as it is to feed a cute, fuzzy mouse to your pet snake for the first time.

Let?s not forget one of Bartending?s most annoying customers: "Brags About Shitty Tips And Really Drives you insane guy" or BASTARD.

Bastard is either from the midwest, or an absolute snake (apparently 10% tips are generous in Indiana). Bastard will become a regular and tip you 10%, 12%, and occasionally 15%. After many months, he will arrange a meeting with a woman or an important business contact at your bar. He knows you by first name, and you get lulled into always being extra friendly to him in hopes of coaxing him up to the modern day standard of 20% tips. BASTARD has the biggest balls of all the Annoying Bar Customers.

BASTARD will order the first round and maybe an appetizer with his date or potential account/boss before remarking aloud... "Don't worry, we'll get treated well here, I always take extra good care of your name here, don't I, your name here??

He tempts fate with this question, but from a professional standpoint, there's no way you can answer in any way but the affirmative. You're being taunted and he knows it, but BASTARD has you trapped like a pair of Chinese handcuffs. All you can do is swallow you pride and nod in his direction. The first thought a bartender has when awaking in the morning is coming across BASTARD in a closed-off back alley, so he can hurl profanities and possibly broken glass/sullied syringes in BASTARD?s direction.

[LuvPeckham]

HonaloochieB Wrote:

> Though I've never been in the run down bars of Glasgow, should we aver meet, I'll happily stand

> you a pint of Heavy on the basis that you come

> across always as a thoroughgoing gent.

Is that what you tell everyone these days, that you drank in the posher bars in Glasgow, come now we both know (apart from the 39 steps under the station, the Horseshoe bar and the two drum and monkies) that there wasn't any posh bars in Glasgow, they just kept the stabbings in a seperate bar area (They had the the Snug, the Lounge and the Killing field or rear garden if I remember correctly)

Sadly, I don't think they sell "Heavy" this far down south, and the nearest place I know off is Newcastle but I thank you for calling me a gent, not been called that since last time I gave a tramp 5p (I think however he was being sarcastic at the time) so I doff my Cap at you for the compliment and raise my little finger to you in salute as I sip my tea.

[djfitz]

"Picture a busy bartender, running around, gathering liquors, liqueurs, cordials, apertifs, 17 types of glassware, 3 types of ice, all from memory, trying to appease Serial Orderer on a busy night. He also has the past 3 order memorized as he hasn't entered them onto the respective guests' checks"

I can definitely picture this bartender - nay God! - but he doesn't work round here.