Uno, Dos, Trays

All waiters occasionally drop a tray, but after years and years of practice it happens less and less often. Throughout my near upon two decades of experience (I started waiting tables at the age of two) I have gotten to where having a tray at the end of my arm is as natural as having a margarita at the end of it. I can maneuver my way through a crowd with a tray of glasses held over my head with grace and elegance. A few weeks ago I dropped my pen onto the floor and just bent down to pick it up while holding a tray of martinis. I didn’t think anything about it but the lady at the table acted like I should go join Cirque du Soleil or something. When I worked at the Marriott, I entered this thing called “Marriott Olympics” and had to run through an obstacle course while holding a tray with glasses of water. Didn’t spill a drop. I didn’t win though because this lady named Nancy had been waiting tables since the invention of food and she had more experience than me. That bitch won a free night at a hotel and some luggage for that shit. I’m not bitter though. Much.

Some servers can do that really cool spinning trick with their trays and I have never been able to master it. I was never able to spin a basketball on my finger either so I’m pretty sure I have some kind of finger tip deficiency problem. I work with a guy now who’s really good at it and every time he does it I get all jealous and have to leave the room. Some people aspire to write the next great American novel or find a cure for cancer. I just wanna fucking learn how to spin a goddamn tray on my finger. Damn this finger tip deficiency of mine!

I don’t remember the last time I dropped a tray but of course since I just typed that, the next time will be tonight. About a hundred years ago I was a food runner at a Mexican restaurant in Denver called Juanita’s. I worked there for about nine months and never once dropped a tray. And those trays were huge-like five and six platters worth of food. On my last night of employment there, I mentioned to someone that I had never dropped a tray. I jinxed myself. At the end of the shift, after I had punched out I went to say goodbye to the kitchen because I was moving the next week. The food runner who was still on was all of a sudden weeded so I said I would take the last tray out as I left. My swan song, you might say. Of course I dropped it. Fajitas, enchiladas, rice and beans all over the place. Seriously? My last tray is the one I dropped as I am doing them a favor? I cleaned that shit up and got the hell out of Juanita’s.

When I worked at Houlians’s, we played a game sometimes that involved dropping a tray on purpose. The point of the game was to drop a tray on purpose. All you would do was pick up a tray and then drop the tray on purpose. It’s fun to break stuff. Ah, Houlihan’s…good times.

Click here to follow The Bitchy Waiter blog.
Click here to follow The Bitchy Waiter on Twitter.
Click here to find The Bitchy Waiter on Facebook.

Share/Bookmarka2a_linkname=”The Bitchy Waiter”;a2a_linkurl=”http://thebitchywaiter.blogspot.com”;

Discussion

  1. OO
  2. CDS
  3. Rox

Leave a Reply