Friday night had an interesting chain of events, none as intriguing as my brief, yet, dynamic run-in with MS. KREMLIN. (she looks like a young Russian version of Cyndi Lauper) More on that in a minute.
The early part of the night started out with a small gathering, thrown by a guy who had just gotten back from serving his country in Iraq. He was getting all of his friends together to surprise his girlfriend, who had no idea that he was coming home. So you can imagine her surprise when she walked into the bar and found not only their friends waiting for her, but her boyfriend as well. A nice surprise.
We also got another visit from RON DARLING and his very lovely, sexy....um, wife? Whoever she was, she was SMOKIN'! (holla!) TEACHER'S PET said that she was wearing something called TRUE RELIGION jeans. They looked like regular jeans but she was gushing over them like they had the winning PowerBall ticket pasted on them. I guess I didn't get the memo on cool jeans...
While that party was going on, I had an opportunity to bring in my newest employee, MR. TELEPHONE MAN. He'll be working the door as well as working an occasional gig behind the bar. He hails from Brooklyn (better known as Crooklyn) and works for the phone company when he isn't working the bar scene. A real nice guy. At least TEACHER'S PET seems to think so (wink, wink).
By the time the party ended, the bar had filled up to a reasonable number; a nice crowd. Of course, my night wouldn't be complete without a visit from my new best friend, MS. KREMLIN. Now she's been in practically every night of the week and everyone by now knows how to deal with her when she comes in: keep the conversation short and sweet; don't let her back you into a corner or else, you'll be the prisoner of her vent-fest.
So on this particular night, she met up with a couple of her "neighbors" and made herself comfortable at the back of the bar. She spots me and made a beeline to where I was hiding.... er, I mean standing. She immediately goes into her tirade about the same thing that she always goes into tirades about: her ex-boyfriend. She got about 45 seconds into her tirade when I suddenly reached for my cellphone and did the old "I gotta take this call" routine and immediately headed for the door. That bought me about 20 minutes of freedom.
About an hour or so later, I get waved over to the bar by TEACHER'S PET. I go to see what's up and there's a concerned look on her face. Immediately I sense that something's up. When I asked what was up, she said that FIREGIRL was upset and when I asked why, she said that MS. KREMLIN had been rude to the both of them; being loud, obnoxious, banging on the bar for attention, etc. I called FIREGIRL over to get confirmation of the events and she said that she normally exhibits a lot of patience when it comes to customers, however, she was so upset by KREMLIN'S behavior, that she was ready to punch her in the face. So when I heard that, it was enough for me.
I walked over to MS. KREMLIN and pulled her over to the side. She tried to give me the puppy-dog face but I wasn't buying it. Next thing you know, I found myself basically tearing her a new asshole; In a nutshell, I blasted her on how she had no right disrespecting my barstaff and that if she ever wanted to come back into the bar again, she better change her tune when it comes to how she treats people in my bar. She tried to "justify" her behavior, but I wasn't buying it. She finally relented and apologized to me for her behavior. I told her that I'm not the one that is due the apology, so she went to the bartenders (FIREGIRL & TEACHER'S PET) and apologized to each one individually. While both of my bartenders looked at her with that "yeah, right" look, they bit their tongues and accepted her apology (although I'm pretty sure if they were in a dark alley, a different tune would have been sung). In any case, I think the Russian Diva got the message, loud and clear: Don't f*** with my staff.
Now people tend to think that it's all glitz and glamour behind the bar; it's quite the opposite. You have to be a special kind of person to have the patience to deal with people's personalities. Imagine someone barking orders at you, expecting to be treated like they are the #1 customer in the world. Depending on who's barking orders, it can grate on your nerves at times. Picture yourself behind the bar, with eight or nine people shouting orders at you at the same time. And amongst that group, you have one or two who are being obnoxious to you. Over the course of the night, that could wear on you real quick. Especially someone with an abrasive personality like MS. KREMLIN. So in that sense, I commend my bartenders for handling themselves with class; any other person would probably have punched her in the mouth.
SEXY BLONDE stopped by the bar with SIR DUKE for another birthday drink (or two). Even though her birthday officially ended at midnight, she felt the need to extend it a couple more hours, which is cool.
The rest of the night found ourselves with a lot of folks puking. Poor barback SPIDER had his hands full, hopping all over the bar to keep things flowing. He's slowly starting to shape up into a good barback.
Today, I have a MAJOR mission: PURCHASE A COMPUTER. I've been talking about it for months and now I have to either shit or get off the pot. If I don't come home with a computer of some kind, then I don't know what i'll do. But I'm not worry because I'm coming home with a computer, dammit.
That's it for now. Hopefully I'll be posting everyone from my new computer.
NUFF SAID
3 comments:
Swandad - laying the law down thick. Now tell us, what else are you laying down thick on Ms. Kremlin?
so when I advised Angry Black that the best way to get your attention for a new drink was to shake around the ice in his empty glass--was that bad?
~ANGEL
Compared to slamming your hands on the bar and barking out orders like a sergent? Certainly not.
Post a Comment