seen from Malaysia
seen from China
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from Türkiye
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from China
seen from Pakistan
seen from Russia
seen from Kuwait
seen from United States
seen from Kuwait
seen from Russia
seen from Türkiye
seen from Italy
seen from Malaysia
seen from Singapore
One of our favorite music venues recently closed down. That sucks. But I just bought a bunch of equipment and furniture from them in an auction and I'm going to use it for my restaurant. So I just saved a bunch of money I was going to spend and I get to let pieces of a place that meant a lot to us live on in our own place.
Sooooooooo
The other night I was confirming Thanksgiving reservations and I get to this one single-diner lady. I go over the whole rigamaroll and then get to the bit when I tell her we apply a 5% service charge to our checks to help with increased expenses due to COVID-19.
Now normally when I tell people this, they don’t care. But this lady? She cared. She cared a lot.
As in, she starts going A W F on me about how “they already got expenses of their own”. Mind you, the restaurant I work at’s cheapest meal is a coffee cup-sized serving of gumbo for $8.50, so this is more like luxury eating than bare necessities.
I’m already bothered by her rudeness but hey maybe she thought I said 85% — it’s happened before. So I repeat calmly and explain that it’s 5% and going towards hourly staff’s wages, benefits, and sanitation protocol.
To which she snaps that she knows and I’m just repeating myself.
Ah. So she’s just a bitch.
I wished her a good evening and hung up.
Today I came to work and a server who is also sometimes a manager told me the lady came in today and they sort of got into it because she didn’t like the smell of our hand sanitizer and she’s honestly just rude and treats people like shit. She has tried to sue not only Cafe du Monde, but also apparently the city before, though for what I haven’t the faintest clue.
Anyway, I’m almost positive this is the same lady who is actually a local activist with her own Wikipedia page, has been escorted out of a board meeting, and also was the person my step grandfather gave my stepdad’s coronet to.
So that’s happening.
Mmk. Talking to an old friend I realized not all of us have suffered through food service jobs for years on end. Like my friend, who chose the unique torture that is retail.
(As if anyone chooses minimum wage customer service. 🙃)
Anyway! I am hereby sharing my random food industry nuggets. Consider yourself informed.
Lemons + hot water. Microwave a couple mins wipe microwave. All your crusty old spaghetti splatter is cleaner than a Dexter kill room.
Put your citrus rinds in the disposal and grind away to keep it from smelling rank.
No citrus? No problem. Shove a bunch of ice cubes in the drain. Pour some dish soap over the ice. Run a light stream of water and flip turn on the disposal til it stops sounding like a wood chipper. Cleaned AND sharpened!
Moving? For a week or so before, stop by your local shops and ask when they get deliveries and if they mind you taking boxes of their hands (they won't).
Coffee filters are the best window/glass cleaning material around.
Speaking of, after sanitizing with your fav bleach wipe, use windex + coffee filter to clean any shiny surface. Chrome, nickel, steel, etc. Faucets, lights, counters, whatever.
Use a finely serrated knife for tomatoes. And really anything with tense skin but soft innards (except your friends 😉).
Get your knives sharpened regularly! You're more likely to injure yourself when you're compensating for dullness with excess pressure.
What else am I forgetting?
One week in and quitting my job to focus on the restaurant was the smartest thing I've done in a long time. I've accomplished more productive work in the last week than I have in any week working for someone else, while also getting more done around the house, relaxing an appropriate amount, and making time for fun things as well. I can't believe I was going to try to do this this while working my old job through the end of the year.
I made a Facebook post on the old pizza shop's page with an update of what I'm doing and the response both there and irl has been overwhelmingly positive. My "No one will ever show up" anxiety is gone.
Of course, now my "They'll all be disappointed when they do come, because I'm a fraud and don't know what I'm doing" anxiety now has room to spread it's wings. But that's a battle for another day. I'm going to a concert tonight.
Sunday Seven
I miscalculated the size mgs of the gummy I just took and took double the amount I usually do on the rare times I take them. So about an hour from now should be fun. Maybe I'll finish this then. (Narrator voice: He did, or tried to, and that's why you're getting this on Monday instead of Sunday)
Getting ready for Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday. My mom was supposed to go with her new husband to his son's house this year (I still need to get used to the fact that I have a step brother.) But their plans changed and they're coming here instead. I've never not been with my mom for Thanksgiving. It's healthy and good that she spends time with the rest of her (our?) family. But I'm glad I can put off breaking the 47 year streak for at least one more year.
Restaurant remodel is going well. But I think I'm spending too much time with the building and not enough time on the business. So I'm going to start concentrating on that part of it more.
We're going to Disney/Epcot/Universal at the end of January with my 3 adult step kids. I'm along for the ride. I was never a big Disney kid and haven't become a Disney adult. But I did enjoy Universal when we went 6 years ago. There's just so much involved with going. My wife and her daughters seem to love the game of all you have to do when visiting. I'm not so much. But I'll still have a good time and they will too which is most important.
If a 9-5 job was still 9-5, I think I could handle that. I'm finding I'm far more productive if I wake up at 8 (instead of 6:30) and start work at 9 (instead of 7:30). Unless we have evening plans, I work until 8 or 9 pm and it feels more like my natural rhythm.
My mom posted on Facebook that she was proud of me for following my dream in doing the restaurant. Which is very nice, but she also told me multiple times before that I shouldn't do it. I don't know if I've convinced her that I have a good idea or if she's just resigned to the fact that I'm going to do it anyway and she might as well support me. Either way, it's better to have support instead of resistance, so I'm just taking it and enjoying it. Looking forward, not back kinda thing.
Titties are pretty great
Renovating The Restaurant - Scene | The Bear | FX
Life lately
A Before/Currently video I did for the restaurant
It's been a relaxing weekend. I've done nothing and it's been great.
The restaurant had a very large (like 24'x9') walkin/display cooler that we don't need anymore since we're doing away with the convenience store aspect of the place. So we were going to shorten the cooler part to half size. When we took the walls down, the walls behind it were covered in black mold. The floor underneath was rotted out. So that whole section of the building has to be torn down. So that sucked. It's going to cost a lot of extra $ to build a new addition. I didn't sleep well that night.
The next morning, I woke up and decided to look at things from a new perspective. The new addition will be something we can do anything we want with, instead of being confined to working around what existed. The new bathrooms that were taking up floor space are now back there, allowing me to add tables and a better traffic flow. I'll have a better prep area. I'll be able arrange my kitchen with a better layout. The new bathroom location means I don't have to cut as much of the existing concrete for the plumbing, saving that money. The new kitchen layout means I don't have to move my electrical panels, saving that money. It's still going to cost more than I wanted. But it's going to set me up better to make that money back sooner.
I ordered windows and asked for an estimate of when they would be done, figuring 3-4 weeks. I freaked out when they said "The beginning of next year" thinking that's a long time, until I realized that we're pretty much at the end of the year already. They'll be on time. The end of the year kinda snuck up on me.
Related, I haven't gotten any outdoor Christmas lights up. Not sure if it's worth doing it at this point. The tree is up and that's the most important thing.
We're going to Disney at the end of January. I'm not so turned off by the "Disney adult" as much as I am just how much work it all is. We have to make reservations to go to a bar to buy overpriced drinks. My wife and stepdaughters seem to love the game of coordinating it all. That's not me. I'll go and have a good time doing whatever they plan. But I'm not excited for it. Part of it I'm sure is having a lot on my mind right now. Part is that I just wasn't much of a Disney kid growing up. I loved Star Wars, but they've squeezed it dry for every penny to the point I'm pretty meh about it now.
Usually when I leave a job, even if I don't like it much, I kind of miss it in a weird way. I don't miss my last job at all.
