The Full Moon Strikes Again

The moon is a mysterious entity. It's responsible for the tides, menstrual cycles, werewolves and general insanity.

For long-time readers of this blog you may remember this post, in which I had to put up with a suspiciously increased number of drunks, fights, super-rudeness and swearing during a shift at work when the moon was nigh.

This year was no different. The following things happened:

- Two bar staff mysteriously quit on Friday night so we were understaffed on Saturday night.

- According to the drunk girl I cut off from the bar, I "ruined her night" because "she washhn't ddddjunk k?" Poor diddums. 

- Had to explain to a woman that Coopers Pale Ale was not a dark stout. And neither is Coopers Sparkling.

I believe the key word here is "pale."

- Observed an increase of people milling about aimlessly at the and had the following conversation for every 2nd person I served:

Me: "Hello. What would you like to drink?"

Customer: "...Duuuuhhhh?"

- Not sure if this one is true, but I'm very sure the Mustang Bar caught on fire. I heard a fire alarm (the back of my work is across the road from it) and saw a fire engine parked outside. More alarmingly, heard groups of patrons scream "Woooooo!" Burning to our deaths, how exciting!

- The soft drink guns stopped working so I had to tell people that they couldn't have soft drink for a while. It was fixed within 15 minutes but most people just didn't understand.

Customer: "Can I have a vodka and soda?"

Me: "Sorry, the soft drink guns aren't working."

Customer: "But I want a vodka soda."

Me: "The soft drink guns aren't working. So I can't give you soda."

Customer: "Oh okay, can I have a vodka and coke then?"

- A girl I work with cut off two drunk dudes. One started screaming, "I KNOW YOUR MOTHER AND I AM GOING TO TELL HER" (oh noes). He raised his fist and I ran to get security.

- No less than 5 minutes later, the same girl told a patron to move because a glassy needed to sweep up a broken glass. The patron swore abusively at her. I ran off to the get the security guard again. The angry patron bitch-slapped him furiously. Sigh.

- Was myself very very angry. The peak of my anger hit when a man changed his order 3 times in a very confusing way and still wouldn't tell me how many scotches he wanted altogether. 

He told me to "smile." 

I responded using words that were not very nice. Sorry Mum.

- But despite the existential rage and tiredness building inside me, I got heaps of tips. Just like last year. Weird.

10 things I like about bartending

This is my bartending face.

Kristine Bottone of one of my favourite blogs, LA Bartender Examiner, emailed me and asked me 10 things I hate about bartenders and customers - research for her newest article.

After sending off a long, ranty e-mail, I decided to counteract all that negativity with...

10 things I like about bartending.

1. When I manage to remember what the regulars drink. Good for my terrible short term memory, and the customers really like it too.

2. Getting high fived by friendly drunks.

3. Free drinks. Knock-off drinks are great and my boss is a pretty generous lady. Not to mention the rad sort of customers that buy you one so you can drink with them!

4. Customers who make the effort to leave tips. Tipping isn't compulsory here in Australia so it's pretty exciting when it happens. I usually manage to make around $20 (about an hour's work). The most I've ever made was $60, which I promptly spent at the bar the next night. Awesome!

5. Being constantly surrounded by music. Bartending is one of the few jobs where it's not just okay to dance at work - its encouraged. I also get to see a lot of bands and meet the musicians at the bar.

The Mercy Beat - a rad band and some of the nicest bar patrons ever
(photographed at my old workplace, the Clarence Corner Hotel)

6. Flirty glances over the bar.

7. The pride of making a tasty, well-presented cocktail and watching the customer get excited.

8. Other bartenders are, on the whole, pretty cool. Most of them are friendly and a bit eccentric in some way - hospitality does that to you - which is a good thing if you're working with them. The crap ones usually don't stick around for too long anyway.

9. Watching drunk people dance when you're stone cold sober is way more entertaining than it sounds.

10. Meeting people and making new friends. Not all pub-goers are drunken idiots, you know.

The Full Moon OR How I earnt $10 of Hatred

I’m posting in my blog at 4am to tell all of you out there in blog-land about my worst shift at work ever.
As interesting as my workplace is, I don’t like posting about it too much. I’m sure everybody’s sick to death of reading about work rants in blogs as it is anyway. Anyway, I usually have a good time at work. Some day, I plan on writing a book about my misadventures, the history and culture that goes on at the pub I work at because it truly is fascinating. But that won’t be until I have well and truly stopped working there and when I figure out how to publish the most interesting bits without getting sued or arrested.

Anyway. The worst shift at work ever. I figure that posting about this and cracking a few jokes would be much better catharsis than bursting into tears and wailing “I JUST HAD THE WORST NIGHT EVER” to Dan (who is asleep).

My manager, Nathan, mentioned that it was the full moon and people had been a bit weird lately. He wasn’t wrong. The night started off consistently busy – enough to be constantly serving, but not so insanely busy that my head would explode. However, I always take this as a sign that it will just get busier and I’ll end up being completely exhausted quickly.

I was right. It got progressively more insane as the glasses piled up and I bounced back and forth between the bar, the bottleshop and the gambling facilities. Damn understaffed-ness.

At around nine or so, we got a group of drunk men. Fantastic. After they downed some shots of Drambuie – which is a very disappointing way to drink a liquor that should be savoured – they proceeded to piss me off by stealing a beer. I had began to pour the drink then realised the keg needed to be changed. When I came back, Drunk Dude #1 was holding it and saying that he had no idea where it went.
I like to think that I have a lot of patience. But who needs patience when you have a security guard?
“Can I have rum and coke?” asked Drunk Dude #2.
“Hell no, I’m kicking you out,” I said, as I brought the security guard over to them.
“I hope you feel proud,” slurred Drunk Dude #3 self-righteously.
“I hope you do too!” I replied as he was manhandled out the door.

A co-worker of mine, who wasn’t on shift that night, brought her ex-boyfriend and his friend over for a drink. Said co-worker of mine is lovely. Her ex-boyfriend, however, needs to die a slow and painful death.
He whistled to get my attention. After I jokingly told him that he’d mistaken me for a puppy, he said, “Puppies don’t respond when you whistle. But dogs do.” His friend high-fived him. I fantasised about punching them both in the face. I don’t even care if my co-worker reads this. Actually, I hope she does. Dude, he’s a douche and has a bad moustache. Stop hanging around with him. And by “stop hanging around with him”, I mean disembowel him.

Yep, my patience was not only gone, but it had hopped on a spaceship headed straight towards the sun, never to return again.

“Can I have a Jack Daniels and Coke?” asked Burly Dude.
“Sure,” said I, and poured it.
A millilitre of Jack Daniels splashed out of the glass as I poured it. “Look, you spilt it!” said Burly Dude. “Could you give me a bit more?”
“Um, no,” I said. “But you can pay me $6 for that.”
When he did this the third time, as though sincerely believing that I would give this extremely rude man more liquor, my response was different: “Shut the fuck up and pay for your goddamn drink.”

The co-worker who was rostered on with me tonight was complaining about a fellow who was very rudely yelling “GIVE ME SHOTS” at her while she was hurriedly serving other people. To relieve her, I went over to give this man his shots. “Hey babe!” he screeched after I handed him his change. “You gave me the wrong change.”
“Oh, sorry,” I said, giving him the right money. “By the way, if you call me babe again, I will break your spine.”

It was 1am and everybody was pissed. “Be careful about intoxication,” warned my manager.
A group of rowdy men wandered up to the bar and took about 10 minutes to slur that they wanted a beer. “You’re all cut off!” I said diplomatically.
“Why?”
I actually said the professional thing, which was, “Because you’ve had too much to drink. But you can have a glass of water.”
“Oh! Okay,” said one.
Apparently, one of the men in the group was quite offended and decided to accost me as I was stacking up chairs at the end of the night.
“I’m talking to you!” he snapped at me suddenly.
“What?”
“I said hello.”
“Sorry, I didn’t hear you.”
“YOU HAVE A FUCKING ATTITUDE PROBLEM! HOW DARE YOU TELL ME TO FUCK OFF WHEN I ASK FOR A FUCKING DRINK!”
The irony of this is that out of all the people I swore at tonight, I didn’t actually swear at him.
“I didn’t hear you. God!”
“I WAS GOING TO GIVE YOU THIS TEN DOLLARS WHICH I WOULD HAVE PAID YOU FOR GIVING ME A DRINK!” He waved a ten dollar note in my face. “BUT YOU HAVE A FUCKING ATTITUDE AND YOU’RE NOT GETTING IT.”
Hell, this dude was beyond wasted, and having fun with wasted people is hilarious. “My mighty heart is breaking!” I cried, swooning dramatically.
“YEAH… WELL… IT BETTER BE!” He dug into his pocket and retrieved the ten dollar note. “HERE, HAVE THE TEN DOLLARS, BUT YOU HAVE A FUCKING ATTITUDE-“
“Woohoo!” I grabbed the note from his hand and skipped over to the bar, leaving the security guard to deal with him.

I’m not sure what to do with the ten dollars. It is the ten dollar note of pure hatred. I feel like whatever I buy with it will bring me bad luck, or that I only have to buy something diabolically evil with it. All I know is that some drunk guy yelled at me, then gave me money. Amazing.



(Disclaimer:
Before you think either, “Wow, she sure KICKED SOME ASS!” or “What a self-righteous bitch!”, I must say that I’m not proud of how I responded to those people tonight. I have a short temper that really should have no place in the hospitality industry and really need to deal with things like that more calmly and in a more mature fashion (ie. Not provoking drunk people).

And it’s not always that bad at work. In fact, I mainly enjoy going to work because I’ve become friendly with the regulars, most people are generally sociable and fun after a few drinks, and I usually get to see cool bands. It's usually a fun place full of love, dancing and giggling over beer.
But tonight was different. It was the worst it had ever been.
And it was all because of the full moon.

I recently quit the newsagency to work at the bar. To celebrate this milestone, I found a retail rant in my old livejournal. I shall repost it here in its slightly edited glory.


HOW TO PISS OFF A SHOP ASSISTANT


1. Meeting and Greeting

- Make sure to ignore all social niceties displayed by shop assistant. It is preferable to make eye contact for long periods of time to give the impression of boring your eyes into their soul. Grunting is a great way of communicating too! If anyone doesn't understand it, they are clearly stupid or foreign.

- How DARE that shop assistant say hello to you when you're looking at something! They usually ask devious things like, "Hello, how are you? Can I help you with anything?" but they really just want to sell things to you. Selling things, in a store! How perfectly horrible. To fend off such barbaric approaches, it's best to screech, "I'm just LOOKING" before they can launch their evil plan.

- Plastic bags are destroying the environment! It makes Greenhouse Effect stronger and the whales explode and Nazis take over the world. If a shop assistant is offering you a plastic bag, you must realise that they are actually offering the destruction of the natural world. Not to mention fascism.
This is why a suitable greeting is screaming hysterically upon first sight, "I DON'T WANT A BAG!!!!"

- It's a good idea to pick whatever it is you want to buy when the shop assistant serves you. They really don't mind when you stare straight ahead with your mouth open and say, "Uuuhhhh" for a few minutes while you're thinking.

2. The Transaction

- Throw or thrust your purchases at the shop assistant. After all, you are the Customer. You are being served by an absolute scum of nature. It is advisable to think of the shop assistant as a form of vending machine - cold, mechanical, devoid of human emotions and social contact. They are your bitch. Thrust away.

- Make sure to pay for EVERYTHING separately and sound disgusted at the very thought of all your purchases being efficiently put through as one transaction. Also, after you have made your purchase, randomly find something nearby that you want to buy too. Repeat several times.

- After waiting patiently for the shop assistant to process your transaction, randomly offer the remaining change of your purchase. This apparently makes the shop assistant's job easier, but we all know that all it does it make sure your wallet is a bit lighter.

- If the register decides to freeze randomly and the EFTPOS machine isn't working, you must always remember that it is not because the register computer is old and the EFTPOS machine won't accept your credit card with a bite taken out of it. It is definitely the shop assistant's fault because they are obviously making the machines break down out of pure spite. Accusing glares and impatient sighs are recommended.

- Assume the shop assistant is a mind reader. When they ask, "Is that all for today?" and you have not mentioned that you would also like a pack of ciggies and a $5 Instant Scratchie, they are obviously inept at reading your mind, which is a virtue that shop assistants should not lack. You have every right to be angry that they cannot read your mind, so feel free to be abuse them. A disdainful, "Uh, NO" is most suitable.

- This is a good time as any other to get rid of unwanted change. All those 10c and 5c coins that have been accumlating in your wallet for the last few years should be used to pay for a $10 purchase right here and right now. Even if you have been waiting in line for a long time, do not use this time to actually count the coins. This is where the shop assistant comes in. Dump the coins all over the counter and say, "I THINK it's $10, but count it for me." This works well especially when the shop assistant is the only person at the register and there are 8 other impatient people lined up.

- If the shop assistant so much as hands you 5c less change than what they're supposed to give you, go absolutely ballistic. After all, they are trying to rip you off. What if you were abducted by Communists, tied up and left hanging by a rope over a pit of poison-tipped shards of glass and forced to watch "Norbit" on repeat for the rest of your life, and the only way they would let you go is if you gave them 5c?
They are obviously part of a secret communist conspiracy. Ignore any apologies and attempts to ratify the situation. After you have flown into a rage and righted this severe injustice, disgusted sighs should signal your departure.

3. Socialising

- Respond to everything the shop assistant says with your life story.
eg.
SA (shop assistant): "Would you like a bag for those?"
You: "Yes, I have to go to Woolworths later, I completely forgot to buy a leg of ham and I have a dinner party today where my relatives from Melbourne are visiting..."
SA: *brains leak out ears*

- Tell the shop assistant hilarious jokes.
eg.
You: I would like a lotto ticket.
SA: Sure, which one?
You: The winning one. HA HA HA HA HA HA! *slaps knee* I bet you get that all the time.
SA: Trust me, sir, I do.

- Ask the shop assistant if a certain item is in stock. eg. "Do you stock any butt plugs?"
If it isn't, describe the item in great patronising detail. "You know, they're plugs, about this big, and you insert them into your rectum?"
When the shop assistant says no, keep asking. "But do you have them? DO YOU?!!"
All stores also have a tendency to hide any product you actually want in the mystical realm of Out the Back. Make sure you ask them if it's there. Oh yeah, and all shop assistants are lying when they say no. You'd better ask their boss as well.
Then compare them to another store to make them feel guilty. "Well they sell them in the Butt Plug store, I just THOUGHT you'd sell them HERE!" Shop assistants care so much about your purchasing habits that this deeply offends them. Teenage part time workers have taken to sobbing into their pillows late at night over things like this.
Continue to ask them if they stock the item. Unless your excessive questioning causes the item to magically appear, walk off in a disgruntled huff.

- When your child is throwing itself on the ground, screaming, it is definitely a good time to take them into a shop. Make sure to buy them lollies. Sometimes it's best to buy them a big chocolate icecream or milkshake beforehand. Melted icecream handprints on the displays? Spilt milkshake? Psst, who cares. The shop assistants have to get paid for doing something!


SHOP ASSISTANT WEEPING FOR HUMANITY OR YOUR MONEY BACK!