Alright now; time to bend over and grab your ankles

The suits came in last night – ordered their Spotted cows & dirty martini’s and talked about whatever they talk about. Fast forward to drink #3, things got interesting (and louder); it got to the point of lower & middle class people who are “in trouble” in this economy. They basically called them all lazy – unbelievable.  Well kinda.

While there will also be exceptions to every rule, their whole approach to how these “lazy people” live their lives was eyebrow raising.  Especially since these were trust funds babies who act like they’ve never even wiped their own brow without help from ‘the help.’

“If those people would just pay their bills on time we wouldn’t be in this mess.  People are just going to have to hunker down and put a bit more elbow grease into the lively hoods of themselves & their families.  Obama’s going to have the whole damn country on section 8 & food stamps…”

Umm, come again?  Not all middle class people are irresponsible breeders, just like all rich or wealthy persons aren’t pretentious assholes.   People usually do what they have to do to get by; it just depends on their route and what they’re capable of and what they feel comfortable with.

Example, a couple of friends that I went to college with:  The one that lives in Chicago has two teenagers and is a widow.  The one that lives on Long Island is a make-up artist and lives with his two 2 cousins in a house.
Now, both of these people worked at their chosen profession with their degree until they were laid off.  One is working through temp agencies and bartending at a gentlemans club and one is working as a cashier and moonlighting as an escort through a long time agency.  After some time they’re making it work and are doing quite well for themselves and their familes.  Why?  Because – you do what you have to do when you have to do it.  When you owe money for things the collector on the other end doesn’t care WHAT you have going on; they want their money.  Doesn’t mean it has to be long term but, bills still gotta be paid, people need to eat, toilet paper and sanitary napkins still have to be bought, kids have camp/school trips that need your attention and gas still has to be put in the car (or your MetroCard has to be loaded…) among other things.

So let’s weigh a couple options using the suits from today’s logic/way of thinking.

1. Stop trying to work altogether, get on public assistance until something better comes along.
2. Continue to hustle on their own on the daily grind, pulling themselves up by their own bootstraps making it work without handouts.
3. Sit in the house and starve/give up while life goes on around them.
4. Grand larceny, start mugging people and pulling off stick-ups.

Do people know their are individuals who used to make (beaucoup) ‘Boo-Coo’ bucks now looking and applying for ‘jobs’ that pay only $30 – 45K vs. $200K+?

Most of these people had a great job, college or no college, and made a decent living not bothering anyone or asking for anything.  “The times, they are -a- changin’” and it ain’t pretty.  Some things aren’t going to change.  People are always going to be willing to pay for things.  Things like fucking, drinking, housing, food, even water.  Just like other people will never know what it’s like to walk in another persons shoes.  Not everybody has it all, nor would most want it IMHO; a lot of workers are taken for granted: housekeepers, bank tellers, teachers, day care workers, the guy that fixes the copier, the person that makes your sandwich at the sub place, hell, maybe even your bartender.

What would you do without them?  Who would you talk about then?  Only time will tell.

I love my line of work.  Take care.

I leave you with this little quote:

“Business bad? Fuck you, pay me. Oh, you had a fire? Fuck you, pay me. Place got hit by lightning huh? Fuck you, pay me.” - Henry Hill, Goodfellas (1990)

14 +1 uses for true russian vodka

Got this in my in box and thought I’d share; sounds interesting although I must say “try any of these at your own risk…”

Enjoy the reading!

1. To remove a bandage painlessly, saturate the bandage with vodka. The Solvent dissolves adhesive.

2. To clean the caulking around bathtubs and showers, fill a Trigger-spray bottle with vodka, spray the caulking, let set five Minutes and wash clean. The alcohol in the vodka kills mold and mildew.

3. To clean your eyeglasses, simply wipe the lenses with a soft, clean cloth dampened with vodka. The alcohol in the vodka cleans the glass and kills germs.

4. Prolong the life of razors by filling a cup with vodka and letting Your safety razor blade soak in the alcohol after shaving. The vodka disinfectsthe blade and prevents rusting.

5. Spray vodka on vomit stains, scrub with a brush, and then blot dry.

6. Using a cotton ball, apply vodka to your face as an astringent to cleanse the skin and tighten pores.

7. Add a jigger of vodka to a 12-ounce bottle of shampoo. The alcohol cleanses the scalp, removes toxins from hair, and stimulates the growth of healthy hair.

8. Fill a sixteen-ounce trigger-spray bottle and spray bees or wasps to kill them.

9. Pour one-half cup vodka and one-half cup water in a Ziploc freezer bag and freeze for a slushy, refreshable ice pack for aches, pain or black eyes.

10. Fill a clean, used mayonnaise jar with freshly packed lavender flowers, fill the jar with vodka, seal t he lid tightly and set in the Sun for three days. Strain liquid through a coffee filter, then apply the tincture to aches and pains.

11. To relieve a fever, use a washcloth to rub vodka on your chest and back as a liniment.

12. To cure foot odor, wash your feet with vodka.

13. Vodka will disinfect and alleviate a jellyfish sting.

14. Pour vodka over an area affected with poison ivy to remove the urushiol oil oil from your skin.

15. Swish a shot of vodka over an aching tooth.
Allow your gum’s to absorb some of the alcohol to numb the pain.

Things that make you want to punch people in the face…

…Since I’ve been away I felt this would make people laugh and de-stress their Monday at work.  Please Enjoy.

• Women w/ too tight stretch pants and show a camel toe so outrageous it should really be called a “Mooseknuckle.”
• People in line for 20 mins and don’t have their order ready and their money out; I mean my gawd – how many times have I seen you here at ____________________ (insert deli/bodega/restaurant name here).
• You are not wearing a hard hat. There are no construction Foremans looking for YOU. If you had an important job to do somewhere, you wouldn’t be here annoying me and everybody else. Get OFF the damn walkie-talkie inspired phone. Dumbass…
• Women at the bar who smile in your face and talk about you (in spanish) once they’ve given their drink order and then turn red with embarrassment and fright when you give them their change back while asking them (in spanish) if they’d like anything else… {Actually I kinda like this; it’s funny to me…}
• One word: Crocs.
• Hypersensitive people that act like if you tell them the truth about something that has to be said you’re a son of a bitch. Chill the fuck out.  It is NOT that serious.
• Irresponsible breeders (of the human kind…)
• People in front of me online at the coffee shop that don’t know what the hell they want.  It’s coffee.  You’re in your 30’s; is this your first day on planet earth?  Get your coffee and get the *F* outta my way. Please.
• People who talk about REALLY personal stuff on line @ places.
• Chicken-headed-hoodrats with annoying RADIO ringtones. You don’t have money for a POST paid phone but you have $$$ for ringtones? Really?
• Chronic Misspellings.
• Women who spend money on their hair and nails and their children look like refugees from some 3rd world country. Get your priorities straight, douche bag.
• People who turn into Phone DJs on the train/on line. No one asked you to play that 30 second blip of Lady Ga-Ga and Mr. 305 over and over and OVER again. Asshole.
• People who don’t wash their hands in the bathroom and then look at me in horror as they get ready to leave the restroom as I say; “um, aren’t you forgetting something?…”
• People who just want to add me to invite me to events and NEVER once send me a “Hello!” or anything of substance.
• Fucked up french fries; you’re fired!
• Women who wear open toed heels and they have jacked up feet and crusty heels.
• Chronic name droppers who have to mention who they know in some city/music group/etc or elsewhere for that matter.
• Miley Cyrus & the Jonas brothers gear/commercials
• Co-workers who are the last to arrive to help set up the bar and the first ones to count their tip jar, barely clean up and one of the first ones to bounce. You tend bar, although not very good, you CAN NOT leave when the crowd leaves. Dumbass douche bag.
• People who can cuss like a sailor but the words “please” and “thank you” are no where to be found in their vocab…
• People with horrendous B.O. and bad breath that insist on trying to come right up on you for an up close and personal conversation.
• People who grunt at the gym although not lifting much. People who do more walking/gawking around the gym than working out. If you had sweat in your eyes maybe you’d do what you were here to do…
• Fake Bitches of the male & female variety.
• Vegetarians who try to make me feel bad for enjoying a big ass tasty hamburger. Get over yourself.
• Women at the bar who give me an attitude due to my “youthful” appearance. I know how to make your White Russian, I’m over 21; and if you were a real woman with your own bread, you wouldn’t have to wait for this guido next to you to buy you a drink…
• Women who don’t wash; if I can smell your p***y from BEHIND the bar… HOUSTON WE HAVE A PROBLEM! You are burning my nose hairs and making my patrons uncomfortable. Weren’t you taught any better? Go wash your snatch before coming in here…
• People who say to me, “you’re putting ketchup on THAT?” (Eggs, mac-n-cheese, etc.) Go fuck yourself and get away from my plate.

These are my opinions. Short or long, feel free to add your own here. Please.  Thank you.

Back from Overseas…

…glad to be back among the living.

See you here weekly!

My People, My People

Strong language below so prep yourself sweet cheeks…

I think I’ve had all of the “Negro Nights” I can take y’all…

I mean, every group of people who come in have their niches, good and bad, but dayum.  As Chris Rock once said: there are black people and there are niggas.

One thing in common; white people and black people HATE niggas.  Why Because they F*ck sh%t up for everybody else.

• The broke bitches always have an attitude and are constantly asking how much something is even though they’re there every week.

• Impatience; when I’m making drinks for the others you’re constantly hollering, hey, hey baby girl, can I be next?

• I tell you I’ll be right with you as soon as I get theirs.  I get to you, you don’t know what you want &/or you take the ppls order from behind you &/or you keep trying to add stuff to your order I’ve already begun to make and once everything is made and in front of you THEN you proceed to take out your wallet/dig through your purse.  All the while you were talking ish about the other two people who did the EXACT same thing you just did.

Try to go out and have a good time and ENJOY your drink without yelling at MF’s and tryin’ to get there quick.

Get it together people; it’s times like those I think about not claiming my black hand side…

A Persian, an Ecuadorian and a Drag Queen walk into a bar…

Fellow Bar Keeps…

Ever have a day, a week, a month, even more go by great at work and then things start heading downhill because you don’t “fit the mold” of the other bar personnel?

Yeah, me neither…  But, if I did (hypothetically speaking) it may go something like this:

You help out the owners and managers  starting out and then they start letting people go at their every whim and talking about them at every waking moment and in every managers meeting.  Then we’ll promote those who spread their legs and do you ‘favors’ (male and female).  Grow up, right?

Of course not; so, we’d start letting one of the managers, (we’ll call her Pera K. just for namesake) splurge and collect salary pay and hourly pay w/ tips of course by sticking those they don’t like on shitty day shifts, every day and taking all of the regular good shifts Wednesdays – Sundays.  And, in celebration of that, she’ll get stinking drunk and call the colored workers stuck up niggers while she passes out and has to be carried out of the bar on the backs of two employees.  It’s her day off but pshhhh, WHAT THE HELL!  There’s no need to show a little reserve within ones place of business even if we’re in charge…

Next, we have a gent who’s kinda nice but, not a strong night bar man, we’ll call him  Six-Four.  He receives a ticket at his other place of bar business for serving an underager beer/liquor and gets a pink slip.  He comes in and gets wasted with Pera K. and most of the other off duty supers.  The next week, he has a strong arm shift after hob-nobbing.  Hmmm…  Six Four must live up to his name in another dept huh?…

Moving onto a supervisor who seems friendly; he speaks but tells horrible jokes.  You chuckle anyway as to be light-hearted; his name is Noni Burma.  A supervisor he is; doesn’t get invited to half of the managers meetings, takes racist comments from one of the owners and tells the staff what he doesn’t like (constantly) about the owners, other supers and certain staff.  Yet, he doesn’t speak up.  I guess its okay to be a pussy and not speak up for yourself in an economy such as this; I mean hey, who needs self respect when you’ve got a family at home and a boss who doesn’t realize he’s going to be bankrupt in under 5 years because his club bartenders are taking at least 5 shots an hour from 9pm til past closing…  Ahh well.

Then there’s Ricardo Amante.  Ricardo runs security and manages the bar.  You can’t miss him; he’s the stocky Latino who tends to be followed by what I call the Blond Brigade.  Never a shortage of them around; as long as there’s  Latino and Black men along with free liquor, you can be sure to find these tricks sniffing around someones nut sack.

Moving on, let’s name some more of the things that are serious no-no’s that are always going to take place:

• You come in to your shift 20 mins. late and immediately get on your cell phone for the next 10 mins. to “help drum up some business by calling my friends”

• You pull a NCNS* (twice) togo to a basketball games and wonder why others are giving you that “funky” look.

• You’re constantly 15 mins. late because you are not getting along with your spouse/significant other and feel the need to have a ‘talk’ right before work.

• You can’t take out trash or get ice because that’s not “your  job”

• You don’t rotate product when restocking because that would require kneeling down on an ‘icky’ floor

• You leave empty liquor bottles on the shelf so when the next shift’s BT grabs it they have to find the backup

• You are OBLIVIOUS  to the 6 people that have been sitting in the stools next to your 2 girl/guy friends because you think that your friends will tip you better on the $10 tab you’ve given them than whatever the 6 ppl  can possibly muster up

• You run your fingers through your hair, play with your teeth and then make a drink grabbing the drinking edge and squeezing a lime into rum and coke because you think “you’re clean”

• You make a White Russian in this order: kahlua, layer it with half and half, then layer that with vodka, because ‘that’s the recipe’

• You think that ‘a little bit of brown on the edges of your lime wedges is fine- after all, they’re still mostly green’

• You refill your speed pourers daily with new on top of old and only wash them when they ‘look dirty’

• You rinse EVERYTHING in cold water because your fingers are too sensitive and it’s the same as hot anyway

• You don’t understand why a dull knife is actually more dangerous than a sharp one

• You get stinking drunk after your shift and laugh as you fall off your bar stool all the while proclaiming loudly, I CAN’T AFFORD TO DRINK HERE AFTER WORK, WHOO HOO!!!!

• You constantly butt in on your coworker’s regulars.

• You’re the bars General Manager and you do so much coke in the other bathroom you have NO idea what’s going on until two-week later.
• You regularly serve drinks in glasses with lipstick marks on them because you don’t do a thorough job washing glasses, and don’t check the glass before making drinks

These are all possibly true and can happen in any bar; anywhere.

The No.1 sign of a bad bartender out of all of them would be if you see any of your fellow bartenders committing any of the above you do nothing.

The No.1 sign of a good bartender out of all of them?  Seeing any of the following and saying something about it and getting written up for bringing things to that persons attention…

*No Call, No Show

Sticky Floors as gooey as a movie theatre and a teenage boys magazine stash

You’re drinking; okay.  You’re flirting; fine by me.  You’re dancing and enjoying the music; fuckin’ fan-tab-u-lous.  You’re past tipsy but not quite wasted; I’ll call you a cab if need be.  But why oh WHY do females feel the need to take their shoes off in a bar.  A BAR.  Do you know what’s on the floor in here?  I know what’s lurking back here before we clean up @ night but my goodness…

Chicken wings, fry wedges, GLASS, spills, VOMIT, cigarettes and other QUESTIONABLE LIQUIDS.  That’s just nasty.  If your feet hurt, cop a squat or bring flats in those big ASS purses y’all bring to the place (which I also wonder why THAT is, but I digress…)

It’s nasty; don’t you have any home training?

I can bar tend; I’ve got the boobs

Yes, you read right.  This chick comes in every week.  Decent bar attitude.  Great tipper.  Always speaks but she said something the other day that made me raise an eyebrow.

Yeah, this is Madison WI and we’ve got cornbread er, brat fed females with tits for days but it takes more than a hefty & perky pair of jugs to tend a bar.  Oh I’m sure she does fine at the house parties, but mingling with the general public is a different story.

There’s a bit more to tending bar than just tippin’ the Tap.  You have to be personal.  You have shut your mouth and LISTEN to your patrons who come in.  You have to have some knowledge on the products you carry so that you’re able to suggest something when someone happens to want something different.  And then some.

There’s an abundance of boobs in this here college town and it amazes me; if I remember correctly it takes a 3.2 GPA + community service and more to get in here.  But, the behavior and persona of some of these people, even those in Grad school act like Vanessa from the Cosby show in her girlfriends liquor cabinet.

For a smart business owner, it takes more than cleavage.  It takes speed, accuracy, neatness, street smarts and those WITHOUT a drinking issue to really ‘put it to work’…

Hell-o-ween Dress Unrest

Halloween.  Time to dress up.  Or down.  Or in most cases for the women, undress.

It was a slow night and conversation sparse, but one in particular took place that sounded way to familiar.  Dialogue that takes place every year about this time.  Freak Fest, Ahoy!

To make a long story not so long, a group of Valley Girls were talkin ’bout who they were going as this year.

Why do chicks always make such a big deal about the little dental floss costume they’re going to wear this year.  We need to rename Halloween, “Closet Whore Admiration Day.”  Oh c’mon, that’s all it is people; and you know it.  A lady in the living room and a whore in the bedroom.  It’s 2008 and by peoples behavior in the bar, they, well, let’s just say nothing’s forbidden anymore it seems.

I wish bitches quit being insecure about shit.  If you like dick (or clits if the case may be) just be you; don’t have a ‘holiday’ be your excuse to dress down.  If you feel comfortable dressing a certain way then let you be you.

It’s like people who always have sex in the bedroom and no other room in the house.  Once a month.  In the same position.  In under 20 minutes.

…or less.

Chickies, stop making excuses for wearing th fishnets and micro mini skirt or the ass-less chaps.  If you aren’t comfortable with YOU, you may as well toss in the towel right now.

Whether you go home alone and wash your face of make-up or home with a partner and your “clothes” end up on the floor like a prom dress and you’re face down ass up – dress the way YOU want to dress and do it smartly.

Please.

…and Thank You.

P.S.  On the same note, please ladies be FRIGGIN’ SMART when you’re out.

• DO NOT Drink beyond comprehension.

Watch you ass because not all your ‘friends’ are good friends.

Cocktail Condoms & Common Sense

Please forgive me people; it’s been a long 4 days and my eyes need toothpicks like Fred Flintstone…

I remember seeing this post from Jess last summer and thought I should breathe life into it here in the Midwest.  Enjoy and check out her position on your side of the bar. (She’s retired from bartending.)

…cocktail waitress Karri Cormican and bartendress Hannah Bridgeman-Oxley … thwarted a potential rapist who tried to drug his date’s beer. Twice. The waitress spotted the first incident when her female customer was in the restroom. Rather than pretend it was none of her business, she fed the couple a line about the beer being bad and promptly replaced it with a clean one (saving the adulterated beer for the cops). As the waitress was privately informing the woman outside about what had happened, the bartender caught him doing it again. This time they called the cops. The guy’s been sentenced to a year in jail.

The woman, of course, was lucky that her hostesses were 1) paying attention and 2) felt an obligation to act. As this instance demonstrates, not every date rape case is the result of drunken stupidity a lá Girls Gone Wild (note: if you’re ever in a bar that has actual signs posted on “How to Avoid Having Your Drink Drugged,” that’s probably not a bar you want to spend time in. And yes, I actually saw this sign in a bar once).

Which is all just to say:

Bartenders, pay attention! Your job doesn’t end at mixing drinks and handing out change. You have an obligation to try your best to maintain a safe environment for your guests.
And drinkers, pay attention! Don’t rely on others to save your ass; drink smart and make sure you’re not opening yourself up to opportunists.

If we each took a little responsibility, we could probably prevent a lot of unsavory crap from going down, and you’d never need to utter the words “I’ll take a pack of cocktail condoms” again.

Jess Sand: http://barstories.blogspot.com/