:: Life on Planet Dan-E ::

:: Friday, December 23, 2005 ::

:: Hi-ho, Hi-ho P.II ::

So I've spent the last three evenings training at this restaurant and so far, it's been pretty nice. The managers aren't dickheads, the other waiters are very friendly, and the best part is that they provide all trainees with a free meal at the end of the day. I can't remember the last time I had a really good seafood dinner three nights in a row. And you have to love the fact that even on my second day of training, they talked me into staying for the company Christmas party, where I was forced to ingest quite a bit of free beer and food. (I would have blogged about this sooner but I've been, uhh, distracted the last few nights.)

Training on the floor has been easy since I have a few years as a server under my belt but the hard part is that they're quite adamant about memorizing as much of the menu as possible. It may not seem demanding at first until I saw that they have 15 different items under sauces and dressings alone. I've spent the last few mornings studying the Training Manual (which by the way, is a letter-sized book that's an inch thick, just to be a damn WAITER. I'm not complaining) trying to learn the various ingredients and the order-taking ritual. Ever been to a restaurant where after you order a dish, there's a seemingly interminable succession of choices regarding your meal? (How would you like that cooked? Would you like soup, salad, or pasta? What kind of dressing? Marinara or white clam sauce? Paper or plastic? Spit or swallow? Sorry, I'm digressing...) That's us. Which is good for the customer but kind of a pain for us to learn the procedure. Seriously, I don't think I studied this hard in college (which goes a long way towards explaining why I didn't finish art school till I turned 31).

Luckily, the staff is pretty nice and it's like every South Beach restaurant I've worked at in that I'm sometimes the token straight guy. I don't wanna say the majority of waitstaff is really gay but you couldn't find a bigger flame on the grill during a flare-up. Not that there's anything wrong with that. There are four girls on the staff as well (not including Hector) who are all also very friendly and everyone's helped us newbies feel right at home. Anyway, give it a week I should have some interesting stories to blog about.

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 12:34 AM [+] :: | 0 comments
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