Dumbass Award For February 2014

“When I think over what I have said, I envy dumb people.”~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca

Wow. Well, I knew that this was coming soon. I could feel it in my bones. The problem was that I never thought it would hit on a local level. 

“You always hear about it happening. But you never thought it would happen to you.” Yeah that. EXACTLY that! 

So here I am on Friday evening, sweating the weekend. Knowing that this is not going to be fun. In fact the entire weekend is going to be nothing but not-fun-for-me full.

Instead of going into a panic, such as running out into the middle of the street, pulling what hairs I have left on my head from getting my head buzzed a few weeks ago, and ultimately getting hit by a bus or some idiot without a license, I went for the “next best thing” and asked the neighbors to take me out of this place for a while because it was going to be the only escape I would receive for the entire weekend. 

Sadly though this means that my suggestion to go out to eat comes with the fiscal responsibility of paying for the guy driving me there, and his wife. But I struck a deal with him that he was to know full and well that I would be reimbursed once he was paid next week. And any and all debts that were still outstanding with me would also be paid. 

He agreed and then we went to his wife to see what she thought about the idea. And she didn’t get what we were pitching at her. We had to walk her through it with baby steps. 

Finally, we were up and on our way to go out to eat at a restaurant of THEIR selection. $42 was the bill and I was told that $26 (plus tip) would be added to their current debt and be paid off next week. 

But I will say this before I go into the reasons why the nomination was so close to home. I was out of the house for nearly three hours, and the time just melted away. Everything that I had been poisoning my mind… I hadn’t even thought of. I am sooooo  thankful for that. 

So at the end of our evening, our waiter by the name of Jose came by and asked if we needed anything more. We declined but then the neighbor’s wife spoke up. 

Holy crap! What is she doing??

She was feeling absolutely rotten because neither she or her husband could participate or pitch in on at least the tip that was being left on the table. And it was really eating her up inside. 

What does she do?? One of the weirdest and dumbest things I have ever heard in my life!!!!! 

She asks Jose for his business card. And poor Jose!! English as a second language Jose. 

Between his faulty grasp of the English language, the babies that were screaming, crying, and carrying on. The multitudes of people talking all at the same time…. he just could not understand what she was asking for. 

So he brought over someone else who was actually busy trying to direct traffic of customers who were just coming in for their dining experience of the evening. And so the neighbor’s wife again explained the following scenario as I will write it below from her point of view: 

“My husband and I were invited here as a special treat to come eat here. And we don’t get paid until Tuesday of next week. So I was wondering if y’all could give me his card.”

Confusion set in on their faces again, just like Jose. 

“What I mean is write his first and last name on one of y’all’s cards so that the next time we come in here to eat, I can give him our half of his tip for tonight. We come in here regularly, and I just wanted to make sure that we gave him his tip.” 

WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT, OVER???????

First of all, she lied. Neither she nor her husband frequent the place that much. Probably once every couple of months. That’s not “frequent” by any definition. It might be consistency, but that’s not high frequency. 

Secondly, who does that and can say that they are of sound mind?????? NOBODY! Who gives an I.O.U. for a tip?? I have never heard such ridiculousness in all of my life. 

Besides…. there was already a tip on the table that I left. It wasn’t a lot. Nor was it the “average” but I gave what I could. And this woman decides to go pull this stunt. Probably because she felt he deserved more. But when you are being treated to dinner, it is really not your responsibility. It becomes yours only if you decide to chip in. And she was wanting to but found out that she was unable to. And pulls a stunt like that. It only caused her to get strange looks and an explanation in return that there’s a privacy policy that needs to be in place to protect their employees and she was not going to get what she requested…. but thank you for coming in and come back again soon! 

I do not know what her husband thought or was thinking at the time. But we were trying to leave and she insisted that she was going to wait for that second person to come back with a card with Jose’s full name on it. We waited ten very long, boring, and grueling minutes before she saw that same person again and realized that she was going to receive nothing. 

We marched our way to the exit doors. Our stomachs full of disgusting buffet food that was probably not good for anyone to eat. And the wife again found the second person she talked to and asked for that card just one more time. By then it was just embarrassing. And I bolted out through the front door into the chilly night air as the sun had disappeared for the evening and I realized we had been gone for hours. 

This is the quality of people that I live around. NOW can I get some sympathy?????????

 

 

Excited For A New Day

“In this business, life is one long fund-raising effort. “~Alvin Ailey 

Happy to say that now since the Independence Day holiday is over, that reminds me of two very special and important things that are about to happen.

One, would be the approaching Halloween season, and I have to keep reminding myself that its coming and if I ever wanted to have my dreams come true of working at the House Of Torment, I better get my game face on.

But then “game face” reminds me of the OTHER special and important thing that is soon to happen. And that is the 2012-13 season of sledge hockey!!

Needless to say that our team is still beaming with tons of pride over the fact that we claimed third place in our first ever tournament. Yes, its still being talked about. And we have every stinkin’ right to do so and be very proud of our accomplishments.

And we now are looking forward to perhaps doing it again in the upcoming season. However, it will not be as easy for us as there is talk about it being in Pennsylvania in 2013. Philadelphia, maybe????????????

I know that the StarSkaters program in Houston is considering going. They are fully aware that they must get out there and do whatever they can to fundraise.

This actually is the time now to do fundraising for sledge hockey. At least for MY team. We lost our ice rink at the end of 2011 and we never got back on the ice to practice in our hometown. Each time we got on the ice after the closing of the rink, we had gone out of town.

So there’s the need to raise money for ice time. There’s one ice rink left in town and that’s just flooded with so many different other programs that it feels like we’re being squeezed out of it. Unless we wanna practice in the middle of the night, during the middle of the week. We had become used to our practices on Sundays.

There had been rumors of a brand new ice rink being built. But there was no clear evidence of it. Just a hole that was dug in the ground. Okay, now what? There’s still no rink.

But recently I was told that it was actually going to happen. A new rink was being built and they are expected to be open for business at the beginning of this upcoming season.

Can I get a “AMEN” anyone?

But with the good came the confusing and the potentially bad. The 501(c)3 that our team was beneath the umbrella of no longer exists. And that could possibly be a problem.

I need to find out just what is going on. We could be still under the protection of a 501(c)3 that I am not aware of.

With the financial support of other people that I am connected with, they have said in the past that the sledge hockey team needed to have their OWN non-profit going on. Suddenly I am aware that if this is true and that we are not a part of any, then we could start.

And that’s all fairly technical. I know. The team still goes on with the memories of our first tournament and the burning desire to go to Pennsylvania soon.

I spoke with the leaders of the Houston program. I asked what the magic number was.

$30,000.

They are trying to do their best with a budget without really knowing exactly when and where the tournament will take place. The idea is that with travel and lodging and everything else in between, it might cost around $2,000-3,000 per player. And Houston is wanting TEN solid players to go.

I am guessing that $30,000 is a conservative figure. It really could be a lot more. I am not sure.

So I’m set and ready to go for this new season. And I am in FULL funding mode!

I am open to any and all ideas of how this goal could be achieved. Because I do believe that it is possible. Even though it is a lot.

Both hockey programs, here and in Houston, ARE non-profit.

Any little idea that anyone can think of, please let me know in the comments. We need to get a good start at this before we attempt to hit the ice. Anything and everything is appreciated!!!!!

 

 

 

Two Cougars & A Waitress

“Oh you crack me up!”~ my neighbor

As promised, I was taken out to eat. The e-mail invitation said to get cleaned up, so I did.

Suit and tie, baby!!!!

I tossed a photograph of myself up on my Facebook profile and captioned it “Pass/Fail ?”. It didn’t receive a lot of feedback. Not sure why. But I wore it anyway.

Off I went on an adventure back and forth and up and down the Interstate because nobody knew where the hell we were going. I had to make a call to the apartment manager to make sure that we weren’t losing our minds over it all. Finally, we found our destination, Applebee’s.

I’ll shorten this experience for the reader’s sake though.

Here I am, with two of my neighbors as they wanted to take me out to eat, and increasingly I was finding that our waitress was real cute. My first thought was that she was probably still in school, so I wasn’t about to try to talk to her.

Then it came to me like a lightning bolt. They serve alcohol, and so she has to be a certain age to work there because of the alcohol serving laws. So I started warming up to her little by little.

When my neighbors saw what I was kinda starting to do, they chipped right in and started flirting really aggressively with her… in my name and honor.

By the end of it, the two neighbors received 10% off their meals, because they were senior citizens, and I ended up with a free ice cream sundae because the BOTH of them kept telling everyone that I was celebrating my birthday. Wooohoo!!! I think everyone won there.

Each and every time the waitress came and went, one of the neighbors would tell me what my next move should be.. as if they were both dating coaches.

Eventually, one of the neighbors would steal my camera off of the table. I had emptied out my pockets and put it there while searching for my wallet. She then tossed it over to the waitress for a photo. But I told her to wait until I had dessert.

So then I posed with it, then I don’t know how the heck I got it out, but I asked for her to take a photo with me. To my utter shock and surprise she agreed. I mean, I kind of really sprung it on her when I made my request.

Then one of them said, “He’s gonna put it on Facebook!!”. I jumped back saying, “NO I’M NOT!!!”.. (but YES, I AM.) However by that time, I had lost the tie and I had given my jacket to the neighbor because she was freezing cold.

After feeling so bad that I jumped her for a photo, I picked up a $5 bill from the table and attached it with another $10 bill and then added my card inside. Then I personally handed it to her myself, and she never broke eye contact when she received it and then slipped it into her apron. So she never really saw #1- the card, and #2- just how much the tip was in total.

Not sure what, if anything, will happen. The law of averages state that when she finds it, she’ll throw it away.

But one thing is for sure, even if this waitress does throw it away… the next time I am there, I’m ensured even better service from her because I was personal enough to hand deliver her tip and give a higher tip than usual.

My neighbors laughed as they watched it all unfold from a distance. I told them that I was going to put this in my blog. One of them said, “You should call it ‘Two Cougars’.”

There you have it!

So a good start to this re-birthday celebration weekend. Tomorrow, who knows???

 

Gratuity

One of the things that eludes me in life is the knowledge of what exactly should be given for gratuity. I question whether or not there is a standard scale for certain services. And I also get very confused at times on knowing when to tip as much as I get confused on how much to tip.

I have my doubts on whether or not that standard actually exists because the gratuity is based on so many different factors. Certainly, it boils down to the kind of service you receive that will determine how generous you are feeling when leaving gratuity. Many services require many various services. Sometimes it is a lot, and sometimes it isn’t. So then, how do you know and what is fair, what is good, and what is considered a moral faux pas?

Restaurants and other food services are probably the most well known places in which a person leaves a tip. The things that I believe are factored in, are the total amount of the bill, how many people in the party, and of course how well the waiting staff had offered service and help.

Some say its 15%, others suggest that you should give 18% of the bill, and even still others are now saying 20% of your total bill is what is acceptable gratuity rates. And even though I have only had a couple times of experience, there are some places that actually INCLUDE a certain amount of gratuity and include it in the total bill. Does anyone think that is right or fair? And if so, do you leave even more cash gratuity… or is that just another moral faux pas?

I am definitely not the world’s best person or authority when it comes to leaving tips and gratuity. A lot of the time, I do not leave a tip simply because I either cannot afford it or do not have the cash. If it was a scenario of not being able to afford it, that means that I have only budgeted so much money for the total bill, and have money left over to go about my business and be able to live. Mainly though, I tend to lose cash if I am not paying attention and so I don’t carry it all of the time. But I am more than happy to leave something extra on the credit card slip.

On the other hand, I have gone out of control with tipping. Once I’ve established some kind of a relationship with waiting staff, I am more than happy to let them have more than what would commonly be considered your usual tip.

I once tipped one waitress over $200 in a span of six months, all because I enjoyed her repeated awesome service for one. And because we had established a friendly connection. After frequenting the restaurant many, many times in that time span, I dumped so much cash on the table or just given it to her directly that I literally had to stop and think, “Why am I giving THIS MUCH to her? Was her service that valuable?”.

Probably not, but that’s what I had done.

Needless to say, that since that awakening I have only given her up to $5 on top of the usual gratuity.

Tipping is also important because you will want very awesome service should you happen to be in a situation where you are again with the same waiting staff. If you want their service to be the best it can be, well… let’s just say that they will remember you by what you tip. Believe me, its true.

Waiting staff, taxi drivers, bartenders, and deliver drivers all work solely on the tips that they receive. I have experienced in some ways, both sides of it. One half as the person leaving the gratuity, and the other person having hearing about how crummy people can be when they stiff the people in which they have been receiving service. These people receive squat in terms of wages, and they must live on what they receive for tips. So I really just do not know if there is a rate that is “set in stone” when it comes to gratuity.

This afternoon, I had ordered some fast food delivery. I signed off a tip on the credit card slip AND I gave some extra in cash. The delivery person looked at me like I was handing over the keys to the kingdom with his eyes bugging out of their sockets when I handed him the cash.

There are websites that try to help you determine what you should leave for tips, but again, I question it. According to this chart I read online, it said “$1.00-2.00 or 20% of total, whichever is greater.” I calculated what I had given as gratuity and found that I had given 24.5% of the total bill. So I guess I’ll live to see another day of food service delivery, if I chose to order from them again.

All in all though: I just don’t get it.