Today was my first bar shift at Chili's Conifer ... I loved it. I absolutely love being behind the bar. It's my own little domain, I set it up in the morning the way I like it, nobody else comes back there and everything is right where I need it. Love it!! Here are some other pros of being behind the bar:
1. When I have nothing else to do, I'm expected to stand around and chat with my customers. Which I like to do anyway as a server, but never have time for.
2. No kids. I like kids when they're well-behaved, and when the parents are well-behaved, but let's face it ... how often does that happen? Exactly. So no kids is awesome.
3. I'm never REALLY all that bored ... I mean, it wasn't super busy today, but there are always dishes to wash, fruit to cut, things to clean. Occasionally drinks to make, beer to restock, kegs to change.
4. It pays well. It wasn't busy today, like I said, but I made $27 off six people, and that doesn't even include tipout. So I made as much money today as I would have on the floor, only I did less work and had more fun.
5. I'm working in Conifer, with windows on three sides of me, and it is absolute gorgeous, especially with a dusting of snow all around. What a view to have at work.
6. Ditto for the drive.
7. The money is fantastic for the amount of work I put in. I suppose it takes an extra level of skill to be a bartender and be able to multitask ... but ... seriously. I stand around and chat and make a few drinks and make as much as I do running my ass off as a server.
So now that's my Sunday shift. Yippee!
And a random thought about technology and music: My iPod is on the fritz right now. I may just have to get a new one -- it's old. And my car is old, too, it's a '93 Volvo that has a radio and a tape deck. As in cassette tape. I love my car, it's fantastic and classy and fun, but I have no CD player, and I don't even know where to buy blank cassette tapes. So I think it's kind of interesting how my car was musically bereft in the years after CD and before MP3. Once I get an iPod figured out, I can listen to my music in my car to my heart's content. Meanwhile, I have KGNU, with its spiritual and news programs, its reggae show on Saturdays from 1 to 3 and general good listening material.
I do need to get a speaker replaced in ol' Volvy, though. One of the back speakers is blown and crackles like crazy and drives me a little bit nuts sometimes.
Showing posts with label bartending. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bartending. Show all posts
Sunday, October 14, 2007
Monday, September 24, 2007
Update
Just in case anyone needs to catch up on the happenings in my life ...
1. Saw Spamalot last week. It was highly amusing and I would recommend seeing it to any fan of Monty Python. There were references to other Python skits and movies, which were probably over most people's heads. I was also rather underdessed for the theater, I discovered -- nice jeans and a black velvet top and white Pumas are, apparently, not good enough. So now I know (it really HAS been a long time since I'd been to the Denver Center for the Performing Arts).
2. Then this weekend I went to the drive-in movie for the very first time ever! I know -- at the lofty old age of 26, I should have been taking more advantage of this wonderful feature of Denver. Sorry, people. I got to see Halloween (not as scary as the original) and Superbad (very funny). I wasn't expecting the kind of crowd that was there -- a little more ghetto than I thought it would be. Still a great time, complete with drag queens and a scary little concession stand selling questionable food. I hope it doesn't close next year -- I'd like to go again. Double features rule.
3. I will be leaving my post as a competent Sunday lunch worker at Chili's Applewood after October 7. I'm going to start driving to Conifer for my Sunday lunches, where they'll let me work the bar. I'm pretty excited about this development. Working behind the bar is a gajillion times more fun than on the floor, no one else gets to be back there so everything should be more or less in order, I get paid to do nothing but stand around and talk to my customers, and occasionally make a drink. Applewood was sad to see me go -- they even went so far as to ask if there was anything they could do to change my mind. Nope!
There's one server there who is one of those girls who has to find something bad in whatever it is you're doing. She reminds me of another Chili's girl from Columbia. So, for example, I tell her I'm leaving and she's like, "Does it ever get busy up there?" I told her at the moment it's a little slow, but once winter hits, people will not want to be driving down the mountain for their drinking and dining needs. Plus Conifer is the type of place where I can build up a clientele like the regulars we had in Columbia. Either way, it's better than working the floor on Sundays in Applewood. Then she's like, "Yeah -- except for the DRIVE." Um, hello? I live in Morrison. The drive is pretty much the same to both stores. She didn't really know what to say then; I'd taken the wind out of her "I-have-to-find-something-about-this-situation-that-you-don't-like" sails.
4. I love KGNU community radio (AM 1390). I like radio news. I like the music they play (seriously -- a three-hour reggae slot on Saturday? Sweet!). I've discovered some new artists since listening and it is now my favorite radio station, hands-down. I do, however, still enjoy Slacker and Steve on Alice 105.9 FM. Their afternoon show is pretty funny and very interesting to listen to, although I could do without their choice of music most of the time.
5. Lately there's been a lot out there about the power of thought (The Secret, What the Bleep do We Know). I think there is a balance at work here -- your thoughts don't entirely control the universe, but they do affect things beyond what most of us are willing to acknowledge. I find myself, in certain day-to-day interactions with people I don't like, thinking to myself, "Wow. I really don't like this person." I wonder if I were able to stop that vein of thinking, if I would feel more kindly toward these people.
Just food for thought (ha!)
1. Saw Spamalot last week. It was highly amusing and I would recommend seeing it to any fan of Monty Python. There were references to other Python skits and movies, which were probably over most people's heads. I was also rather underdessed for the theater, I discovered -- nice jeans and a black velvet top and white Pumas are, apparently, not good enough. So now I know (it really HAS been a long time since I'd been to the Denver Center for the Performing Arts).
2. Then this weekend I went to the drive-in movie for the very first time ever! I know -- at the lofty old age of 26, I should have been taking more advantage of this wonderful feature of Denver. Sorry, people. I got to see Halloween (not as scary as the original) and Superbad (very funny). I wasn't expecting the kind of crowd that was there -- a little more ghetto than I thought it would be. Still a great time, complete with drag queens and a scary little concession stand selling questionable food. I hope it doesn't close next year -- I'd like to go again. Double features rule.
3. I will be leaving my post as a competent Sunday lunch worker at Chili's Applewood after October 7. I'm going to start driving to Conifer for my Sunday lunches, where they'll let me work the bar. I'm pretty excited about this development. Working behind the bar is a gajillion times more fun than on the floor, no one else gets to be back there so everything should be more or less in order, I get paid to do nothing but stand around and talk to my customers, and occasionally make a drink. Applewood was sad to see me go -- they even went so far as to ask if there was anything they could do to change my mind. Nope!
There's one server there who is one of those girls who has to find something bad in whatever it is you're doing. She reminds me of another Chili's girl from Columbia. So, for example, I tell her I'm leaving and she's like, "Does it ever get busy up there?" I told her at the moment it's a little slow, but once winter hits, people will not want to be driving down the mountain for their drinking and dining needs. Plus Conifer is the type of place where I can build up a clientele like the regulars we had in Columbia. Either way, it's better than working the floor on Sundays in Applewood. Then she's like, "Yeah -- except for the DRIVE." Um, hello? I live in Morrison. The drive is pretty much the same to both stores. She didn't really know what to say then; I'd taken the wind out of her "I-have-to-find-something-about-this-situation-that-you-don't-like" sails.
4. I love KGNU community radio (AM 1390). I like radio news. I like the music they play (seriously -- a three-hour reggae slot on Saturday? Sweet!). I've discovered some new artists since listening and it is now my favorite radio station, hands-down. I do, however, still enjoy Slacker and Steve on Alice 105.9 FM. Their afternoon show is pretty funny and very interesting to listen to, although I could do without their choice of music most of the time.
5. Lately there's been a lot out there about the power of thought (The Secret, What the Bleep do We Know). I think there is a balance at work here -- your thoughts don't entirely control the universe, but they do affect things beyond what most of us are willing to acknowledge. I find myself, in certain day-to-day interactions with people I don't like, thinking to myself, "Wow. I really don't like this person." I wonder if I were able to stop that vein of thinking, if I would feel more kindly toward these people.
Just food for thought (ha!)
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