I woke this morning to a thud, and when I sat up I found Wyatt, dazed and I daresay a little embarrassed, shaking out the cobwebs on the floor next to the bed. It was early, and though I had sworn to sleep until at least eleven, I was already wide awake, so I stumbled downstairs for some coffee.

Last night I bartended a wedding for some douchey former frat kid types. It's funny how they can get older (and look even older than they are, thanks to the fake tanning and whatnot) and never change. By "funny", I of course mean pathetic and gross. There were two girls there who were so plastic and terrifying that I couldn't stop staring at them. The Blonde One was bitchy and never made eye contact with me no matter what. The other two bartenders were guys, you see, so she had no use for me. She and her Hooker-like Friend both bought a round of shots from FB, and they bought one for him and "the other guy bartender" as well. But not for me. Not that I wanted one, mind you, but that is a really shitty thing to do. I think she was pissed off because my tits were nicer than hers and I didn't have to buy them. Her Hooker-like Friend was brunette, scarily tan, and wearing a skimpy white top with no bra (to a wedding- very classy) and short shorts. She kept standing with her chest puffed out like a rooster - also very classy - and one hand on her hip. They were loud in an attention-seeking way, and nobody at the wedding liked them except the two guys they were with. I think it is possible that they were both hookers. If so, I hope they weren't expensive.
There was another chick who was also incredibly bitchy to me. She was actually attractive, dark-haired and with a sense of style that wasn't as cookie cutter as everyone else in the room, but her attitude pretty much ruined it. After the second time she barked an order at me I stopped asking what she wanted and started opening her shitty domestic beer and shoving it at her when I saw her coming.
I swear to the gods, despite the snarky nature of these missives, I am actually a very nice person behind the bar. After all, it doesn't behoove me to start off an evening acting put out that people expect me to wait on them. I actually enjoy my job quite a bit, and my philosophy as a bartender has always been to treat people like they are my guests. The problem comes when your party gets crashed by assholes. When that happens, I can't help but respond. Luckily my boss had warned me in advance that these were "Horrible people," so I was ready. My expectations were low and my tolerance was high.
There was a couple there with two children. The woman was pretty in a soccer mom way, blonde and yuppie, with a balding blonde husband and two Hitler Youth kids that kept being fed soda after sugary caffeinated soda. They got more hyper and more annoying, and their parents got madder and more reactionary. Made me want to kill them all. The guy had a one word vocabulary: "Guinness." This was grunted at each of us bartenders in turn, without a please, a thank you, or an acknowledgment that we were, in fact, people. I started saying "You're welcome very loudly each time I set a drink in front of him. It didn't have any effect. To those people we aren't people, after all, we're The Help. Well, The Help was getting paid by the Father Of The Bride, one of maybe two nice people in the whole room, and The Help had a guarantee, so The Help kept their heads down, smiled and laughed and joked with TFOTB, and put as many drinks as possible across the bar. I poured the well drinks STOUT, dreaming of the wretched morning that would follow for those people and their toilets.
The band was horrible, too. They played some old Motown songs and what would have been cool soul numbers, but they were so white that everything sounded like J1mmy Fucking Buffett. It was horrible. At least they were nice, though. At one point I served one of them a beer, and I said

"You must be in the band."

"Because of my shirt?"

"No. Because you actually said 'please'."

He looked horrified, then pulled out his wallet and stuffed a few dollars in the empty tip jar.

When all was said and done I made an assload of money for not very much work. And, unlike those people, I didn't have to wake up and be-well, one of them.


Finally finished Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste. Fucking brilliant. Have started The Yiddish Policemen's Union, by Michael Chabon. I'm also due to pick up a book from the b.h.'s mom tomorrow. I started reading it when we bought it for her, then gave it to her, and now I need to borrow it back and finish it before his sister leaves town on the 12th, so she can read it on the plane going home. So I haven't been very good at reading this month, but I'm starting to get better. My hours at the BS2 are about to get cut for the season, so I suspect that I'll start tearing through books again.