» Restaurants, Kitchens and Bars... Oh my!

Always Open
For a few years I worked as a waiter at a well-known chain restaurant in North America. Its main money maker is breakfast, but our location did a brisk business at night as we were up the street from some famous and large cowboy bars.

The saddest day I ever worked there was Christmas. I volunteered to work the counters instead of a sections of tables. As we were one of the only restaurants open, we were incredibly busy with every seat taken, even at the counters. It seemed that every 55ish single male with no family or friends who wanted to have a Christmas meal came to sit at my counters that day. Of course, I was too busy to chat, let alone spend time listenening to some old crank complain. But the sad part is that we all knew there was nothing wrong with the service given the class of restaurant. The issue was really that these guys needed a reason to force someone to talk to them, and I was to busy to help.

But mostly, I worked on the graveyard shift 11 to 7, mainly dealing with drunks trying to sober up before driving through the police stop-checks, and the "coffee bums" who spent every night of their lives in the restaurant nursing a bottomless cup of horrible coffee for 70 cents a day.

Of course, it was hard and chaotic, but there was a warm sense of brothers-in-arms about the staff, which is really what I want to talk about.

When you wake up at 9 pm, and go to sleep at noon, you're on a different wavelength than other people. When they're just waking up, you're just getting off shift ready to go home and relax. I'd stop at the gas station on the way home to buy smokes, and the attendant and other customers would look at me like I'm from another planet, but they wouldn't know why they felt that way.

My fondest memories of that time are the poker games Sunday morning 8 o'clock after work. We'd crank the heavy metal music, drink and smoke hash and cigarettes, gambling the waiters tip money while the neighbours went to church. The level of play wasn't that sophisticated, so I always made money.

Sorry for the lack of sabotaged food stories. We took pride in our jobs, even as we laughed at them. Twenty years later, I still have vivid memories of those days.
(Mon 24th Jul 2006, 4:41, More)

» Faking it

Validate assumptions
Years ago, and for many years, I cultivated marijuana, as did most of my friends. I did reasonably well, until I had a child and gave all the money to his mother. Some of my friends are still going. Many of them are millionaires now.

A necessary part of the work is maintaining a respectable identity and cover story for various suspicious activities. From keeping neighbours happy and unsuspecting to laundering large quantities of foreign currency, practically all aspects of public interaction have an element of deception.

The technique I found to be best is to be a blank slate and accept the assumptions that people make, just like in improvisational acting. Avoid "blocking". Whatever the other person says, just go along with it. The person will feel gratified that her assumption was correct, and won't question any further. The real trick is to avoid hesitation. If you are too slow to validate, then uncertainty sets in.

Now for the funny story:

It is difficult to maintain a facade, and very tiring mentally sometimes. The girlfriend of my friend told me the story of when she had had enough and decided to break up with him.

She was skiing with her brother and and his friend, and on the chair lift, the friend wanted to know the local price of marijuana.

As growers, we typically deal in quantities of tens or hundreds of pounds. For a friend, we might sell as small as a quarter pound for a favour. More often, I would just give it to them.

So when the brother's friend asked, "How much does a quarter cost?", as in quarter ounce, she jumped in with, "About $900."

They looked at her wondering what the Hell she was talking about. It took her a second or two to realise they weren't talking about pounds.

It was then that she knew she needed to go.
(Sun 13th Jul 2008, 0:17, More)

» Encounters with Royalty

In the weeds
After I dropped out of university, I moved into a farmhouse north of town, about halfway to the airport. I did a little indoor farming myself there, and became enamoured with the lifestyle.

I began to enjoy the emptiness and quiet of the neighborhood. We were only 45 minutes from a small city in the wilderness British Columbia, Canada, but at certain times of the day, traffic ceased and one could feel all alone in the world.

I wore Salvation Army store clothes, and drove an old pickup. With the secrecy of my particular type of farming, I became a caricature of a backwoods yahoo.

One day, I was driving towards town on the highway, and had stopped at a red light waiting to turn left. I felt a little goofy waiting there as there was no one else on the road, but I wasn't in a hurry, and it would be just my luck to have a cop come over the hill just as I was running the light.

Then suddenly, a cop did come over the hill. He was riding a motorcycle at speed, and quickly slowed down to come to a stop right in front of me in the middle of the intersection. He signalled for me to stay where I was. Then another motorcycle cop sped by. Soon after, a large new black limosine cruised through the intersection against the light, which had changed.

I suddenly realised this was a high security VIP being escorted by the RCMP. It was an almost surreal situation to find myself in. I was totally alone on the road except for these cops and the limo, and it happened so fast.

It wasn't until after the limo sped by, with the passenger giving the royal wave to the non-existent crowd that I remembered that Prince Edward was in town for a visit.
(Tue 8th Aug 2006, 21:03, More)

» Amazing displays of ignorance

Vancouver Island
When I first moved to Vancouver Island, I noticed many trades vans with the name "Van Isle" printed on the side. Van Isle Windows, Van Isle Plumbing, Van Isle Electric, etc.

For months I thought, "Wow. That Dutch family has a lot of businesses here."
(Sun 21st Mar 2010, 5:24, More)

» Pet Peeves

Myself hates this
Over the last few years, it has become popular to say "myself" instead of "me", as if it makes whatever one is saying more formal. It just makes the person sound like a boob.

For example, Star War II was diminished for me, because Obi-wan tells Anakin, "Don't take any action until you hear either from the council or myself." Aaarrghh!!! Obi-wan is supposed to be a wise Jedi. Here, he sounds like a mis-educated mid-level government official trying and failing to sound intelligent.

It starting bothering me to the point that I would write to publications that perpetuated this mistake, but I gave up after a while. It just became overwhelming. I just hope this fad will pass, and this illogical use of the reflexive pronoun will not become accepted usage.
(Sat 3rd May 2008, 5:49, More)