Karen says she won't tip me because of my service, but a 20% tip is required at my restaurant. Here's what happened. Subscribe to AMI The Jerk on YouTube and hit the bell for notifications.
This happened to me a few years ago and I just remembered it recently. I was working at a restaurant waiting tables in a very affluent area on the Jersey shore. We had our fair share of entitled people who were under the impression that if you threw enough money around, you could do whatever you want and treat people however you want.
And when your income depends on their tips, you kinda just have to deal with it. The restaurant had an outdoor dining in bar area that overlooked the ocean with an amazing view. During the summer, this was pretty much where everyone wanted to sit rather than our indoor dining area. And for anyone who works someplace with outdoor dining, you know the one monkey wrench that can ruin a very profitable dinner shift is the weather.
No matter how accurate the forecast says it's going to be, you can never know for sure. For the most part, we never had an issue. Because if it started to rain abruptly, there would usually be more than enough room inside for all the people who were sitting outside to move in. It's usually a mind-freak to try and keep track of which table moved where, but we always handled it without any issue. Until that one day. We had a large party booked one day in our indoor area that took up more than half of our tables.
A 50th birthday, I believe. So our indoor capacity was limited, and even on top of the party, there were customers who were weary about the weather, so they decided to sit inside also. And then more and more people started sitting outside. By manager did a quick assessment, and realized that if it started raining, we would barely have enough room inside to accommodate everyone who was sitting outside.
He told us we had to stop seating our outdoor area and to start recommending to our outdoor tables to move inside because of the impending weather. Just to be on the safe side, everyone's weather app was saying that there was a downpour coming up the coast. Everyone was okay with it, except I had a table of nine people who seemed fairly middle-aged and very wealthy.
Margaritas with top shelf tequila and gaudy looking jewelry, things like that. Each end of the table seemed to be in their own conversation, not paying attention to the other. Upon hearing about the incoming rain, I go to the woman whom my thought was in charge. She had the fakest tan of them all. We'll call her Karen. I tell her, ma'am, I'm really sorry, but because of the weather coming in and our limited seating inside, I'm gonna have to ask you folks to move inside so you don't get caught in the rain.
This Karen is so entrenched in her conversation, she doesn't even register that I, a lowly waiter, was talking to her. So I try again. Ma'am, I'm sorry for interrupting, but she cuts me off, exasperated. What? What are you saying?
I begin again. Ma'am, I'm sorry. Because of the weather coming and our inside filling up, we need you to move inside. We have a table ready for you. I can move all your drinks and everything for you. She snaps back with... The only reason we came here was to sit outside. We'll deal with the weather.
I realize she doesn't grasp what I'm saying, so I try again. Ma'am, just in case the end, then she goes from 0 to 100 and yells, we'll deal with it! She yelled so loudly that the people on the other half of her table heard. They didn't hear our prior exchange, but only heard her outburst and went back to their own conversation.
Assuming this must be normal behavior for her. She wants to deal with it on her own? You got it. So I began to take their order. Filet Mignons, a few lobster tails, expensive stuff. I put the order in and look back, and all the other tables had moved inside, because they were all rational human beings. And my table of nine entitled jerks were the only ones out there. I heard the leathery-looking Karen say to the rest of the table, Wow, we have the entire patio to ourselves.
What luxury? After a while, I looked inside and saw that the table I had held for them was taken by another party that had just walked in. The last available table. And, just as the last butt hit the seat, I felt the best feeling I possibly could have felt at that moment. A glorious raindrop tapped me on the top of my head. Oh sweet glory. Within seconds, it went from beautiful blue skies to torrential downpour.
Everyone at the table grabbed their drinks, a little watered down at this point, and ran inside. After they shook themselves dry, they looked around and realized there was nowhere for them to sit. Most of them looked dumbfounded, like a lost child in a supermarket. Karen makes a beeline to me and screams, we need a table!
I reply, I'm sorry ma'am, we're fully seated and on a wait for our indoor seating. Maybe one table on the waiting list, but a list is a list. Well, what are we supposed to do now? She hocked back at me, which led me to so eloquently say, ma'am, as you said you would, you deal with it.
I airquoted the deal with it to really emphasize that that was her response. And as I said that, everyone else at the table realized that that was our interaction earlier. And Karen had dug their graves. I felt bad for them because if they had all known the circumstances, they probably would have convinced Karen to move in. But after she raised her voice and cursed at me, all bets were off. And as serendipity would have it, at that moment, their food came out and we handed it to them.
But there they were, nine people in damp clothes holding a Cosmo in one hand and fully minion another with nowhere to sit and eat. The rest of her party convinced her to just get some boxes for their food and pay their check and leave. As I hand care in the check, she smugly says, this will be reflected in your tip.
To which I replied, ma'am, we implement a 20% tip on parties of eight or more. It's our policy, and it's clearly stated in our menu. She paid and then left with their boxed up food leaving behind their half full drinks. Best 60 bucks I ever made.
Why do you gotta be such a jerk to the wait staff? They wouldn't be trying to get your attention without a reason. They know you guys are a large party and can see you're all having a conversation. Obviously, they wouldn't interrupt unless they had something to say. And given that they're your server and there to serve you, it's probably for you that they're interrupting your conversation. Just pull your head out of your butt for 5 seconds and listen to what they have to say.
It seems like Karen may be eventually kind of listened, but it seemed to really go in one ear and out the other. Hopefully the other Karens shunned her out of the group for a while after this stunt. You can submit your own stories to be featured here on the channel. The story submission link is in the description below. And if you want to listen to some vibey music in the background, check out Easy Mode, also linked below. And don't forget to subscribe.
Entitled Kid, I'm babysitting, broke into my room and stole my diary. I was babysitting for a neighbor today while she worked. I had shut my door because I have some pretty private stuff in there. Well, as I was making lunch for us, I heard snickering coming from the dining room. I went inside and saw the kid I was watching reading my diary. Now, I have some dark stuff in there due to my past.
And this kid violated my privacy and was reading my diary. Cue a five minute chase around the house. I took the water off the stove to be safe. And man, kids are really fast. I got my diary back and their mom just got back. And the conversation went something like this. Hey, so, entitled kid went into my room and took my diary. So, just lock your door. My door doesn't lock.
I really don't like them reading my diary. There's stuff in there not for kids. Well, then why are you writing it? It's a private diary for me to vent. I have a troubled past, and writing about my feelings helps me calm down. Well, whatever, you're just overreacting about it. It's just a diary, and she hands me $15. At this point, I was so upset that I didn't really care that I didn't get paid properly. I had them leave, and I told her I wouldn't babysit for her anymore.
And I closed the door. She stood there, yelling about how I'm a horrible person for not being willing to watch her kid anymore. I just went upstairs and am now writing this post.
If the kids not gonna respect your personal space, then I don't blame you for not wanting to have him around. That being said, he is a kid. They're gonna get into things. They're curious. They want to explore every inch of that house. It is kind of up to you to make sure he can't get into anything you don't want him to get into. That being said, mom's attitude to the whole situation is really what just puts me off. She doesn't even care that her kids being a little creepin' to begin with.
And then goes ahead and stiffs you on payment just to add insult to injury. No, I don't blame you. I'd be done with them as well. It's not worth the 15 bucks.
I made my daughter do all the post-Christmas celebration cleaning because of the gift she gave to my wife. I've been with my wife for four and a half years. She suffered from breast cancer and we got married after she completed her treatment. This is also our first Christmas together as a married couple. I have a 16 year old daughter who can tolerate but not accept her stepmom and can be passive aggressive towards her sometimes.
She's done some things in the past that warranted a number of punishments, but my wife has been graceful and forgiving, saying my daughter's being a typical teenager and trying to adapt, but in my opinion, she's gotten out of control, especially with lack of consequences. There's been tension around the holiday.
And surprisingly, my daughter decided to spend Christmas with us, saying her mom went to visit her future step-dance family a few towns over. My wife was thrilled with my daughter staying with us. She prepared everything. And I helped here and there. While my daughter was on her phone the entire time, I welcomed my in-laws and we had a great time throughout the day. Christmas dinner went fine, though my wife seemed a bit upset. She refused to say what was wrong until I pressured her.
She then opened the box my daughter got her for Christmas and there was a bra inside. My wife broke down crying in the kitchen. I was fuming. I called for my daughter and confronted her about the gift, and she tried to explain that it wasn't malicious, but I disagreed and said it was, and it was purposefully done to offend her stepmom and mock her illness.
I decided to punish her by having her do all the cleaning after the guests left. But she tried to evade it by saying okay, and then turning around and calling her stepbrother to come pick her up and take her to her mother's house. I caught her at the door and kicked her stepbrother out, and told her to start cleaning up immediately. She went hysterical, yelling about how cruel I was to punish her on Christmas, and how insensitive and unlady like my wife was to be offended by the bra.
I refused to engage in her yelling matches, and made sure she did all the cleaning, which my wife said was a lot and asked me to let my daughter go to her mom's house. But I insisted not until the punishment was complete. My daughter called her stepbrother again and left later. She immediately called her mom, who came after me on social media and berated me for doing what I did and ruining Christmas for her.
I had an argument with her about what our daughter did, but she sided with her and called me abusive and a robot controlled by my wife. Though, my wife asked me to let it go. She got my former in-laws involved, and they've been criticizing me about what I did. Am I the jerk?
No, I agree that that's probably an insensitive gift to be giving someone who has breast cancer. It hasn't been stated here in this post, but we don't know how bad this was for her. If she had to have a hysterectomy or something like that, then that bras a gift is incredibly insensitive. Either way, it's probably a topic to just best be avoided overall.
It sounds like your daughter has just developed general disrespect for your new wife. And while I understand that there are some growing pains that come along with having a new stepmom, that's just completely out of line. Clearly not addressing or punishing this horrible behavior is starting to have an impact over time. I don't blame you for finally putting your foot down. At the end of the day, she can feel how she wants. But her stepmom's a nice person who's trying to do the best she can, at least show her some basic respect.
My boss wants details of my illness, so I give them every dirty detail I can think of. So at my workplace, if you're absent from work for pretty much any reason, you need to fill out an absence form. Not an overly complicated document, but it does ask you to give a line or two describing the reason for your absence.
Over the whole time I've been there, you've never needed to go into huge detail. I vomited and was not fit to work. That sort of thing. I was really sick, and I mean really sick, for the first time in years. And upon my return to work, I did my duty and filled out the form with the expected level of detail, then handed it into HR. I then find later a fresh one put on my desk with a posted saying, I haven't described my illness in enough detail.
Employees were now required to provide a more detailed account of their illness. Grabbing a fresh piece of paper, I launch into a vivid recount of the stomach and bowel-based torment my body had experienced. I describe the texture of the vomit as a gushed forth, the slow, vile tide of vile and half-digested pasta that rolled across the bathroom floor as I lay there in too much pain to move, and the absolute agony that all of the contraction that a body feels from multiple bouts of vomiting.
I added a passage about how I had to scoop the slop up with my hands and dump it in the toilet. My brow caked in cold sweat and hands shaking. I didn't forget to mention the putrid stink that happens when warm vomit splashes against a hot heater. And how the pervasive stink made everyone in the house gag. I staple the recount to the form and write, see attached in the section to describe illness. As for consequences, well, nobody said anything to me directly.
I heard from other sources that it did make the people in HR laugh and feel ill, but I was leaving a week later so I didn't really care anyway.
buddy, I get that you had to share this with HR just to prove a point, but did you have to go into so much detail for us? I'm sorry those of you who have a weak stomach that had to listen to this and maybe gag just a little bit, but seriously though, if you're feeling ill, you're feeling ill. That's just how you feel. Do they really want to know the details? Because this is what they're going to get. Are they trying to catch you in a lie or something? I mean, like our original poster said, this is the first time in years that they've been really, really sick.
I assume the issue is that they had to take a few days off and HR wanted an answer as to why they needed that much time. I feel like they might rethink this policy a little bit going forward. I accidentally started a political war between my mom and my future mother-in-law, so the outcome of this is literally happening as I type this out. First, a little context. My mom is very left on the political spectrum. My soon-to-be mother-in-law is at the complete opposite end.
I understand that politics has had some really bad repercussions over the last couple years for some families, but I'm just now beginning to witness it firsthand. My mom made a post on Facebook about condemning the invasion on the US Capitol. Someone commented on it basically saying that Antifa is planting people in there to make the right look crazy. My fiancé showed it to me and said she can comment actual substance to disprove these comments, and I encouraged her to do so because I honestly think the truth should be shared, especially if someone's passionate about
the subject, so she linked her research and my mom thanked her for the backup, and the other person didn't have a reply to it and that was the end of that, until it wasn't. My soon-to-be mother-in-law basically commented that everyone should keep an open mind, and that there's a lot of fake news being spilled by the media.
She argues that Trump has done a lot of great things that the media doesn't acknowledge, and that people shouldn't make rude comments about her president. My mom didn't realize who made this comment, and immediately replied that mother-in-law is one of the idiots who blindly follows Trump, and that if she agrees with him, then she's a traitor.
She immediately apologized after realizing who it was, and tried messaging her and texting her. But she's been unfriended, blocked, and now my fiance is having a pretty heated political discussion with her mom. We've tried apologizing on behalf of my mom, but mother-in-law is airing out all of her political beliefs. Man, I can't wait until the wedding.
Okay, well, this one is tough to comment on. I'm gonna do my best to not stir up too much crap in the comments. Let's just focus on the interaction between these two. At the end of the day, you can post whatever you want on social media. Mom posted her opinion on a subject that was a hot topic at that moment.
But mother-in-law going out of her way to comment on it about fake news is really just trying to start something. I get it, there is fake news. But guess what? It goes both ways. A lot of the news you're receiving is probably fake as well. It's hard to know what to believe nowadays. Now mom's comment back was definitely escalating things. Mother-in-law was being generally respectful and just trying to share her two cents. Unfortunately, mom didn't realize who it was.
And you're a lot more willing to lash out at a random stranger over their political beliefs on the internet than you are someone you actually know. I think this could have been played better from both sides, but honestly, everyone has their opinion. And getting heated about it on social media isn't going to actually progress the conversation at all. I guess, to sum up, just don't believe everything you read and hear, and use your head and think for yourself.
When you take things to an extreme, either left or right, then you're leaving yourself blind to other ways of thinking. The truth typically lies somewhere in the middle.
Entitled Mother thinks the outdoor gym is a park for her kids and asks me to leave. Then calls me a creep when I say no. Today, I, 18-year-old male, went to a local outdoor gym. It's a fairly basic setup. A few bars to hang off, some planks to jump onto and parallel bars. I like to do a workout after uni most days. Today was no different. I got into my workout gear and ran from where I'm staying at the moment to the outdoor gym.
I was the only one there when I got there, just like normal. Occasionally there will be one other person. After about a half hour, a mother with a few kids came. The kids would be between three and five. They started playing on some of the bars and stuff as kids do. I was fine with that. I just didn't use those bars in my circuit. While working out, the mother kept looking at me.
She would have been mid-20s or early-30s. After about 10 minutes, she came over to me and said, isn't it weird to be using a playground like this? I was confused, but responded, uh, this is an outdoor gym. Well, you should go to a real gym, so I don't have to worry about my kids. This is here for the community. I don't have an issue with kids being here, but I find it kind of rude how you're asking me to leave.
Well, if everyone's allowed here, how about you stop scaring my kids with your presence? A big guy in the playground is scary. What do you mean by that? Well, the way you're here, you're kind of being a creep. I really don't appreciate you throwing around bullcrap like that. Wow, now you're swearing? Absolutely disgusting. My kids don't need to hear this. She then left with all of her kids. Am I the jerk?
Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, if you're out at a park in public, there's people that are going to be trying to be active and healthy. That's kind of the environment for that. Yeah, there are indoor gyms, but they shouldn't have to be confined inside. Why run on a treadmill when you can run outside and enjoy the weather?
Why do pull-ups at the gym when you have a perfectly good bar at the park? It's just the environment our original poster prefers to be in. They're not being a creep because they're using a public space. Sorry, Mom. You just got to accept that there are other people in the world.
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