90210 Reunion
 

Her teeth? Her left eye is about half an inch higher than her right one. This bothers me to no end. Am I the only one who can see it?

Look:
http://www.shannen-doherty.net/magaz...nnen_mag29.jpg

TM

Restaurant tipping
 

Me too. I can't stand it when people get all calculator-y with deducting the tax. Be the person who makes the waitress happy.

90210 Reunion
 

She's just all wrong. As for her teeth, they are obviously caps, bad ones at that -- my guess is they are porcelain over metal rather than just porcelain. It could be that the metal, which should only be visible at the margins by the gums, is casting a shadow.

More likely it's dirt.

Survivor
 

Seriously MR, did I not leave enough of a spoiler space?

If so, I apologize to all and will ensure I make it bigger next time.

And if it makes you feel any better, if I wanted to piss you off I'd insult you personally. But you haven't given me a reason, at least not yet. No, you needn't give me one now. ;)

PJ

Restaurant tipping
 

A young cousin of mine (too young to actually pick up a check) pointed out a particularly easy way of calculating the tip for those less mathematically inclined -- double the tax, round up. Of course, this works best for those of us living in high sales tax states. (Yee-ha!)

I always tip 20% on the subtotal (rather easy to calculate by moving a decimal point and doubling), unless I am really tired and/or the place is really dark and then I tip 20% on the total because it's easier to find.

E/O

Restaurant tipping
 

I've been doing the double the tax thing for years, though I generally add a dollar or two if doubling the tax doesn't look like it's enough.

Restaurant tipping
 

the original question was an academic question, I think. practically, once you get to the approximate 20%, you have to round up anyway. if I'm leaving cash tip, it just seems cheap to be counting out change to get to the 20%, so I round up to nearest $. if paying by card, I can't leave anything other than dollar increments.
the thing that seems unfair is the difference between a 3.95 a plate diner, and a 20$ entree, with 8$ side dish restaurant. it just seems like the diner waitstaff does almost as much work for a fraction of the tip.
are you suppose to tip 20% on the cost of overpriced wine? once, me and another associate on firm card with clients, my card, but the guy ordered the wine. I wasn't listening. the bill was $1500, half for the wine. do you tip 20% on that total? I did figuring I'm in trouble anyway.

Where there's smoke, there's ...
 

Further evidence that the "smoke police" are not, in fact, now becoming regulars in these clean air establishments.

From today's NY Post cover story:

CIG BAN LEAVES LOT OF 'EMPTIES'

By JEANE MacINTOSH
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
May 12, 2003 -- Business at New York bars and restaurants has plummeted by as much as 50 percent in the wake of the smoking ban - and the drop has already sparked layoffs and left some establishments on the brink of shutting their doors, a Post survey has found. At Ruddy & Dean, a Staten Island hangout near a courthouse that's popular with district attorneys, lawyers and judges, bar business has been slashed by half.

"If it weren't for private parties, I'd shut down," said owner Danny Mills.

Business at Bill's Gay '90s in Midtown is off 50 percent overall. "If this keeps up, some of us might as well just close up shop," manager Richie Sporacchio complained.

The two longtime New York establishments are just two of 50 the Post has randomly selected - from beer joints to the city's most exclusive eateries - to survey.

The new law prohibits smoking inside bars and restaurants but allows outdoor cafés to designate 25 percent of their tables for smokers. Cigar bars are exempt. Most of the establishments said they began complying with the law April 1, and most said they're suffering heavily because of the ban.

A half-dozen of those surveyed either laid off staff last month or are cutting back hours for bartenders and waiters because of slow business.

Across all five boroughs, 34 of the 50 businesses queried have shown a decline in business since April. Twenty-nine of those said their drops ranged from 10 percent to as much as 50 percent. The median of those reporting declines was a 30 percent cut in business...."

Full article found here

Restaurant tipping
 

Okay. The conversation was done to death in resevoir dogs:

NICE GUY EDDIE
Okay, everybody cough up green for the little lady.

Everybody whips out a buck, and throws it on the table. everybody, that is, except Mr. White.

NICE GUY EDDIE
C'mon, throw in a buck.

MR. WHITE
Uh-uh. I don't tip.

NICE GUY EDDIE
Whaddaya mean you don't tip?

MR. WHITE
I don't believe in it.

NICE GUY EDDIE
You don't believe in tipping?

MR. PINK
(laughing)
I love this kid, he's a madman, this guy.

MR. BLONDE
Do you have any idea what these ladies make? They make shit.

MR. WHITE
Don't give me that. She don't make enough money, she can quit.

Everybody laughs.

NICE GUY EDDIE
I don't even know a Jew who'd have the balls to say that. So let's
get this straight. You never ever tip?

MR. WHITE
I don't tip because society says I gotta. I tip when somebody deserves a tip. When somebody really puts forth an effort, they deserve a little something extra. But this tipping automatically, that shit's for the birds. As far as I'm concerned, they're just doin their job.

MR. BLUE
Our girl was nice.

MR. WHITE
Our girl was okay. She didn't do anything special.

MR. BLONDE
What's something special, take ya in the kitchen and suck your dick?

They all laugh.

NICE GUY EDDIE
I'd go over twelve percent for
that.

MR. WRITE
Look, I ordered coffee. Now we've been here a long fuckin time, and she's only filled my cup three times. When I order coffee, I want it filled six times.

MR. BLONDE
What if she's too busy?

MR. WHITE
The words "too busy" shouldn't be in a waitress's vocabulary.

NICE GUY EDDIE
Excuse me, Mr. White, but the last thing you need is another cup of coffee.

They all laugh.

MR. WHITE
These ladies aren't starvin to death. They make minimum wage.
When I worked for minimum wage, I wasn't lucky enough to have a job that society deemed tipworthy.

NICE GUY EDDIE
Ahh, now we're getting down to it. It's not just that he's a cheap
bastard--

MR. ORANGE
--It is that too--

NICE GUY EDDIE
--It is that too. But it's also he couldn't get a waiter job. You
talk like a pissed off dishwasher: "Fuck those cunts and their
fucking tips."

MR. BLONDE
So you don't care that they're counting on your tip to live?

Mr. White rubs two of his fingers together.

MR. WHITE
Do you know what this is? It's the world's smallest violin,
playing just for the waitresses.

MR. BLONDE
You don't have any idea what you're talking about. These
people bust their ass. This is a hard job.

MR. WHITE
So's working at McDonald's, but you don't feel the need to tip
them. They're servin ya food, you should tip em. But no, society
says tip these guys over here, but not those guys over there. That's bullshit.

MR. ORANGE
They work harder than the kids at McDonald's.

MR. WHITE
Oh yeah, I don't see them cleaning fryers.

MR. BROWN
These people are taxed on the tips they make. When you stiff 'em, you cost them money.

MR. BLONDE
Waitressing is the number one occupation for female non-college
graduates in this country. It's the one jab basically any woman
can get, and make a living on. The reason is because of tips.

MR. WHITE
Fuck all that.

They all laugh.

MR. WHITE
Hey, I'm very sorry that the government taxes their tips. That's fucked up. But that ain't my fault. it would appear that waitresses are just one of the many groups the government fucks in the ass on a regular basis. You show me a paper says the government shouldn't do that, I'll sign it. Put it to a vote, I'll vote for it. But what I won't do is play ball. And this non-college bullshit you're telling me, I got two words for that: "Learn to fuckin type." Cause if you're expecting me to help out with the rent, you're in for a big fuckin surprise.

MR. ORANGE
He's convinced me. Give me my dollar back.


Everybody laughs. Joe's comes back to the table.

JOE
Okay ramblers, let's get to rambling. Wait a minute, whodidn't throw in?

MR. ORANGE
Mr. White.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
Mr. White?
(to Mr. White)
Why?

MR. ORANGE
He don't tip.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
He don't tip?
(to Mr. White)
You don't tip? Why?


MR. ORANGE
He don't believe in it.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
He don't believe in it?
(to Mr. White)
You don't believe in it?

MR. ORANGE
Nope.

JOE
(to Mr. Orange)
Shut up!
(to Mr. White)
Cough up the buck, ya cheap bastard, I paid for your goddamn
breakfast.

MR. WHITE
Because you paid for the breakfast, I'm gonna tip. Normally I wouldn't.

JOE
Whatever. Just throw in your dollar, and let's move. (to Mr. Blonde) See what I'm dealing with here. Infants. I'm fuckin dealin with infants.

Restaurant tipping
 

I think that it's easier to just allocate $2 for every ten rather than getting into complicated calulcations unless the service is really bad. As in our waitress this weekend - kids started really acting up, we asked for boxes and our check ASAP so that we could get out of there and spare the other patrons. We then watched the waitress flit around for a while - she apparently forgot until she came to our table and said, "can I get you anything else, coffee, dessert - a babysitter," - not funny when we had asked for the check 15 minutes ago so that we could leave.

I haven't waitressed in very long time - I wonder if they IRS still automatically taxes them on a percentage of gross sales. As I recall, you could really get screwed tax wise if people stiffed you on tips all of the time.

Aroma Assault
 

I'm thinking of pressing charges against a number of old women I've passed on the streets lately.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/South/05/....ap/index.html

[Spree: A woman was arrested for dousing herself with perfume, spraying the house with bug killer and disinfectant, and burning scented candles in an attempt to seriously injure her chemically sensitive husband]

TM

Restaurant tipping
 

I am a simpleton. I don't figure percentages of anything. I like round numbers so I use the tip to round. Of course, I make sure it looks sufficient -- for example, a tab of $41.09 (including tax you cheapasses) will garner a tip like $18.91 or $13.91 depending on whether or not the waitress/waiter skedaddled over with a fresh beer before I was forced to start licking the inside of an empty bottle. I admit it, I am an overtipper most times. It is either because my mother (bitch) was a barmaid at one point and always stressed tipping to us (that, and we always stacked our dishes which to this day gets me rude looks in the "nicer" restaurants because apparently a "lady" should not bus her own table -- I am a fucking moron) or else it is my overwhelming need to be liked by strangers which forces me to buy them off.

If you ask me, I don't know how or why we became such a society of tippers. There are tip jars fucking everywhere nowadays. I mean, I already paid the owner for the service/meal/whatever, why should I have to pay his employee too, isn't that his job as an employer? The government should get off its ass and revoke the laws that permit these cheap fuckers to pay people less than minimum wage. I mean it, eating out ain't exactly inexpensive and it sucks to also have to make up for the fact that the cheap son of a bitch who owns the place won't pay a decent wage. Next thing you know, I will have to start tipping the rude fucking checkout girl at the grocery store. Fuck.

ThrashersFan

Restaurant tipping
 

CTD, thanks for that. Since I never saw the movie, I didn't get Str8's joke last week. I mistakenly thought he was just plain mean. :eek: (I've waited tables and worked as a secretary and would choose the former any day.)

The pissed off dishwasher line is my favorite. It explains why I hated tipping out to the bartenders (though I made sure not to show it).

Restaurant tipping
 

I have a bit of a problem with "expected" tips, even if the service sucks. But as far as tipping goes, I think it is a good custom. When I was a waitress/bartender, it used to make me motivated to know that the better job I did, the more money I would make.

Of course my best tips were kind of unexpected and nothing really to do with my service - like my regular customer who would always tip in lottery tickets and once I won $1000 (and he was such a sweetie that he totally refused to take his share). And that guy who played (still plays?) Cass Winthrop on Another World who tipped 100% ($200 on $200) for no reason at all. (Maybe he mistook my "who are you - I know you from somewhere" stare as deep concern for his well-being or something - in any event, it was much appreciated).

Restaurant tipping
 

In order to make up for an industry that lobbied to pay its workers $2-odd an hour as an initial response to our voluntary tipping to say thank you, because with that plus full min wage then waitstaff were in danger of earning enough to actually live humanely on. Now it's enshrined in law as a way to let restaurants jack their staff and will just not change, so lousy as it is please suck it up without taking it out on the innocent waiter.

End of populist rant. I tip well for good service, cut slack for inexperienced-so-still-not-stellar but enthusiastic service, won't tip for someone simply reads my order off to someone else from behind a counter but do tip the person who fills it, and have no time or money for some wench of a waiter who takes her problems with her crappy boss out on customers.