Today was bound to be shitty from the get-go. It's two days after Christmas - optimal time for everyone to still have family around but be fresh out of orange juice. And fucking sick of turkey. Yet, everything else in town was still closed, for reasons completely beyond me. And one of the waitresses called in sick.

I know, I know, I should be happy about a certain leve of madness after the lull we've had. But for the first three hours, I was handling the whole restaurant on my own - that's about fourteen tables at that time of day. Then for the next five, I was splitting twenty six tables with one other girl. Yyyeah.

To be fair, it didn't go nearly as poorly as it could've. I suppose people are still all festive and shit. We didn't have any walk-outs and nary a complaint- at least not that I heard of - and while the tips weren't great, all in all people were pretty chill about it.

I do, however, have one little gem for the day to demonstrate to you the perils of being a waitress. I got a new table, shamefully explained that we were out of soup, and took an order for a beef sandwich on miche, and two alsatian pizzas. Wrote it down, handed it to the kitchen. Cool.

Flapped around like a chicken for about twenty minutes.

Realised that another table of mine, who's bil had gone in after the above one, had gotten their food first. Hmmm. Investigated. Turns out, the kitchen had somehow lost the first bill.

There are a million ways that could've happened, and it wasn't really anyone's fault. We place our bills on the counter dividing the kitchen and the cash/espresso bar, so it could've been as little as a gust of air, or someone thinking it was an old bill - food comes up at the same place, along with the bill to remind us where it goes when it's crazy - but at any rate, the kitchen didn't have an order.

Shit. These people are already getting impatient, and their food isn't even started. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I did a little 'fuckity FUCK!" dance around the kitchen for awhile, before realising that there weren't any alsatian pizzas left. FUCK.

Have I ever mentioned that whoever invented the phrase "killing the messenger" was talking about servers? The tables was not happy, and they were sure it was all my fault. I apologised profusely. I brought free appetizers. And I got another order - whew.

The kitchen, at this point, had a stack of orders a mile high and wasn't taking too kindly to the fact that I wanted to bump mine to the front. Not their problem, they said; they make the orders as they come in.

Have I ever mentioned that whoever invented the phrase...oh wait, yes I have. The kitchen was not happy, and they too were sure it was all my fault. So I apologized, I licked feet, and because I'd been going nonstop for six hours at this point, I cried a little. A sous chef, who also serves sometimes, took pity and got me bumped up at her own considerable peril. She'll be at the bar tonight, and I'll be buying her a beer or twelve, kthnx.

And not with that table's tip, that's for sure.