I, for lack of a better term, am a sucker. I can't help myself from over-tipping people. "Oh thanks for doing your job, mister, here's 40% because I'm a bleeding-heart bitch when it comes to blue collar workers!"
You see, at one point in my life, I was a waiter. It might have lasted all of two months, because I was awful, but no matter, I still served food to people who were seated at a table and weren't related to me, so in essence, I was a waiter for a short period of time. One time I spilled a plate of salad on a guy. He was thrilled. Another time I chased a patron down and returned the $1.25 they tipped me on a $70 check. My boss thought that was just charming.
But I remember just how unforgiving the job was. You get paid nothing, get to see what happens in restaurants behind closed doors which in turn makes you NEVER want to step foot into a restaurant again unless you're drunk or starving, and if the people you are serving decide to be assholes, well, then you can forget about making any money. WHY DID MY BAKED ZITI TAKE A WHOLE 20 MINUTES TO MAKE??? ARE YOU RETARDED??? I MAKE MINE IN 7 MINUTES AT HOME WITH MY MICROWAVE, EVER HEARD OF ONE??? I DON'T CARE THAT YOU'RE NOT THE CHEF, IT'S STILL YOUR FAULT!!!
But I digress...
I tend to over-tip because whenever I'm in a restaurant, bad memories begin to resurface like I'm a veteran of the Tet Offensive watching a fireworks display at the town park. Did you see how heavy that plate looked? Maybe we should throw him another few bucks, no?
(wife takes wallet away from me and burns all the credit cards)
I also over-tip cab drivers. But with less reason because I've never been a cab driver. But in my thick, twisted brain, I believe that my extra $1 tip is going to help them bob above the poverty line. It won't, but still, I'm having none of it. Here you go sir, thank you for almost killing me when you ran that other cab off the road and then accelerating to 87 mph but slamming on the brakes every 30 seconds so my wife and I can go home and fight to see who will vomit first.
Again, the whole digressing thing...
Since there is no smooth segue into what I want to talk about, I'll just jump right in. I hate being handed receipts that have tip lines printed on them from people and stores that do not deserve tips. I buy coffee in the morning, they receipt has a tip line on it. I buy a roll of toilet paper, the grocer gives me a receipt with a tip line on it. What the fuck? Why are you giving me a guilt trip? Yes, yes, I know, I should just ignore it...BUT I CAN'T. Even when I go to get takeout food, I have to draw a slash through the tip line while the polite Asian lady watches me with absolute DISGUST. Spoiled American, doesn't want to give me extra money to make his food. But you know what? FUCK THAT. The point of takeout is so I don't have to sit around and have you serve me. You see, I'm a friend! A friend! Please, please, please don't spit in my Hunan Chicken next time I come here!
I'm also convinced that if you don't scribble over the tip line, the cashier will add a $50 tip to my receipt. I read about stories of Midwestern couples being swindled out of thousands of dollars by their local pizza place, and I scoff. BAHAHAHA, I bet they were too busy watching Fighting Illini games and eating fried cheese to notice their money being siphoned away! But then, the mind begins to go, and I start to panic. What if Juanita the coffee lady is slowly bleeding me dry of my hard earned money? What if she is taking a few bucks a day, and then a few more, and then a few more? So the next day I go in and give Juanita the evil eye and then she says something to me in Spanish that I don't understand and now our amicable relationship is RUINED.
It should be against the law to use receipt paper that includes a tip line if you're not a sit down and eat business. Fuck you, bakery, you do not get a tip for baking bread for the general public. It's not like I came in here and asked you to bake me a loaf of seeded Italian bread. If I didn't buy this loaf of delicious bread, someone else would have. You decided to become a baker - I didn't make you go to baking school. I don't ask for tips when I build presentations for clients, and they're kajillionaire cocksuckers. I should be getting tipped. I should be getting envelopes of tips from clients for doing their dirty work. They don't pay me. I don't see a dime of their money. And so what if I'm technically salaried to do a job that includes building presentations for them, the fucking movers job is to move your shit, and they get tipped on top of it, right? This whole fucking tipping business is backwards. I work my ass off and receive nothing extra, but Bobby the fucking pizza man hands you a slice of margherita and gets a bonus dollar for rotating his fat greasy hand from the oven to the counter. He handed you a slice of fucking pizza! I fucking photoshopped a picture of your CEO eating sushi inside a fucking spaceship with John Lennon! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE???
2 comments:
that tip line at the good bagel shop i go to fuckin kills me it's like stupid fuck all you did was hand me a bagel
Personally, I hate tip lines even if they are given at a place that deserves a tip.
I like to put my own tip. Sometimes I give a very hefty tip, sometimes I don't want to tip. The reason could be that the waitperson was terrible or simply I have cashflow problems.
*rant head*
I think the idea that you're only supposed to go to a restaurant if you can pay the meal AND the tip is ludicrous! When I go to an architect's office, I pay for the design of the building, not the service, yet as a result the staff get paid wages. When I go to a lawyer's office, or a private detective's office or a doctor or pharmacist or anything, the result is the same. The only exception to this rule, apparently, is restaurants where not only do I have to pay for the product I receive (the meal) but I also have to pay for the service.
If I have to forcibly tip anyone, I would choose the doctor who sweat blood doing part time work to support their medical degree, eventually sold their soul to the debt devil and put up with moany, hypochrondriac and entitled idiotic patients to get to a stage where they could advise as to what to do to ease that weird ringing sensation in my ears, not the person who only deals with moany, entitled idiots.
What really sets me off though is that I know the tricks of the restaurant. I know that if they put that forced tip on there, the money does NOT go to the server but the restaurant.
I also know that if you pay by card and ask to add a tip on that little pin machine, the extra money you pay goes to the restaurant.
Yep, that's what really makes this whole "tip to be polite" stuff rubbish is that the person you're tipping does not even get the tip at all!
*Rant over*
That said, I ALWAYS tip the delivery person because what that guy goes through is usually a hundred times worse than a waitperson. Of course, unless he is incompetent
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