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No reason for hungry people to get so damn angry, South End eatery says
By adamg on Mon, 08/16/2021 - 9:05am
Jay Hajj at Mike's City Diner on Washington Street in the South End reports he had to call 911 twice in one day due to "unruly and insulting customer behavior" and asks people to remember everybody's doing the best they can and to take a deep breath before deciding to lash out at somebody over a breakfast order.
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Comments
Part of the problem might be
Part of the problem might be that the restaurant is not communicating their situation well. You can't seat people like there's no problem, make them wait a long time, take their order, make them wait a long time, when they ask what's going on say "it'll be ready in a minute", make them wait a long time, and then after they complain say "we're short staffed". That's a waste of everyone's time.
If breakfast will take an hour to serve, tell people that number before seating them.
Hopeless
People who are inclined to be assholes will be assholes regardless.
I've worked in restaurants which smartly will not seat people if the kitchen is slammed or they are short servers. They would rather people go elsewhere than have a bad experience.
Inevitably some jerk will come in and point to an empty table and demand to be seated. The host will explain why they aren't seating people right now and ask if they want to be added to a wait list. The jerk will give the server (often a young woman) an earful.
Sometimes the host or manager will relent and sit the person but only after explaining it's going to take a long time to be served. The jerk politely agrees yet 10 minutes later they are complaining about how slow everything is. (And not leaving a reasonable tip.)
In short, it's not just the money that's making it hard to staff restaurants.
Autocorrect Sabotage?
Your 3rd paragraph-I think you mean “Inevitably”?
Yup
Thanks. :)
“People who are inclined to
“People who are inclined to be assholes will be assholes regardless.“
True indeed. However I sometimes think they save up their bitterness especially for restaurant folk.
Hey, that's my line
Well, close, same intent. My line is "He's an asshole because he's an asshole".
Regardless, so true.
Just don't seat them
Took a trip to Virginia recently, and lots of places had huge waits despite plenty of space to seat people. Was glad that the restaurants were being straight with people, and at least had their shit together enough to know when they were at their serving capacity.
Who on Earth is going out to
Who on Earth is going out to restaurants these days during breakfast or lunch rush somehow blissfully unaware of the staffing problems that have been facing restaurants for well over a year at this point? Do we really think that the restaurant telling such a person "service might be slow" would make any difference whatsoever?
At some point, the people who behave poorly are responsible for their own behavior... and that point is always, really. No restaurant has ever forced a customer to be a prick. It's the prick customer's choice every single time.
The problem is entitled assholes
It isn't the restaurant or this restaurant or any restaurant: entitled tantrum throwing assholes are now more entitled and emboldened to throw tantrums than ever.
How I know this:
It isn't confined to the this restaurant
It isn't confined to this area
It isn't confined to this business sector
Until and unless these diaper babies start spending the night in jail for assault or we start having vaccine passports that can be blacklisted we will continue to have entitlement tantrums disrupting much of everyday life everywhere.
Stop looking for ways to blame the victim. You are an enabler.
To be fair to the assholes
Mike’s isn’t anything special. Everyone knows that the Victoria on Mass Ave is the only real choice in the area. One big difference though is that if you mouth off to the staff at the Vic, it’s where all the cops and firefighters eat. Don’t do it.
diy
I can cook up a nice breakfast for cheap pretty quickly at home. Boomer here. I weigh convenience into my decision on dining out or do it yourself at home. Diy usually wins!
There are other options for eating outside your home. Call ahead for a takeout breakfast? Bring it to a scenic location instead of a loud greasy spoon restaurant!
Female boomer?
Most men your age weren't raised to cook.
Gen-x were the latchkey kids, so many of us, male and female, ended up learning out of necessity.
Somehow a lot of this training was absent in the millennials, but youtube has saved the day.
So, what's your point?
Restaurants exist.
People go to one occasionally.
What's your point?