Cooking Up Some Trouble

(Five minutes to closing, a woman and her grand-daughter come to the door. What kind of person takes their five-year-old grand-daughter to dinner at nearly 11:00 at night?)

Customer: “I demand you serve me. It’s not closing time.”

Me: *hiding a mental sigh* “Certainly. This way, ma’am.”

(Everything has been cleaned by then: the grill, the counters, the tables, everything. This woman orders things that causes us to re-clean everything. All of us, especially the cook, are livid. They spend about an hour eating.)

Customer: “I need to complain about my steak. I demand that the cook remake it.”

Me: “Yes, ma’am.”

(They finally left at about 12:30. When I was cleaning her table, I noticed she had left her car keys. Right after she walked out, we had locked the door. When she came back to the door yelling that she had forgotten her car keys, we all acted like we could not hear her. She had to take a taxi home. I suppose she never was taught about the cardinal rule of not pissing off the wait-staff or cooks.)