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It is banal and self-absorbed, lacks depth, lacks charm, and is not especially funny. I must be out of touch with blog writing, and I permit myself to find this book distasteful. I disagree with the readers who gave it outstanding reviews.
As an IT/AV guy, I have worked the back of the house at many hotels and restaurants and can vouch for what goes on and what many valiant wait/house staff must put up with. We see everything from maniacal owners to sadistic managers, loyal customers, clueless tools, hard working chefs, and everything in between. After reading this book you will see your waiter/waitress in an entirely different light, and hopefully treat them with the respect that they deserve. What a wonderful book this is. The Waiter recounts his revealing experiences working in various restaurants in the New York City area, expanding his daily blog into this delightful book. It is an entirely different world, existing right under patron's noses without most of them ever thinking twice about it.
The places are filled with people moving on to something else. But sometimes they do not move on. Each group, though, will probably get something out of it, though perhaps that something will be a wince of recognition.Separate chapters on those days when everything - everything - goes wrong, substance abuse, those little ways waiters take their revenge on rude customers, WAITER RANT provides the full meal. To those of us who left the field behind, we will understand the concept of repressed memory syndrome at the description of the rude and self-centered, each one believing he deserves the single best table in the joint. This is not necessarily for the worse. Consistently truthful and almost always funny, WAITER RANT will no doubt be read differently by those working as a waiter, those who used to, and those who never have. And one of the true joys of my job was making someone's experience a little better.
I have said to others that waiting tables changed my opinion on human nature. His popular blog quickly rose to the top in a saturated field of would be hacks. WAITER RANT shows a peek of what I mean. I simply recognized that, when people think they are in a position over you, their true nature comes out. Reading this book, WAITER RANT, named for the blog, we can see why. A familiar refrain for anyone who has ever waited tables. Getting sucked in to the vortex of instant money and a partying lifestyle, they get as hooked as the heroin junky in the back alley.That is what Steve Dublanica thought he might be.
The guy has true talent.Customers come alive even though, frequently, we might wish them in the opposite condition. The chapter on Mother's Day alone is worth the book.Dublanica does not, thankfully, focus only on the rude diners. Sometimes bad, sometimes very good, but always very revealing. Easy to get into and hard to get out of. Taking a waiting job after his corporate one fell apart, he found himself getting further and further in.Lucky for us, though, he formed his own escape hatch. Though they tend to weigh more heavily in the waiter's psyche, looking back at my own experience in the field, I remember a lot of awfully nice people, too.
I read this book with fascination last summer, front to back, at one sitting. Since the moment that I finished it, I have very rarely eaten in any restaurant: in the very few cases where I did, it was where I could see the food being prepared.
The telling passage for me was the waiter's description of the dirty bathroom at one of the restaurants he worked at.and how he hated to use it because it was dirty.let's see, you use the restroom, you are on the clock at the company.but it never occursthat YOU could help clean it. I hope one of the good ones writes a book someday.oh wait.Danny Meyer did, only he is not a waiter anymore, he is thetop service man in NYC.because he wasn't lazy selfish or greedy. There is some funny stuff here and a few insights, but mostly is about a self-absorbed waiter, who like many in this profession view themselves as the center of the restaurant (and the universe). Typical.let's see those kitchen Mexicans should clean that restroom, because I am too important.or when he closes the restaurant early for lunch so he can eat tacos.nice job of managing for the owner who pays and trusts you.There are a lot of waiters WHO GET IT.this guy is not one of them, lazy, selfish, greedy.
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