| rev:text
| - Wed. 10/7/15 4-5:30pm
I walk into this unremarkable hole-in-the-wall pizza joint, I order a single slice with a few extra toppings, it comes out to $5.31. I hand the cashier my trusty debit card and after a couple times running it, she informs me it doesn't work.
"Oh, that's odd. Shoot, I didn't bring my wallet on my bike. Okay. Well, thanks."
I take a step back and make a call to my bank, with all the traveling I do, occasionally security will red flag the card, but a quick phone call will unlock it. Unfortunately, "due to a massive information leak, a lot of cards have been cancelled for security reasons". After an extremely tedious round of "brief holds" and being disconnected twice, I'm finally able to make a one-time transaction at the ATM. Success! Cash! That's the last time I leave the hotel with just my ID and one card!
It's been nearly an hour. I'm spent. And really hungry. And now late for my massage appointment. But at least I can finally get this delicious pizza my friend talked about. I go to the counter and reorder my slice. I notice that now it is happy hour and one of the specials reads "free appetizer with $5 purchase." Pleased that some good has come out of wasting a hour on the phone, I ask about adding that happy hour deal to my order. The goateed cashier says, "if you want to order a beer you have to go to the bar." "Oh, no beer, thank you, just the appetizer." He repeats himself, I repeat myself, and accepting we must be experiencing a language barrier, I go to the bar anyway. I try to order my slice of pizza and an appetizer. The bartender says, "You can't have ordered at the counter already to get the appetizer here. You have to order over five dollars at the bar."
I look back toward the counter, confused. "No, I didn't order over there, I was told to come here."
"You ordered earlier." (I come to realize it's the same girl who ran my card before.)
"Oh. Yes, I tried. But my card wouldn't go through so I called my bank. I have cash now. I'd like to order with the bar so I can get the appetizer for happy hour."
Her tone is escalating in rudeness, "Yeah, well, you'll have to pay for that pizza from before and then order over five dollars from the bar." She walks away to another customer at the bar.
The gentleman next to me offers to let me order an appetizer on his tab since he has spent well over five dollars at the bar. Gratefully, I accept and we let the bartender know our plan. Again with the rude tone and a roll of her eyes, to boot, "no. We can't do that."
I'm so frustrated. I give up. I've had it. Forget the damn pizza.
"Okay, you know what, I don't want anything. Thanks."
I pick up my twenty from the bar and start
to leave. The bartender apparently can't help herself from viciously spewing, "Well if you can't afford it, maybe you shouldn't be here."
I'm stunned. "What a rude, bitchy thing to say."
"Hey, the truth hurts."
Then she ran away to the kitchen before I could respond.
Of course you think of everything you would like to have said later... It would have gone something like... "Broke? You work at a fucking pizza place, Bitch."
Shocked, frustrated, humiliated, I asked for the manager at the counter. A tall, thin, Indian-looking man stretching pizza dough in the back stays rooted to the spot and hollers, "I'm the manager, what's the problem?"
"Could you come over here, please?"
He sighs and begrudgingly approaches the counter. I take a breath to calm my irritation so I can communicate effectively. At the end of my account, he looks at me blankly, unsympathetically, and says, "what do you want me to do?"
I can't believe it. "What do I want you to do?!"
With attitude he says, "We are busy right now. We don't have time for this. You want a piece of pizza?! I'll make you a piece of pizza!"
(Busy is not what I would call the place. The large first room of tables is completely empty. On the counter side, there is a table of six, a table of four, maybe six people at the bar, and no line to order. Five guys making pizza and two serving girls.)
I'm disgusted with this place and appalled with the alarming opposite of customer service, "No, I don't want your pizza."
"Well, what do you want me to do? I can't fire her right now because we are very busy."
"No, I don't want you to fire her."
"Well, what do you want me to do? I can't fire her right now because we are very busy."
"No, I don't want you to fire her."
"Well, what do you want me to do?!"
"Nothing. Forget it."
That was it. I left. Wow. My day really went down hill with the decision to go to Genoa.
As I rode back to the hotel, I was frustrated with myself for letting some snotty, trashy, pudgy, $8-an-hour-plus-tips bar tender get to me. I've done my time in customer service and food service. I was great at it. Then I moved on and built a career. Now my work pays me to travel all over North America and Europe doing what I love. Who's broke now, Bit
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