Going to restaurants is getting a little, not sure what to call what I'm about to say, but let's call it odd.

Doris and I on our road trip to Florida made a stop in Orlando and treated ourselves to a beautiful dinner at Charley's Steakhouse. We've been there before, but a long, long time ago. Like when the children were babies. The youngest was two. I remember this, because on our first night in the city of fun we stumbled upon Charley's and we enjoyed it so much we took the kids back before we were ready to head back to Jersey a few days later.

When the waitress asked our two old, if he would like a hot dog, he exclaimed, "king crab legs". She was a little shocked, "really?" Now, that wasn't his meal of course, it was an appetizer for the whole table. Hot dog! Hot dogs are for those hot summer days along with a cold beer.

Back to our current dinner. It was fabulous, exactly what I remembered from thirty some years ago. The smell of the steaks sizzling on the open grills is a wonderful experience. Fine bottle of wine. Server was great. Couldn't of asked for more.

Now, when our waiter sensed we were done, he brought the check over to our table. Now, this is no longer a piece of paper, where you can sit back and look through the receipt and say things to your spouse like, "yeah, we had that, wow, that was that much, oh, they didn't charge for the bread, but look they charged us for the extra sauce". You know what I mean. Sometimes there are surprises, but even though they appear, chances of us complaining about it are really rare. You had a good time, suck it up and pay the man.

Nope, saving on paper waste. (Meanwhile, the waist suffered)

So, as the waiter is holding the hand held CC machine, on the screen he scrolls down pointing out what we had. To be honest, I really couldn't keep up with him and at this point I had already handed him my CC, so he was calling the shots. 

Now, peer pressure at it's best. Or better yet, let's call it "waiter pressure" which I succumbed to. After all the rattling, at the top of the machine are three choices for gratuities. 22%, 25% and 28%, which, as he handed me the machine he highlighted the middle one, himself as he taped the 25% and then taped the CC on the machine. It all happened so fast. Before I could say anything he thanked me. 

Pressure was on and I just signed in the little screen with my finger and "poof". He got a beautiful tip and I got a "how much did you give him" from my wife. Why didn't you do 20%? It's not there anymore. The good thing was he wasn't that greedy and he did me a favor of 25, not 28.

Look, we had a great meal, service was great, we had a good time. I don't mine giving nice tips, but would I have done the 25%, not sure but in retrospect, that gratuity doesn't just go to the the waiter, it goes to the whole staff because of the exceptional experience we had.

Be safe.

John A Sutich

Just Another Story Blog

 LX

Think about that for a second. We've been watching the Super Bowl for 60 years. I still remember the first one, 1967, Green Bay Packers vs the Kansas City Chiefs, NFL against the AFL. My Dad was a beloved Packer fan, although he didn't wear a foam cheese head, he was a New Jerseyan with love for the boys in green and yellow.

Myself, I was a Giant fan, which started when I was at my friends house across the street and his dad had a football game on, not the Packers, some other team, called the NY Giants. It was 1964 and I saw this guy, Clarence Childs, return a kick-off 100 yards for a touchdown. Wow, who are these guys? That is when I became a Giants fan and my ride on the Big Blue rollercoaster had just begun. A lot of agonies, but we also have four Super Bowl trophies. Not a bad trade off.

NY Football Giants, me and you on Sunday afternoons. When we have years with more "L"s than "W"s, it's mostly 1 PM, watch and be done. Good years we are the later time slot, 4 PM. This is good, because I got all the Sunday stuff out of the way, time to sit down have a cold one and watch a game. Hopefully, we're done in time to be able to enjoy dinner.

Then, along comes Monday Night Football, then Sunday night, then Thursday night. Then some Saturday games.  Now, how good you are makes a big difference as to when you are televised. Fortunately, we've had a lot of nationally televised games come our way through the years.

Super Bowl Sunday has always been a tough day in the limousine business. Every chauffeur, like the rest of America, viewed this day as a national holiday. We had a harder time finding guys to work on this "fan fanatic" Sunday then on Mother's Day. I kid you not.

Grown adults, who did chauffeuring for a living, actually chose unemployment, so they could watch the big game, over work. Now, keep in mind, I would do everything possible to make everyone happy. I tried, I really did, but you customers wanted to travel, how crazy was that? What am I suppose to do. Hey, sometimes I'd ask them to possibly miss a quarter of the game!  Nope, "I ain't working".

We had a guy, who knew nothing about football or sports in general. This was good, because at least we knew we had one guy available on the big day without having to make a deal to get him to work.

Until, one Super Bowl Sunday, well, actually a few days earlier when I was making up the schedules, he comes to me and says he needs the day off. 

Rick, you are kidding me, why? You know nothing about the sport. His response: "well, everyone else wants off, why not me". So, I traded Mother's Day with him, because I knew he had to have a Mother.

The good thing about the Super Bowl is, if the game stinks, at least you have the commercials to enjoy.

If you are tired of watching all the the pre-game hoopla, at 4 PM you can turn on the Olympics and catch an exciting game of Curling! It is an event played on ice. With brooms!

Which, a few years ago, Doris and I had the pleasure of trying, during a business team building event. Now, I couldn't stand at all and I spent the whole time either on my knees or my butt. Doris on the other hand, did  pretty good, because she knew how to do a lunge! All that time at the gym paid off.

Be Safe.

John A Sutich

Just Another Story Blog