Baby It’s Cold Outside

Hello world! I’m back! It’s been a while – I’ve taken a trip to Washington, had Thanksgiving, and, drumroll please….

I FINISHED MY FINALS!

Which means that I am done with my MA coursework – All I have left is to turn in my thesis on April 16, 2010. Did I mention that my thesis was 90% done already?

Anyway, since I have been gone, I went to Washington:

isn't it pretty?

We spent a week at home planning a wedding with my groomzilla (post on that will appear in the next couple of days) and having delicious Thanksgiving food. For the first time in my life I cooked a lot of the side dishes including the green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, pumpkin pie (from scratch!) and the stuffing. I had supervision of course, as my sister (the seasoned cook) made sure that I couldn’t mess anything up, and I didn’t, which is very surprising. And the dog got in the Christmas spirit a bit early:

Boo's first appearance in the blog!

Since Victor and I are getting married in the summer, he is officially the oldest male in my immediate family. In our family that means carving the turkey at Thanksgiving, which he enjoyed too much I think:

Turkey carver extraordinaire!

The dinner was fantastic and stress free. Usually holidays at my house are a little on the tense side. Not that we don’t like each other, but the stress of planning big dinners really seems to stress people out. This year, however, we really had a good time:

Mi Familia!

The next morning I made a huge mistake, that will appear in a later blog post, I promise 🙂 But let’s just say its a doozie, having made everything so perfect the night before it only logically followed that the next day I would wipe the slate clean again.

In the meantime I have been back in New York preparing for Christmas. We are official New Yorkers because we have out own Charlie Brown tree, and I finished all my shopping and wrapping:

Our tree!

And today it started to snow! My family has been driving to Orlando all day to go to Disneyworld, and Victor and I are trapped in a snowstorm. We decided to venture out in the storm and have some fun, after bundling up:

Then we decided to make designs in the snow with our gloves. The back windows of cars were our main target, and I don’t think its vandalism per se if we are spreading joy that will soon be covered up with more snow:

caught in the act!

Needless to say we have had a fun weekend celebrating the end of our respective MA degrees 🙂 I am going to make sure to update the blog much more often – as I have a lot of material! Have a lovely and snowy weekend!

Blustery Days

The last couple of days here in NYC have been pretty rough on us. And there is no sign of it getting any better. In fact, it seems as though our lovely city has decided to skip autumn all together and head straight into winter. The high today was 41. That, my dear friends, is winter weather. Yesterday it poured rain on top of the cold – I swear we are going to have snow before Thanksgiving. I headed off to the bar in what is best described by Winnie the Pooh as “blustery” weather:

rainy and cold - but resourceful!

The bar was how I had expected it to be that night: slow and miserable. The thing about the change in the weather is that for the first week, no one comes out of their house. Once everyone has come to terms with the fact that the weather is terrible and not going to get any better they start to venture out again. Seeing as how the weather has taken a complete nose-dive, I have no customers but my regulars. Which is fine and dandy and all, but it also means that I am make 1/3 of what I am used to. This is not a good sign with a wedding coming up.

Nonetheless, last night was particularly painful for two reasons: the first being that I aided and abided an affair at my bar. Thats the part of the job that I HATE. The fact that I am the enabler to many peoples alcoholism is guilt enough, but the affairs are what kills me. This couple comes to sit at the bar, him ordering a beer, and her a vodka cranberry, and they proceed to go to town on each other at my bar like this:

please, stop!

However, the couple in this particular photograph are tame compared to my 40-something customers. We deduced that they were having an affair based on two pieces of evidence: wedding ring on his hand, none on hers, and the fact that she was rubbing his crotch while sticking her tongue down his throat like that in public. Married people do not do that. Teenagers don’t even do that in a well lit restaurant! They had to be sneaking around.

So, me, freaking out, I realize that I have to say something. Given my lack of managerial support, I recognize I am going to have to say something to them, and its killing me. I turn around to give them a speech and find my manager offering them the booth in the back, where they might have more privacy. Aka stop with the crotch grabbing out in the open. I was shocked! Our manager actually helping me out!

Not only did I have the affair to deal with, I also had TWO customers walk out on their bills last night. Not only was I making no money to begin with I now had to deal with two unpaid checks. Not okay. The frist was a regular who was very drunk. I told him he hadn’t paid, gave him the check, turned around and he was gone, leaving three dollars on the tab worth 13. Meaning he assumed that he had already paid me. Understandable, but still sucks for me.

The other guy was a total jerk. He got all pissed that we didn’t take Visa, and when I apologized profusely for the inconvenience he said he would go get cash. (See, the thing is, people get pissed over a policy I have ZERO control over. Do you think I enjoy getting yelled at and stiffed? No. I do not.) So this guy gets up to leave, turns to me at the door and says, “By the way, I’ll come back and pay this tomorrow” and walks out. Meaning that I again get no tip, and have another open check. This is the classic example of a guy who has never worked, or known anyone who has worked in the food service industry. I could have cried. It’s not my policy and again I get screwed.

I had a terrible night at the bar, and I can honestly say if I don’t start making money soon I’m going to have to look elsewhere for a job. I really like this bar because of its hours and proximity to my house, but to be honest I could be making a lot more elsewhere, especially in the city. Oh well…

Sorry to be such a downer – but the blog is called Confessions of a Brooklyn Bartender.

Nerdy Nights

Sorry I haven’t been blogging much, I’ve had a pretty busy weekend/beginning of the week thanks to job interviews, homework, oh and did I mention? It was Victor’s birthday this weekend. Being the greatest fiance in the world – I got him a great present. My thought was, since Victor proposed a few months ago and got me this sweet diamond ring I would get him a really great birthday present. I know he wasn’t too happy to be turning 24. I discovered from a friend of mine that there was an event on his birthday this year at Radio City Music Hall. I saved some monies and bought tickets to see a screening of The Lord of The Rings – The Fellowship of the Ring while an orchestra and choir performed the score. Basically everything he could have ever wanted.

Radio City!

I have to admit something to you, dear blog readers out there. I had never seen the movie before. You see, I read all the books in high school (thanks Mr. Modarelli – not) and they just aren’t my thing. I enjoy Harry Potter a LOT, but I think it’s because Harry was a normal kid at first. When, like Mr. Tolkein did, a world is created outside of any familiar world to me, I have little to no interest in it. Middle Earth? Just not as cool as Hogwarts.

This isn’t to say I didn’t have a great time, however! We got to meet a real Hobbit (or a guy who genuinely thought he was one):

Bilbo?

And I got to see the inside of radio city music hall. Which was incredibly beautiful:

pretty!

And we had great seats:

illegal photograph taking...we are stealth

Overall I think we had a great time, I thoroughly enjoyed the orchestral portion of the show, having grown up with a parent that was a musician, I am utterly captivated by watching the orchestra. It made me appreciate just how amazing the score of that movie really is. Good going!

However, I must note that it was by far the nerdiest thing I have ever been to. Seriously, people in the audience were cheering at specific parts of the movie that were of great importance. And I must admit parts of it were pretty badass. But Orcs are gross. And I don’t like them very much. Did I mention that literally all the women in the audience screamed at the top of their lungs when Orlando Bloom came on screen. It made me wonder: is that what going to see a Twilight movie is like? I shudder to wonder…

Did I mention that Elijah Wood and Billy Boyd showed up? Yeah, that was pretty awesome.

But, as we were leaving I saw a horrific sight:

Noooooo!!!!!

The ice rink is back – making it officially WINTER here. That plus the 45 degree weather is not a good sign for the winter to come. Expect much complaining from this west coaster!