Practicing being a grumpy old man.

I'm going to try hard not to let this turn into some sort of rant, and not let myself drone on too much, wish me luck.
   So I've been thinking a lot about where we are as a society and how we got here. I'll start with where I think we are. I think we're in a bad place, like real bad. The way I would define a society is how the majority of the people that make up that particular area act and what the people in that society value. Based on that I think we are headed in the wrong direction. Now I was trying to think of examples I could use to try to prove my point. I considered  popular music, like N A$AP Rocky, or Niki Manaji, but I didn't want to make it seem like I was attacking an art form (hip hop) that I really enjoy. Then I thought about television, and the easiest way to do that would be to attack reality shows. But we all know none of those are real. Then I thought about the people on those shows, one man in particular, Lamar Odom. I think Lamar Odom is the perfect encapsulation of what has happened in our society.
   Lamar Odom in a professional basketball player. Let's think about that for a second. There are currently 450 players in the NBA.Now think for a second about how many high school kids play basketball, now think about how many of those make it to college now think about how many of those play in the NBA. Now of course an argument could be made for his size a forward is really the best position for him and that might change some of the statistics are far as him playing professionally but thats beside the point.  Now not only does he play professional basketball, he was also on 2 championship teams, and won the award for 6th man of the year. An award only one person wins a year. I think you see the point I am making, he is pretty good at playing the basketball. However if you goggle his name (go ahead I'll wait) anything basketball related comes up third.
More people know his as being married to Chloe Kardashian. And how do people know who she is, oh yeah she is the sister of Kim Kardashian. Wait though how do people know who she is, well I'm glad you asked. She is famous for a sex tape she made with a B-list R&B singer by the name of Ray J. I would explain who he is but A. I don't want to go further down this rabbit hole, and B. I don't actually care. No wait! I remember now, he's famous for being related to R&B singer Brandy. Okay I got it now. So if you're keeping score at home it goes like this, more people in our society know who Lamar Odom is because he married a girl who is famous because her sister made a sex tape with a dude who was famous because his sister sang some hit songs 10 years ago. That's where we stand.
Also I didn't even get into Kris Jenner and how that's essentially the same story only with Olympics and an even worse woman.
 So you can disagree with my opinion if you want but that doesn't change the facts. I guess the real question now is what do we do about it? I'll leave that one up to you guy's I need a drink after that.
    

Being a server.

So I work, and have worked for several years, as a server, or a waiter, or personal slave, or whatever you want to call it. It's a job I have made good money doing and I like to think I'm pretty good at. Of course if it were all that great I wouldn't bother writing this. I mean who takes the time to write a blog singing the praises of their job? Okay, maybe a professional blog writer, you got me there. Don't worry though, this also isn't going to be a bitch fest. There are plenty of those blogs out there. Think of this entry as more of a way to inform people. Even though I am just one guy writing a blog, I promise you, I speak for more people in my industry than you would think.
Where to start? I guess I'll start with the important part, money. As a server I have a unique relationship with the restaurant I work for. They pay me an extraordinarily low wage. Really low, I mean we're talking $2.38 an hour. Seriously. How can that be you ask, Ted Kennedy (r.i.p.) increased minimum wage to $7.25 right? Right, and good job on remembering that fact, Ted Kennedy did do some good things, but those laws don't apply to people working in the service industry in a tipped position. In fact once the tips I earn are figured into my weekly wage, I end up owing more taxes than I have been paid via my $2.38 an hour. Meaning I get checks that have no value, and end up owing taxes at the end of the year. Does that make sense? The government is assuming that people will tip me and therefor they don't feel the restaurant should have to pay us an actual wage.
This of course is great if people were still tipping like they once were. But they just aren't. More and more companies are using tipping less than 20% as a method of saving money. Oprah even suggested tipping less as a way to save money. Fucking Oprah said that, that's like Jesus saying don't eat pork. Shit runs deep.

Tipping should be viewed as paying for a service. You came into a restaurant, sat down, and a stranger got everything you wanted, had it made for you, and cleaned up after you. All you had to do was give them money for it. Think about that. That's some olde time king treatment shit. Every time you go out to eat. Think about it like this, let's say you needed a new muffler, now the muffler is let's say $200, but the labor to have them install that muffler for you is $150. You can't say to them, yeah I'll pay for the muffler, then when it's done I'll pay you what I want to for installing that muffler for me. Going out to eat is the same thing. The server is providing a service for you and you should pay for that service the same way you pay for the food.

Here's a really shitty example of the kind of thing that goes on in this industry. Some of you are sympathizing with the woman who wrote that. I agree it must be very hard to be a single mom. I know a few and they are some of the strongest people I know. However what is a single mom doing running up a $138 check on one meal? I mean is she really that sorry? I have my doubts.
Also I am sure some of you are asking the question, If it's so bad why don't you quit? Well consider this, if everyone who felt this way quit there would be a lot more buffet's out there. 
By the way, this is just the surface. I haven't even gotten into the way's that more and more restaurants take advantage of the wait staff. Or the ways they manipulate hours, or the lawsuits pending with some of the biggest chains in the restaurant business.
So I hope maybe this educated some of you.