Mores for Gays video blog (122): "Keep the Tip"

Yeah, I had that kind of waitress before too. Twice. Both times I as politely as I could said the service was not adequate and briefly outlined what I thought should have been done. Which leads me to the loose scale I use for tipping, each item is worth 5%:

• smile, friendly greeting [If it's a bad day, just be polite and professional, but a sullen and put out food server just ruins a meal. I had a waitress once at iHop who was dead on her feet tired but she put a smile on every time she came to one of her talbes; her face fell when she thought no one was looking tho. I left her $5, hopefully that cheered her up.]
• prompt service + drink refills [I'm not too demanding if they're swamped but nobody like slow inattentive service]
• be able to give a suggestion or answer a question about a menu item [this I give by default but subtract if they can't do it. No excuse for being unable to state the soup of the day, etc.]
• after delivering the food and giving me time to take a bite, check back to make sure that all is well [Nobody likes sitting there with the wrong type of sandwich or undercooked food or whatever. Just asking if you need ketchup as the food is dropped off does not count.]

after that I round up to the next whole dollar.  If they work hard or are extra nice, I throw an extra buck or two; a lot of the waitstaff around here are college students and they probably need it.

I am disappointed that this video didn't cover the more for flirting with your waiter/giving him a phone #. One of my friends is all in a tizzy and doesn't know what to do and I was hoping I could just link this for him!

Servers don't spit in food.  But cooks do if you ask them to remake something.  ;) 

My favorite part of my old serving days were the stupid questions:

1) "Are the crabs local?"  (asked in a Michigan restaurant.) 

2) "Why doesn't this taste like mushrooms?"  (asked while eating a chocolate truffle.) 

oh, and i could go on.