Waitressing rants again

Had a killer time working alone on a Friday tonight. The customers started waiting outside the restaurant before our opening time, 7pm. Three tables at the same time! And one more shortly after. Ran out of menus to go around even... had to ask them to share. And just after I took orders from one of the tables, another guy came in.

Was kept on my toes all the time. I couldn't manage to serve the drinks and some starters/snacks fast enough. God. Argh. And I really wanted to slow down taking the orders, but they all were so quick to decide what to get! But fortunately most of them were really understanding and forgiving, seeing as I was the only waitress serving five tables at the same time.

Plus it's really irritating to prepare the drinks cos in order to get the the space I'm allocated to, I need to squeeze past the chefs. And then, I need to get the drinks past them to serve. Or if some customer signals to me halfway while I'm preparing some drinks, I really don't know whether to just acknowledge them and continue preparing, or to attend to them first!

Only one of the tables, the guy who came alone, was impatient. He was the last of this batch of people to come in, but even when some others haven't been served their food, he was already asking me how long more it was going to take. Tried to explain to him that there were customers before him and it might be a wait, but he cheekily argued, 'But you can serve me first.' Luckily the head chef has good foresight, when he saw that the order was just one main dish and a drink he tried to prepare it relatively quicker, no matter if it was ready before some of the others' dishes.

On the bright side though, since the bulk of the customers came in so early, we got to close earlier too when all the customers left by 10pm.

I think it's back to two waitresses tomorrow. And boy am I glad... even if it's that miss-experienced helping out.