Loved It!

Okay, so someone asked what an 'All Access' is. It's like a frequent diner card. For example, if you go to the MGM and gamble, they try to get you to open a player's card so that they can send you stuff and track your play. Well, we have something similar to that at the Hard Rock. Everytime you eat there, you give them your card and we track how much you spent and for like every hundred dollars you spend, you get like 20 bucks in free food. You also get a pin and a backpack when you purchase the card, you get priority seating which means if there is a line, you jump to the front and get seated right away and you also get like a years supply of Rolling Stone magazine.

So, the card costs $24.99, but as soon as you activate it, you get $20 on the card to use the next time you eat at Hard Rock.

We are supposed to try to sell the card to every table, we are also supposed to sell glassware and alcohol and appetizers and the list goes on and on.

So, these cards are kind of hard to sell. For the first three weeks I worked there I didn't sell any. Then, I finally started selling like one a week. So, this week, I sold FIVE!!!!

That's huge for me! I'm pretty psyched!

The new SOAPS came out and I dropped from 16 down to 28 which I'm totally fine with. My goal is to stay in the top 50 or so. I got 4 night shifts again this week and i'm debating on wether or not I want to pick up tomorrow morning.

I totally forgot to talk about the Office! How cute was Pam and Jim's wedding??? I thought it was hysterical that they copied that U Tube video. How clever and unexpected.

In case you've been living in a cave, here's the real YouTube video of the wedding march ...



And, here's the office wedding scene...



Loved it!!!

I forgot to tell you guys, my bowling team is in last place, but last week we won all of our games! It was great! We all came together as a team and bowled GREAT!! Let's see if we can do a repeat performance tonight!!

Delish

Sorry, I haven't been blogging so much. I'm over at the parental unit's house for the week. They went to Maryland and I'm taking care of the puppy and the house. So far, everything is going well.

I had to work last night til 2 a.m. and the pup was by himself for like 10 hours! He did a great job though. He's even been sleeping in with me in the morning instead of waking me up at like 6 a.m. like he does to my parents.

Now, if only the phone would stop ringing so damn early. Every single day that damn phone is ringing off the hook and interrupting my beauty sleep! Most of the time it's my parents calling too!!! UGH!

I sold two all access cards at work last night! I was pretty pumped! The glassware is pretty easy to sell, but those all access cards are a bitch.

So, I usually strive to sell one per week. This week, so far, I've sold 3 and I still have two more shifts to go! Yay!!!

Tips last night were the WORST EVER. I haven't complained much about tips lately because I realize that for every 2 dollar tip I get, there is usually a few tips that come along the same night and make up for the crappy one. But, I gotta say, last night was the exception. Literally, 50% of my tables left me horrible tips. I am surprised I even walked out of there ahead of teh game last night.

I got like a 3 dollar tip on 80 dollars - not just once - but like 4 times that happened last night. And, I know it wasn't because of poor service. I was on top of my game. I just think it was one of those nights where nothing I did was going to change anything. Oh well.

To soothe my sadness, I had an apple cobbler for dinner last night. It was delish!

Another Answer

Sorry for the delay Jay!!

Here's the answer to your question...

Jay asks...

Okay I have a question for you.

Were you ever concerned about moving to Vegas given your history with addiction? I mean, Vegas is full of so many temptations. I realize that anyone can find pretty much whatever they want just about anywhere, but in Vegas it's got to be much more easily available. So, did that part worry you any when you moved there?

Answer:

I'm sure that I should have been worried. People were worried for me and a lot of people didn't think it was a good idea for me to move out here. But, when I moved, I was clean and I had every intention of staying clean. I had created tons of drama and craziness in Florida and Maryland, so I figured a new state and a fresh start would do me some good.

As it turns out, Vegas has been a real challenge because not only do I have a drug and alcohol addiction, but I'm also addicted to gambling and there's so much gambling to be done here.

At first, when I wasn't using, I was gambling a lot and I would spend hours in front of the slot machine and lose my whole paycheck. It was crazy.

With time, I've gotten used to the whole gambling thing and the newness has worn off and I don't gamble very much now.

As with everything, I take myself with me wherever I go. So, if I move to freakin Timbuktu and I wanted some drugs, I'd find a way to get them. So, it's not the state or city that is the problem, it's me!

-------------------------

We never get the Ravens games out here on the west coast. So, today we finally get the game and my hopes and dreams were smashed. If only we could have had a few more minutes to complete our comeback! Dammit.

So, who all is coming out to Vegas in December for the blogger get together??

Does anyone have a list??

Jury Duty - Over

Okay, jury duty is over! Wow - how boring. The case was criminal. A 40 year old man was on trial for attempt burglary and conspiracy to commit larceny. It was around noon on a Tuesday in July when a hispanic man goes to this house and rings the doorbell. The lady was home, but she didn't recognize the guy, so she didn't answer. A few minutes later, he comes back and rings the door bell again. He leaves again and then he comes back a third time and rings the doorbell. A few minutes later, she hears glass breaking in her kitchen. She goes into the kitchen and sees a black guy peering in the sliding glass doors looking inside. He sees her and takes off running. She calls the police and gives the description of the black 40 year old man and the young hispanic boy. They detain two guys that match the description and she drives by with another officer to identify them.

Anyway, the hispanic man is the only person that left fingerprints on the sliding glass door even though she says she saw the black man looking inside with his hands up around his face touching the glass.

The men were running in July at noon together in Las Vegas in 110 degree heat when the officer stopped them, the black guy gave a fake name and they both went to jail.

We were just determining the guilt or innocence of the black man. The Hispanic guy will have his own trial.

So, like, they brought in so many unnecessary witnesses. They questioned the guy that lifted the fingerprints, the guy that worked with the fingerprints back at the lab, the officer that arrested them, the officer that drove by with the victim, and of course the victim. I really wanted to kill myself when the defense brought in an expert psychologist that specializes in memory recognition. He went on and on and on about nonsense. She would ask him a yes or no question, and he would expand on his answer for at least ten minutes. It took him ten minutes alone to answer the question about his college credentials and where he works.

Basically, he was making the point that different races have a hard time remembering facial features of people who aren't their own race. So, for instance, the victim was white and the guy on trial was black, so they were trying to shoot down her eye witness account. I knew what point they were trying to make 5 minutes into his testimony, but of course, we had to listen to him blabber on and on for like an hour. I was drawing all over my notepad and I had a very glazed over look.

Finally, we went to deliberate and I gotta say, I think we broke a record. WE went back there, raised our hands, everyone agreed he was guilty on both counts and we were done. Less than 5 minutes.

After jury duty, I had to rush to the Hard Rock because it was our Grand Opening Party. I was cocktailing on the main floor. Piece of cake. We made $20 an hour and we worked for like 8 hours, so that was good. It was crazy. When I arrived, there was a huge line at the door and a red carpet. Wow. It was kind of cool.

Celebrities that were there...

Holly Madison
Vince Neil
Chris Cornell
Justin Timberlake

that's all I know for sure. There were probably others that I don't know of.

Thank god jury duty is over for a few years.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Oh yeah and this is huge! The new sales report came out at work and I moved up from 21 to 16. Yay!!!!!

1 - 15 are considered the top 10 percent and they are the leaders and get the best shifts. I was ONE spot away from being highlighted and in the top 10 percent.

But, I'm thrilled with 16. I started out at the very bottom. I've steadily moved up and up and up every week. I couldn't be happier!

Another Answer

LB asks...

If you could change just one thing in your life right now..what would it be and why?

Answer:

IF I could change one thing in my life right now, it would be the mountain of debt I created for myself. I wish I could just snap my fingers and the debt would disappear. It's always looming in the back of my head and I hate it.

So, that's the biggest thing right now.

Any other questions?

I have tomorrow off from jury duty, and we anticipate finishing up on Thursday. I hope so!!!

Jury Duty

I was selected for jury duty today. It sucked! I called last night and sure enough, they needed me to report at 8 a.m. Then, I sat around all morning. When the afternoon rolled around, I went up to the 16th floor where they were selecting a jury for a criminal trial and guess what? I was picked. UGH! This is the second time I've served on a jury for a criminal trial.

I can't say anything else about it until it's over.

Luckily, I had my boss schedule me for all nights this week and I'm actually off tomorrow and Wednesday. They expect the trial to be over on Thursday so that's good. There is no way I could serve on a jury that lasted months. That would be horrible.

Thursday night is our Grand Opening Party at the Hard Rock. It's invitation only and I'm working it. I'm sure there will be lots of celebrities. It should be a good time. We have a whole different uniform we wear for events like these, so I have to pick up that uniform tomorrow.

Well, I'm wiped. Hanging around the courthouse all day wore me out. Thankfully, we don't have to be there tomorrow until noon! Yay!

Another Question

Question:

Josie asks...

I can ask you anything??? What ever happened to you and MiamiDon? Do you think you were happier when you were with him?





Answer:


This is a long one. The short answer would be that we just kind of grew apart and we realized we were better off as friends.

But, if you want to dive a little deeper into it and you know I do, the thing is, me and Don met in Florida during a time when we were both involved in NA. He had like 3 or 4 years clean when I met him and I had almost a year. We were really good friends first, talking on the phone every night for hours and hours. When we finally got together, it was great. Things were pretty perfect.

We took a trip to Vegas together and within an hour of landing, he was throwing 4 years clean down the drain and I was throwing a year away. We were drinking at the craps table and that was that.

It didn't stop at drinking. The next four or five months was a free for all. We had fun, I'm not going to lie, but I think it was the beginning of the end because our relationship was really tested and when we did get clean again, there was baggage and resentment and things were never really the same.

We tried to move past it. We left the past in Florida and we started fresh out in Vegas, but within a couple of months, I was back to my old tricks and I moved out. Eventually, we moved back in together, but it was strictly as roommates and as friends.

I miss him a lot!!! And to be honest, if my parents hadn't moved out here to vegas, I probably would have followed him back to Florida. But for now, I guess this is the way things are supposed to be.

I definitely think I was happier with him when things were good. I miss the way our relationship was in the beginning. We were very happy.

But, for now, we are very good friends and I look forward to seeing him in December.

Another One

Cstedman asks...

Question. Why did you go all summer without giving us any pool reviews? Actually I just want you to give us more bikini pics. So where are they??

Answer:

The reason I didn't do any pool reviews is because that was a paying gig and when the payment ended, so did the reviews. And to be really honest with you, I put on a little weight a few months ago and I wasn't very excited about being out in public in a bikini. I went to my pool in my complex a few times and I went to my parent's pool a few times, but I didn't go to any pools at any hotels this year.

I am happy to report that I lost all of the weight, so I won't be as camera shy. Now, my only problem is that my camera is in the shop and I need a hundred dollars to fix it. As soon as I can scrape up that money, I'll take some more pictures for you guys!!

Stay tuned for the Miami Don answer!

Answer

Okay, to start things off - I just thought I'd let you guys know that I went into work last night and the new sales performance chart was up and I moved up from 51 to 21!!!!!

I was two spots away from being in the top 25 %. The top 25% people get the BEST shifts, the most shifts and they are chosen to be team leaders and such.

I'm so happy!!! Slot 21 is great and I should have a very nice schedule for next week. Fingers crossed.

Okay, the first question left yesterday was from Nevada Jay...

Question...

Hola Seniorita -

I think it's great you're open to answering questions from your readers!

So here's my question.

I was thinking about regrets the other day, and how I wish I would have married a gal I had dated while in college. She was super hot, super smart, and was really sweet. I, on the other hand, was a prick.

So my question is - do you have any big regrets in life thus far? Not the kind like 'I wish I would have bought that green skirt', but, you know, LIFE kinds of regrets.

Answer:

I could write a book on regrets. The first MAJOR regret that comes to mind is that night when I was arrested at Hammerjacks for possession of extacy. It caused a chain reaction in my life that I've never quite come back from. I was arrested on a Friday night. I was out of jail on like Sunday morning. NSA knew about it and called me down to investigations first thing Monday morning. I was interrogated that day for about 8 hours. I ended up resigning from my position with the government. I had worked there since high school - for 10 years. I lost my top secret security clearance. I ended up losing the beautiful house that I had built. I went to rehab. I lost a lot of friends. I lost my self esteem. I lost my confidence. I lost my self.

Of course, if we want to get technical, I should probably regret the day I ever tried drugs for the first time. But, I guess, all that stuff makes me who I am today and if it wasn't for the drugs, I would never have met most of the people in my life today, I never would have moved out of Maryland, I never would have ended up in Vegas and I'm not sure that I regret moving out here. I kind of like Vegas.

So, I could go on and on about regrets, but I think the NSA thing is still the biggest and most traumatic thing that ever happened to me.

I'll answer another question in a few minutes - gotta grab some breakfast.

Question

I am going to start answering questions from my readers. So, if you have anything you want to ask - ask away - I will be brutally honest.

My first one comes from Brad

Question:

Just a question regarding the blank tip dilemma, since again as an aussie tipping is not big in the culture.

Could you not have raised the issue with your supervisor and seen if there is anything in policy already in the case of someone leaving the tip section blank?

As you pointed out, if they didn't want to leave a tip they would likely have crossed out the section (unless they didn't notice it of course) so perhaps it was possible to add a tip if given the ok by your boss?

Answer:

I totally wish I could just talk to the boss and write in the tip. 100 out of 100 people can agree with me and think that I'm right and the guy can even tell me to give myself a big tip, but legally, it would be fraud or something like that because I wrote it in and it's not my card. He has to write it in. So, thanks for asking.

Need Advice

So, I woke up yesterday with a fever. I knew immediately that I had a fever because my whole body was achy and I was freezing. I had chills like crazy and I just wanted to sleep. I just so happened to be at my parent's house and my mom took my temperature and sure enough, I had a 101 fever. I was on call at work and thank god they didn't need me. There was no way I could go in and work with a fever. I would have been miserable and I wouldn't have wanted to call out. So, it worked out fine because I feel okay today and I'm working tonight.

Here's a dilemma I have.

Need some advice...

As you know, my company is a performance based company and our schedules are created due to how high we are on the sales performance chart. What I've noticed is that people lower than me on the chart are getting more days on the schedule and I really don't think that's fair. I'm not understanding how this is happening and I don't know what to do about it.

Should I say something to management? But, we all know, management doesn't like complainers. They like people that "go with the flow". I'm trying really hard not to ever bad mouth anyone at work and to just take things as they come. But, they are so adamant about this sales chart and I've worked so hard to get up higher on that thing and I'm still getting the short end of the stick.

What do you guys think I should do??

Monday

So, I'm becoming addicted to these Hard Rock pins...

So far, I have the first three in the Showgirl collection...







How cute are they??

There are two more that haven't come out yet.

I also bought this adorable white corset pin. I believe it's part of the madonna corset collection or something. There are still 3 more I need to get. They are adorable.

Thankfully, I get half off of everything in the hard rock merchandise store. That's a big discount.

Tonight, 3 Babes and a Baller bowl - hopefully we can redeem ourselves.

I picked up a few pointers, it's helping my game a lot.

Happy Monday!

Another Day another dollar

I do want to apologize about all the bitching in regards to the tipping. I'm just so not used to working in a place where I have to deal with this. Like, here's the best one. I had a group of guys that worked up a $106 tab last night and they left me 4 dollars.

I just grinned and moved on. I probably do look like an asshole for criticizing Europeans for not tipping. If it wasn't for them, our restaurant would be empty because they are keeping us in business. So, I'm very sorry if I offended any of my readers and I welcome everyone to eat at the Hard Rock. Even if they don't tip.

Happy Friday everyone!

Crazy

Thanks for all of the positive comments about my moral dilemma. Looking back on it now, I can't believe I even considered filling in my own tip. How silly. I can tell you this, the next time it happens, and I'm sure it will happen again, I won't hesitate to leave it blank and take the loss. In the grand scheme of things, that one table is so insignificant. Last night was CRAZY. I was on the patio again and there are normally 4 servers on the patio. But, two of us come in at 5 and then two of us come in at 6. I came in at 5 and the whole patio filled up immediately. I couldn't see straight. That's why they call it in the "weeds". It's like being in a field of tall weeds and not being able to see your way out and having no idea which direction to turn. Me and the other server decided it would be fair to rotate the tables. So, he gets one and then I get one and then he gets on and I get one. This is the fairest way, but it was not smart because we didn't have sections. So, I had no idea which table was mine and which was his and who was sat first and who came in next and every time I turned around the hostess was bringing out more people and he was such a greedy dick that he took the big party. Everyone wants the big parties because obviously you get a bigger tip, plus you get to put the automatic gratuity on it which is SO important at this place considering the shitty tippers we get.

So, he takes the big table, so he was stuck over there taking a bunch of orders and I was just grabbing up every table that walked in. But, the patio is the farthest section from the kitchen and the tables are not pre-set. The hostesses are supposed to bring out the silverware, but half of the time they forget. And then, when I'm running around like crazy, I don't notice half of the time if they have silverware and what a shitty situation - if a table gets there food and they don't have silverware. Terrible!!

I can honestly say that I gave really great service to every table with the exception of one table that never got waited on, so they got up and went inside. I honestly just couldn't get over to them quick enough.

The freakin hostesses didn't ask us if we were okay to keep getting tables, they just kept bringing them out and the managers didn't come out once to see if we needed anything. It was crazy.

I got a 3 dollar tip on a 65 dollar check and I also got another 3 dollar tip on like a 75 dollar check. And, these were people that said they were happy with everything, there was no problem with the food or the drinks or anything. They were both Europeans.

You know, I hate to sterotype, but it's just the freakin truth. The only reason I walked out of there with some money in my pocket last night was because of the sheer volume of tables I had. I just had so many that the 4 and 5 dollar tips just added up eventually. My sales were like $1,000.00, so a server at a normal place that got 15 percent on most of her tables should have made $150.00. Oh not me. Let's just say I didn't even make $100.00 That means I averaged less than 10 percent on most of my tables.

It's such fucking bullshit.

Okay, I swear I'm going to stop bitching about my tips starting now. Done venting. Happy to have a job.

On the brighter side, the new soaps (server productivity report) went up last night and I'm in 54th place. I was in 49, but I'm still very very pleased with 54. It's close to the top and out of 130 servers, I think it's pretty good. My glassware sales are so high. I'm almost the highest in the company. I'm averaging like 15 to 20 pieces of glassware a night. That's really good.

I think I'm going to try to pick up a shift tonight. Another friend of mine got let go yesterday and I know she was supposed to work tonight, so hopefully I'll get her section.

Is anyone watching Survivor this season? If so, tell me how much do you guys HATE the fat guy that dumped out everyone's water and burned the guy's socks in the fire? What a crazy lunatic trouble maker? I really really hate him.

Happy Thursday!