September 6, 2009
"Debra," says Victor, "it's absolutely not personal, and I hope you understand that." He's sitting on the desk in the back room, with Lanie behind the desk in the chair ( Read more... )

Let me explain ( Read more... )

It's about half past seven on a Saturday in early November. I've been on since four, and I'm still not used to the fact that it's already starting to get dark by that time of the afternoon now that Daylight Saving Time is over. It makes me feel like it's later than it really is, so even though I'm a night owl, I keep checking my watch to see how ( Read more... )

It's been a few weeks since Maya quit, but Pat and Todd have had much more difficulty than usual filling her spot. There's a thousand young women out there in New York City hoping to get a good bartending job, but the timing was bad. Out of the dozens of applicants we'd "kept on file" since the last time we had an opening, many had found other ( Read more... )

Thursday, June 26
It's awfully warm and muggy out, and the air conditioning in the Bar is having serious trouble tonight. Pat is tinkering with the controls at the same time she's on the phone about it. Apparently nobody can send a guy until tomorrow. "If only the AC would have the decency to break on a day we don't desperately need it," she says ( Read more... )

"You don't serve mozzarella sticks? What kind of bar doesn't serve mozzarella sticks? I demand to see your license to serve alcohol ( Read more... )

Friday I'm on an earlier shift than usual to accomodate some other girls' schedules, and I regret it even before I set foot inside the Bar. It's another beautiful day, the third or fourth in a row, and there's still a few more hours of sunlight left when I arrive for work. I wait outside until the last possible moment, just a few minutes before ( Read more... )

It's Thursday afternoon. I walk out of the back room trying to process everything that's been said, and I stick my notebook back in my bag. Later in the afternoon I'll send an e-mail to my lawyer describing everything I talked about with Lanie and Victor and asking whether she thinks what they've proposed is fair, but I already have a pretty good ( Read more... )

I'm sitting on the Comfy Couch in our living room, at the outside end of the short part of the "L" the couch forms. At the far end of the long part of the "L" sits Jason Giambi, his cap pulled down, his arms crossed, staring at the television. We're watching a movie I've never heard of, with actors I don't know. In between Jason and me, on the ( Read more... )

At the Bar on Monday afternoon, the owners Lanie and Victor have laid out a makeshift buffet lunch on the bar, and the entire staff is there, something I only see two or three times a year. We catch up with each other and share stories, while making pigs of ourselves on manicotti, steak pizzaiola, broccoli, and some other foods that end in vowels ( Read more... )