The Poop Lady

Daughter had read my post with poop involved and this somehow wormed its way into a conversation we were having about tipping.

I was mentioning my dilemma at tipping people who work counters. Considering all the years I waitressed my way through college and then some, tipping for counter service seems a bit of a stretch.

Daughter works at a coffee house and of course appreciates the tip jar.

However.

She mentions that it is nice to get the tips, but she really only expects it from the people she serves. People who order food usually go and get a table and the baristas take the customers’ food out to them. Plus clean up the dishes and wipe down the table afterwards. For this... she thinks a tip is nice and proper.

There is one regular who Daughter goes into a rant about. The woman is VERY PICKY about her latte – she does NOT like it the way most people do and makes a big show of explaining how to make it every day when she comes in.

She also orders food. She usually eats breakfast at the coffee house, sometimes coming back for lunch.

Instead of paying at the counter when she orders her food, she makes the workers come get her credit card from the table, take her credit card, go and ring it up, and bring it back to the table, where she will sign the voucher.

As she signs it, she puts a line through the tip section, looks Daughter (or whomever is serving her) in the eye, and says, “You don’t get a tip, this isn’t a real restaurant and you really didn’t do anything.”

Then, after expecting to get waited on, not tipping, and being a bit mean and condescending about not tipping, she tries to make conversation with the workers. The WHOLE TIME SHE IS THERE. Shouting to them while they serve customers at the counter.

Daughter did not like the smirk on my face.

“That’s not the worst of it Mom,” she says to my smirk. “EVERYTIME she eats, within ten minutes she has to take a poop.”

Quick aside. The restroom is a big single restroom that opens up to the dining area.

“She stays in there, for like TEN MINUTES. Then, when she comes out, she doesn’t bother to shut the door and the stink is awful. It follows her out. We have sprays in there, but she doesn’t use them. So one of us has to go in there and spray the stink and shut the door so the customers don’t end up so grossed out they gag on their coffee.”

"For THAT," I say to Daughter, "for that, she should really have left a tip."

"If she would just go home to poop," says Daughter smiling, "I could live without the tip."