have you ever played a joke on your waiter?

[CrissyBarrows]

I wait tables and just yesterday I dropped and broke a plate and then took a bow! :)The managers where I work are not very strict though. I would much rather have people clapping when I drop something than just stare at me like I am stupid. I will tell you what I do hate though, when I clear someones empty plate and they joke that they hated their food. I have to pretend to be amused even though I hear it all the time! LOL :D

[rclcruzer]

I wait tables and just yesterday I dropped and broke a plate and then took a bow! :)The managers where I work are not very strict though. I would much rather have people clapping when I drop something than just stare at me like I am stupid. I will tell you what I do hate though, when I clear someones empty plate and they joke that they hated their food. I have to pretend to be amused even though I hear it all the time! LOL :D

Boy if you had a dime for every time you've heard THAT one.........:p

(now that I think of it, I use that same line every once in awhile)..no more, promise :D

[AudioFilly]

Having worked in the restaurant industry for 18 years we always appreciated folks like you making an already bad situation all the more uncomfortable.

 

Many times, breakage is taken out of waiters' paychecks and they only make $2.13/hr to start.

 

I guess I don't see anything funny about that...

 

You appear to be the minority in that group, as the waiters apparently got a good laugh out of it :)

 

My DH and I have an ongoing debate about this. We both worked as waitstaff at various times through high school and college. Any time we are in any restaurant and someone drops something, DH claps and cheers. I always think it is rude.

 

If I dropped something I would be horribly embarrassed and would find it only more so with a bunch of people cheering about it.

 

DH insists that is a waiter's tradition to clap and cheer. That the applause actually helps to alleviate the embarrassment.

 

So, see, it just goes to show that sometimes even within the same family you can't get a consensus on this issue. :)

[ala-kat]

Okay so I'm in the minority... Can you explain why breaking dishes is funny and clapping and laughing at the guy is amusing?

 

Personally I never found it fun to have china costs going against the bottom line when I was struggling to keep a restaurant afloat...

 

The poor waiter who dropped the stuff probably felt like crap.

 

When I was waiting tables in college I dropped a bowl of cream soup on a lady's fur coat-let me tell you, there's nothing funny about that...

 

Macaroni Grille always seems to have fun with it...:eek:

[chasetf]

The only thing we have ever done is when the wait staff tries to remember our names the first night, we switch seats every night there after.

We do that alll the time... not just to confuse our waiters, but so we can mix it up and get to know the rest of our tablemates better. ;)

[capnlars]

We haven't played a joke on our waiters, but we did play the following prank on our room steward when we left for dinner one night:

[oshkosh1]

We were on a 7 day cruise on the Majesty of the Seas in 1994 with 3 other couples at a table for 8. Our waiter spent all week asking us if everything was excellent, reminding us that he wanted excellent ratings from all of us. We got tired of this towards the end of the week and decided to "humble" our waiter. After all of us decided what we were ordering, we randomly had someone else at the table order it for us. When the entrees came, he tried to deliver them to the "wrong" person. He was very flustered and confused until we let him in on the joke.

 

He was much more relaxed the rest of the week, and we didn't hear the "excellent" speech the rest of the week.

 

By the way - he got his excellent ratings from all of us.

[birdylady]

I wait tables and just yesterday I dropped and broke a plate and then took a bow! :)The managers where I work are not very strict though. I would much rather have people clapping when I drop something than just stare at me like I am stupid. I will tell you what I do hate though, when I clear someones empty plate and they joke that they hated their food. I have to pretend to be amused even though I hear it all the time! LOL :D

Guilty, sorry. But we always say it kiddingly and follow up with 'But we didn't want to hurt anyones feelings' and smile. but by this time we usually have had a great time interacting with a great server with lots of personality so hopefully we aren't hurting anyones feelings.

 

Thanx,

Erika

[BoozinNCruisin]

Last month on the Explorer we had a group of 42 and it was alot of peoples first cruise. Well my aunt never saw a waiter clean the bread crumbs in between the main course and dessert and she thought it was very nice! Well to that fact my aunt is a big comedian all the time so the one night she told our waiter "I'll have a surprise for you by the end of the week" and on the 2nd to last day of the cruise at dinner she went to the Windjammer and took about 15 packets of crackers and after the main course she opened all the crackers and smashed them with her hands and threw them all over the table so he had to clean them up! The waiter was laughing so hard and said it was the best and funniest thing someone has ever done to them! We had such a good time with our waiter and would love to have him again!

[cruiseguy1016]

Not to our waiter really but funny anyways. We were on Explorer last March. Our table was against the railing on the second floor of the dining room. We had some friends that we had met through our roll call that were seated below us next to the Captain's table. On the second formal night our 16 year old son coincidentally was dressed in the same outfit as the Head Waiter, white coat, gray tie and vest, black pants. After dinner he borrowed the name tag from our asst. waiter and pinned it on. Then he put a napkin over his arm and headed down to our friend's table on the first floor. He walked up to the table and acted like the Head Waiter, "how was your meal tonight, did you enjoy your day today". Our friends got a kick out of it but the other people were very confused. They couldn't understand why our friends were laughing at and joking with the "Head Waiter". Then, we looked around us and noticed that all of the wait staff form the second floor was looking over the railing at our son and his impersonation routine. Everyone got a big kick out of it.

[ilionite65]

Boy if you had a dime for every time you've heard THAT one.........:p

(now that I think of it, I use that same line every once in awhile)..no more, promise :D

 

Unless your tips were really bad I'm sure you did recieved at least a dime for every time you heARD THAT.

[stompy]

Not to our waiter really but funny anyways. We were on Explorer last March. Our table was against the railing on the second floor of the dining room. We had some friends that we had met through our roll call that were seated below us next to the Captain's table. On the second formal night our 16 year old son coincidentally was dressed in the same outfit as the Head Waiter, white coat, gray tie and vest, black pants. After dinner he borrowed the name tag from our asst. waiter and pinned it on. Then he put a napkin over his arm and headed down to our friend's table on the first floor. He walked up to the table and acted like the Head Waiter, "how was your meal tonight, did you enjoy your day today". Our friends got a kick out of it but the other people were very confused. They couldn't understand why our friends were laughing at and joking with the "Head Waiter". Then, we looked around us and noticed that all of the wait staff form the second floor was looking over the railing at our son and his impersonation routine. Everyone got a big kick out of it.

 

now THAT'S funny!

[ChoosinCruisin]

We haven't played a joke on our waiters, but we did play the following prank on our room steward when we left for dinner one night:

 

That's hysterical! Probably gave the guy quite a scare!

[ChoosinCruisin]

On the Serenade last August there were ten of us travelling together and we are all pranksters by nature. Our Waiter tried to give us puzzles and brain teasers that would stump us, but we always had the solution within minutes. One night he took a small plate, poured a small amount of water in it and started to tell us this story. "On a previous ship the Captain had one too many Alaskan Amber beers at lunch and when the ship was out of the harbor he hit the wrong button and capsized the ship. (He then took the pepper mill and put a fair amount of pepper floating on the water in the plate.) These passengers need to be rescued--sent to the edges of the plate--how will it be accomplished?" He then walked away to let us ponder the situation.

 

This was after dessert and the table next to us was vacant, but not cleared yet. So we took the plate the waiter prepared, placed it on the other table, and recreated the water on the plate without the pepper. He came back and looked at it and was shocked. We were all deadpan as if it was the easiest thing in the world. He said "that is not possible do it again." So he went through his routine, walked away, and we swapped plates again. Upon his return he was very confused and proceeded to have us do it again. This has now caught the attention of the Head Waiter who became part of the joke. After the waiter walked away we swapped the plates and again and the Head Waiter went to his knees is laughter. When the waiter came back the HW starts telling him that he needs to get this straightened out, it makes RCCL look stupid and dimwitted. We finally let the waiter off the hook and showed him all the other plates with the pepper still intact on the other table. We astounded him even further when my DH walked over the solved the puzzle the correct way.

 

This was one of the best waiters we have experienced, great sense of humor.

[tmoret]

last year a group of my friends and I took a cruise on the Sovereign. Our waitstaff was the best I had ever had!!! One night my friend Ryan could not decide what desert he wanted so he brought out like 7 of them for him to try.... 2 of my friends(strait males) were sharing a cabin so he was always teasing them and one night brought them both jello shaped like the upper part of a womans body.. lol so to get even on the night that the staff dances and sings my two friends and I got up and started to dance with them!!! Everyone in the dinning room just started to laugh and it was great! a bunch of the staff in the dinning room came over and said how fun it was and thanked us for making them laugh. That had to me the most fun we have ever had at dinner......

[Amy from Delaware]

We haven't played a joke on our waiters, but we did play the following prank on our room steward when we left for dinner one night:

 

That's fantastic!!! :)

[Rubysky]

On one cruise we had an exceptionally crazy waiter so we switched seats between courses. All courses. It took him until the main course to figure out what was happening....so, for dessert we got the table next to us to exchange seats with us.

This was midway through the cruise, we let him stew trying to figure out who was the instigator. You can't imagine his disbelief that it was sweet little old me.

 

On another cruise we had one of those waiters that believed only he should touch the pepper mill. With the help of the Maitre'De, and my large purse we smuggled 10 pepper mills to the table and kept them hidden until the salads came. As expected, when the first person reached for that precious pepper mill, he came rushing to assist. At that point we all pulled out our own mills and started grinding away. He was yet another one who was fooled by my sweet innocence.

[Cheerysmom]

We astounded him even further when my DH walked over the solved the puzzle the correct way.

 

Come on . ..I gotta know . .. How did the pepper get rescued? Solve the riddle for us ...

[serene1]

Hmmm...I know you can do it using a drop of dish soap...but you wouldn't have that at the dining room table!

[sargeantcurley]

Originally Posted by capnlars

We haven't played a joke on our waiters, but we did play the following prank on our room steward when we left for dinner one night:

this one was great :D

[wrkfire911]

HEY Tami!! GREAT thread ya got here...I have enjoyed reading it...and taking notes for the next cruise LMAO

 

I was part of the switching of the silverware to plastic ware along w/the OP on our last cruise...that was only one example of several things we did...boy did we get some not so nice looking from surrounding tables! LOL 11 cruises and counting and we have always done our little joking after "feeling out" the wait staff...many are jokers themselves..only once or twice did we have staff that was just TOO serious or didn't have the time so the jokes weren't played...what is funny though is when you see others around you that look so envious over our fun!

 

gonna have to do the pepper mill thing! that was great AND the "towel man" on the toilet was a riot !!! will have to do that also LMAO

 

 

keep the ideas coming....and keep up the good work...it really does make for a great dining experience:D

[pepsicruiser]

This was funny when we did it but may lose something in the translation lol. We had a wonderful time with our table and waiter. On the last night of the cruise while he went for our desserts the whole table made it look like no one sat at the table (real neat and clean) and then we all moved across the room to an empty table and watched while our waiter came to an empty table with our desserts. It was really funny as the whole end of diningroom saw what was happening and laughed with us.

[kasandra1679]

Wow this post makes me smile. I hope on my upcoming cruise I will be able to joke and play along with my waiter. My last one was far to salty for such shenanagins.

[jebl]

On my first cruise on the Nordic Prince, the dining room had a theme each night. This was also in the day when the side dishes were served ,rather than plated in the kitchen. Each night our waiter would offer baked potatoes. No one ever took one. We teased him that they looked like Italian potatoes on English night, English potatoes on Chinese night, etc. He would always insist they were fresh and we would roll our eyes and say not so! On the next to last night all of the ladies at our 8 top took a baked potato. When the waiter cleared the dishes there was not a trace of potato or foil on our plates. We had hidden the potatoes to take back to our room. On the last night we placed our envelopes with the tips in slits in the potatoes and that was how we presented them.

 

Also since our HW was exceptional, we ordered a small cake, had him sit at the table and we sang our version of "Thank you for the excellent service".

 

It was the most fun I have ever had with the waitstaff in all of my cruises.

[familycruzrs]

My son, about 11yrs old at the time, played a joke on our waiter. When asked what he would like for dinner, his response was, "the octopus." He kept a perfectly straight face. The waiter was confused for a moment until we all started laughing. It was a good time.