Sunday, April 28, 2013

Starting Traditions

Tonight was painfully slow. Typical sales for a busy day are at least $7k to $10k. Today lunch and dinner combined came to a grand total of $3.5k. Excruciatingly slow. There were, however, a few treats. The couple from VA that made my night the other night with talks of Civil War history came back, with reservations for dinner. After their two hour dinner, they came to the bar to talk shop. It was a great gesture that I not only appreciated but it also gave me a reprieve from ESPN on mute to swap war stories experienced only from the pages of books and History Channel documentaries. Rick and Jennifer Cole from northeastern VA left me a few suggestions of books to check out and an email address to check in on them with my review. Little things like that make the make the slow days not so bad. Thank God for good people.

Saturday, April 27, 2013

Rent and the Civil War

Nothing like ending a two day stretch of living at the bar all weekend and making enough to cover rent and all my bills in two days. It makes me feel not so bad about being a mid twenty-something and tending bar. God bless the blessed and their generosity. For every husband with the "recently removed from WW1 trenches" glazed over look there was at least one chatty, pino guzzling, shopping-bag laden wife who had all kinds of questions about where to go for the best seafood and the best cocktails and bla bla bla.

I met a couple from VA today. The wife had all types of stories and questions and comments about how different the weather was and how bad the pollen was back in VA and "Oh my goodness, we've had such a cool spring this year" and the second I mentioned my dad was a military man and that I was a bit of a military history buff the husband, Rick, ears perked up like Pavlov's dog at dinner time. We finished the following hour with conversation about the Civil War, Stonewall Jackson's biography, and how General E. Lee could have turned the tide at Gettysburg if the 5th Maine hadn't wheeled around the crops of trees to lay down a defilade of fire. So goes the conversations over a black marble bar. I miss you already Rick. 

Friday, April 26, 2013

And so it begins..

Simply the thoughts, concerns and observations of a twenty-something trying to find his way in a saturated job market. I'm slowly starting to discover, that in my line of work, or that is, the line of work I would like to end up in, everything is driven by social media and all things software. May this be one small step for a starving graduate and one giant leap towards benefits and a 401k.