We're out of that too

I was watching vids on YouTube this morning with my daughter and happened across a bunch of skits of (Sesame Street's) Grover as a waiter. I'd seen and remembered a few, like the tiny/huge burger, with the blue, mustached exasperated guest (creatively named "Fat Blue"), but didn't remember this one which is now officially my new favorite (I can have favorite Sesame Street skits. What?).

We've all worked someplace where it seemed that we were missing at least some minor component of what we needed to do our job at just about every turn. My recurring favorite is that once every never months that some couple orders that most expensive wine on the list...which, I find out from the bartender, sold out two weeks before, along with, of course, their eventual second and third choices. They inevitably settle on a couple of Diet Cokes, preserving my hope that I can extend my White Zinfandel sales streak to a new personal best of eight bottles in a row.

A few more of my favorite out-ofs:

• the liqueur that we've never had since we've been open that's a key ingredient of one of the cocktails that's been featured on our menu...since we've been open.
• espresso spoons: The average restaurant has three of them: one jammed in some inaccessible part of the dishwasher, one in the pen caddy in the office, and one at that table that's needed to be bussed for the past twenty minutes.
• creamers: Usually, if you can slide it by the M.O.D., a ramekin'll do here.
• coffee: one out of every 46 or-so waiters will brew a pot when they've used the last serving. After all, if we were team players we'd be professional athletes, not waiters.
• clean dessert menus: I think I saw one four years ago

I'd give myself carpal tunnel syndrome finishing half this list, so I'd better not.