Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Southern Utah Bastard--No, Really

I was out with my wife in celebration of our 19th wedding anniversary. I was thinking--I'm 37 and I've been married over half of my life. But also my wife and I were both craving taco salads. Lots of lettuce, grilled chicken on a freshly deep fried tortilla and mixed together with sour cream a guacamole. Damn yes.

My wife had a glass of wine with her meal. We were too full for dessert. We sat hoping to digest enough to get dessert but we had other places to get to before we returned to the homestead and our little half bastards (born within wedlock to a full blooded bastard = half bastard). During our optimistic sitting two moms and a whole bunch of children walked in. They were not the empowered lesbian minivan family. This was two separate moms with mean creases in their faces. They sat down and spoke openly of their very, very limited budget. One of the smaller babies threw a handful of chips onto the ground. I saw our server wince.

"They are not going to tip her shit." My wife said quietly for just me. Utahns are not known as generous tippers in the first place but she has been in the business for awhile. She has the eye of the server. She had worked in Nevada where servers would fight over who had to wait on the people about to come into the restaurant from the car with the Utah license plates.

We got our check and she nudged me. "You should give her something extra." She was telling me because I had the cash in my pocket. The card I paid with was the account both of our checks went into.

I put two five dollar bills with my card and we paid. We were full, in good spirits and in the mood to spread the wealth. Our server ran my card and looked at the cash in confusion.

"Did you need change?" She asked.

"Nope. All for you." I smiled.

"It's our anniversary," my wife said.

"Are you from around here?" Our server asked.

I laughed. I had been in born and raised in southern Utah. My wife and I met in high school.

"We are. We've both worked for tips, though."

I looked over my shoulder where one of the mothers was jabbing at the menu one of her small children was holding--he was getting one enchilada, not two. "It can be rough." I tapped my heart with my fist.

My wife wished her luck and on the way to the car we joked about what a compliment it can be to have people thing you must not be from around here.