fight, fight, fight

Wednesday, oct. 18, 2006   |   0 comments

Last night Marco and I went to go see the Sharks beat the Stars (by which I mean hockey), and while I was waiting in line for garlic fries (I’d sent Marco inside to go sit down because I had been taking so long to figure out my whole food situation), I got into a heated battle with some woman. It was all very authentic. Best of all, I’m not entirely sure I was in the right? It’s a very specific sort of feeling, being on the wrong side of an argument, a spoiled and rotting sort feeling with a small sliver of thrill folded inside. But I was very hangry (have you heard this, the a portmanteau of hungry + angry?) after standing in line for over fifteen minutes — all while listening to the crowd roar inside as the team made their big entrance thorough the smoking shark mouth, which is my very favorite part of the game. And the line just was not moving. The woman behind the counter, a nice mom-looking sort of person, kept wandering off into some back office, and then meandering out to talk to coworkers, and then whispering something to the two guys at the front of the line, who had paid but were still sanding there. And she also kept pushing buttons on the register, and making things beeeeeeep? So I went up and asked what the deal was, were they out of food or something? And it turned out yes, they were currently out of some key foods, specifically the garlic french fries: they were waiting on some big delay in the kitchen to clear up. With obvious exasperation, I said to her, “You know, in the future,” this is always a really great way to start any complaint, “you might want to let the people waiting in line know what’s going on.” The woman just smiled vaguely and ignored me, but this OTHER lady, who had been standing in the same frozen line that I had, turned to me and said, from her haloed perch atop a fluffy cloud in heaven, that I shouldn’t take it out on the counterwoman, that there were plenty of other places to buy food, that I could just leave. Which wasn’t true! Because I wanted garlic fries! And this was the only place on that side of the stadium that sold garlic fries! And also I’d already wasted fifteen minutes on this line! And like a person idiotically clinging to rapidly devaluating shares in a highly suspect company, my need to get what I came for was irrational and strong. I wanted some ROI! Because if there’s anything worse than waiting fifteen minutes of prime smoking-shark-mouth time for a towering pile of garlic fries, it’s waiting fifteen minutes with no garlic fries to show for it.

So now suddenly my conflict had shifted from the incompetent woman behind the counter to the self-righteous woman in line. I told her that the counterperson was clearly not a great communicator, and if she had told us what was going on, we could have saved some time and ordered elsewhere. The Self-Appointed Defender of the Nice Working Moms said, “How was she supposed to do that?” Me: “What do you mean, she could have yelled out that they were out of food!” Her: “That’s not her job, her job is getting food and taking money.” And I said, “Obviously you’ve never worked in the food services before,” and she was all, “You’re kidding me, right?” She stood a little closer, and her skin looked weird and bumpy, and clearly she was getting ready to tell me alllll about her years of waiting tables and, you know, having to deal with lesser people just like me. So I just rolled my eyes and walked away. With no garlic fries!

As I walked to my seat, I felt all hot and floaty from adrenaline, and I just kept thinking of things I wished I’d said to her. I didn’t really manage to relax until deep into third period (and an order of Dipping Dots). Once I let go, though, I realized that the woman was probably right. I mean, I’ve totally been that person who confronts someone for taking frustration out on a service worker. Also I really do believe that anyone who gets paid the ridiculously low minimum wage (which I’m pretty sure is what they pay at the fry and beer stand at the HP Pavilion) has the right to do the very barest minimum. That’s what they get in lieu of a sustainable income; they’ve earned the right to sloth it up.

So instead of garlic fries, my stomach was full of shame. Which was probably for the best; garlic fries always make my ass explode anyway.