There are benefits that come with good (read: high-paying) jobs. Usually, the higher-paying the job, the better the bennies. Not usually, higher. I was fortunate in my chef career to have befriended and worked for several very rich people. Diamond Danny owned forty-seven restaurants around the globe, and all of them were in coastal communities.Continue reading “Fringe Bennies”
Category Archives: food service
Tipped Employees
I am a good tipper. I was taught by my mom that you did not accept service from someone without compensating them. We always had money to go out AND tip for services rendered. And we weren’t rich by any means. Of the many jobs I worked in my life, it’s hard to beat musician,Continue reading “Tipped Employees”
The Bike Ride From Hell
I was thirty-two years old and had the body of a coke-fueled alcoholic on the fast track to The End. I had not lifted a weight since I was nineteen years old and I soaked my body nightly in Seagram’s VO, Elephant Beer, and other people’s girlfriends. I was dating my wife-to-be for all ofContinue reading “The Bike Ride From Hell”
Ice
Where would we be if there was no such thing as ice? Warm beer. (But if you know anything at all about beer, that is a good thing). But no cold lager. Them’s fighting words. Ice storms would just be storms and those old ice skates in your closet would never have been made inContinue reading “Ice”
The Return of Maddogg
We know the Satin Latin is back, but guess who showed up at an open mic tonight in the coolest little venue I have ever lifted a guitar in? Maddogg is back. Two days removed from the Cardiovascular post-op ICU I finally make my way out to a little town called Pleasant Plain. (I wishContinue reading “The Return of Maddogg”
Bigger Than I Ever Knew
I am on record as saying my big brother Ed is one of my biggest heroes and I always wondered what it would be like to bear the responsibility of having a younger sibling. I had a chance to find out when I was in my late thirties. I was living in Norman, Oklahoma andContinue reading “Bigger Than I Ever Knew”
Meat Eater
I am a carnivore and I have already eaten way more meat than I ever should have eaten, but I make no excuses. My father and Grandfather were both butchers and worked in slaughterhouses. I remember being horrified at the sight of the cows being led up the chutes and the man shooting them inContinue reading “Meat Eater”
Be on the Alert
Why? Why do you want to live life continually “on the alert” for things which may or may not, happen? Go gives a flying shit anyway (as if shit could fly)? I am drawing the line on alerts. I just got an alert from my bank telling me “you have no alerts at this time.”Continue reading “Be on the Alert”
Waiting in Line
Who likes waiting in line? I don’t know why, but I always feel like I lose time waiting in line that I will never get back. Unless you are waiting in line to get into a Guns ‘n Roses concert with Sebastian Bach and Skid Row opening up for them. Then you are guaranteed thatContinue reading “Waiting in Line”
Stripes
Used to be the only people wearing stripes had done something bad enough to land in prison or those with bad fashion sense. I never got the whole “stripes are slimming” thing. I don’t perceive as anyone being slimmer or fatter unless they are nude of course, but short of that, who gives a shitContinue reading “Stripes”
