well,
we drove the hour and a half out to the military cemetary to the MIL's grave site. We haven't seen it since the stone was put up. MOH also wanted "alone time" with MIL. So I saw it and walked away leaving MOH alone. WE took this HUGE arrangement MOH ordered to go there. MIL LOVED flowers, so for Mother's Day it was appropriate, we would have taken her some kind of {potted} flower anyway.
Stopped at a Bob Evans Restaurant. I used to be a cook in a restaurant and even once dated a waitress co-worker {often a bad idea to mix work adn pleasure...not in this case, though she did move away}, so I am aware of the inner workings and pay scale of wait-staff in particular. Here in NY they only get $2.19/hour as wait-staff minimum wage, and are taxed based on what gets rung up under their # for food sales. They may or may not also have to share their tips with: busboys, hosts, cashier and, oddly enough, in at least one case that shocked me on TV, the cooking staff! Now the cooking staff usually gets paid relatively well { at elast I always did}, usually quite a bit above Fed. minimum wage{$7.25/hr. Here in NY and some other states is higher by law}. The host/cashier may only get paid based on Fed. minimum wage{or state}, too.
Now i say this because I saw 2 little old ladies {70s or 80s} in my field of vision straight ahead to the left of the aisle finishing up their complete meals and sodas, and have desserts. Probably at least $25 tab without the desserts. They left only a single dollar on the table. SOme people are under the impression wait-staff just "rake it in", but not on $1 tips for a half-hour sitting on a $25 tab.
So, I was gonna leave a 15-20% tip anyway {I always do, unless service was particularly bad-not the food, as food is NOT wait-staff's control-you send it back to the kitchen -or ask to see the chef or cook- if not satisfied with the food in any way}, but bumped our tip up to a bigger tip to help make up for the old ladies who essentially left her no tip. A $1 tip on 2 meals and drinks and desserts now-a-days is considered "no tip". Unless you had a coffee only.
Some people just don't know, and I hate to say it, but the older they are, the less likely they are to tip appropriately. It is hard to understand if one doesn't know the rules inside workings of a restaurant. They also "live in the days" when you left two pennies or a nice shiney nickel with the quarter for coffee only, and that was a "fine tip",and figure a $1 is a grand gesture on their part. Or they figure 10% only is enough,and so on a $10 entree that appears to be a proper 10%, but they fail to consider the cost of their drinks and desserts, too, if applicable. any "special resquests" also deserve extra tip.
that is why some places state on their menu...that "a tip should be between 15-20% of the total dinner price", AND/OR add a 20% tip for "large parties" as often to have help with the table, 2 or 3 wait-staff are needed and they share the tip. AND to make sure the wait-staff doesn't get a $1 tip for 6 meals and drinks.
My FIL is one who tips only a $1 per meal, he thinks they get Fed/state regular minimum wage{the $7.25, or here in NY $8.00}, and that he does them a favor by leaving a tip, even at only $1.
Personally I think tipping should be abolished here in the USA-they get paid like the cooking staff does {only the lowly dishwasher in the back of the house gets the fed/state regular minimum}, then there would be less confusion over the issue!
Not being "political" just sayin'.
It was a nice meals and we both brought home leftovers for later.
MOH insisted we stop at my mohters grave on the way home. The plots next to my mother's plot {3 of them apparently} is new recently. Only one party of the marriage had passed, so the dual stome was marked incomplete for the living party. It sure 'crowded" my mother's ample stone.My father spared no expense and had a big stone and a vinyl "permenant" portrait of mother installed in a recess on the stone. He will be buried at her feet in his cremation urn or box. The military plaque he gets will be bolted to the back of her stone. There are 3 other family plots, one in which, unless we move somewhere else, will be the plot MOH and I share. My brother is there too. Funny thing is the next door neighbor that I and my parents hadwhile I was growing up and who's son still has the house next door, well when the neighbor passed, they buried him in the plots next to ours. so My mother and the neighbor's wife {still going at 97} who was dear friend to my mother will be "neighbors" with her husband "afterwards" too.
Both cemateries looked nice, though the military is better kept, I think. $250 "perpetual care" fee doesn't buy you much.
Enough about that, I am sure I bored you.
was a NICE sunny day in the early 70s untill we got home, then thunderboomers
set in up from the PA border.
WEll, Jeffrey is certainly excited about what came today. I can see why, I think? All I got was a bill and "junque mail". Usually all the bills mostly come between the 12-22 of the month, SOme i think are 'moving up' to an earlier date on me! Used to be only one bill was a straggler from the norm there. But not now.
well, we will rest the rest of the day. MOH has already gone for a nap, I think I go join with the puddy!
Dinner will be leftovers!
