31 Waiters Recall The Most Fucked Up Thing They’ve Ever Heard While Waiting Tables
"Well technically he isn't my brother so I shagged him" to which her friend replied, "But you have the same Dad."
By Eric Redding
1. “Technically”
In a Witherspoon’s and there was a slight lull in the Friday night noise and a buddy and I overheard a girl say “Well technically he isn’t my brother so I shagged him” to which her friend replied, “But you have the same Dad.”
2. Anniversary Confession
Had a guy confess to banging his SO’s sister when I brought their drinks to them. It was an anniversary. I guess he thought it would be the least likely place for her to cause a scene. She caused a scene.
3. “I Am Not Pregnant!’
I overheard a customer talking about someone “coming and being so much fun”. I assumed she was pregnant because she seemed to be showing a bit. I decided midway through the dinner to congratulate her on being pregnant. To my horror, she said, “I am not pregnant”. I felt horrible. I told my manager who comped their meals and I hid in the back for the rest of their dinner. Push comes to shove she refused to let the manager comp her meal and left me a $20 tip with a note that said: “I was kidding I’m due in July.”
4. The Regular
We had a couple who would come in regularly and always asked to be seated in my coworker’s section. They were probably in their 60s and were always really affectionate and cute with each other. My coworker would joke around with them all the time.
One day the man came in with a different woman than usual, and my coworker jokingly told him “ooooh, you’re in trouble. I’m going to tell your wife you were here with another woman.”
Woman said “Excuse me? I am his wife. Who the fuck has he been coming here with?” Dead awkward silence while she death-glares at her extremely uncomfortable-looking husband.
My coworker just turned around and walked away.
5. A Familiar Topic Comes Up Again
Older couple at Bob Evans.
“I just wish I could die already.”
“I know dear.”
—nn30
6. That’s A Different Kind Of Dance
I overheard a guy on a date, at the table next to ours, trying to impress the girl by saying that he loved swing dancing, and that maybe they should check out that “Swinging Richards” place sometime. Their waitress was in earshot and quickly explained to him that Swinging Richards was not that kind of dance club… (It’s of the male nudity variety).
7. Grandpa Jokes
I am a server at a small hall that runs a restaurant/bar out of the basement in a small, rural community. One night, after almost all of the patrons had left, an old man shuffles up to the serving area, looks left and right, leans in and says, “All old people have AIDS,” He pauses, then says “Hearing aids, bandaids, and Roll-aids!” He cackles, then shuffles away.
8. A Public Kink
A couple used to come into my work, probably mid 50’s, they would request to sit somewhere private so she could proceed to jerk him off under the table and have him cum in a glass. We obviously didn’t allow this (nor realize it) until we actually saw the glass. They were already gone by then. The next time they came in we didn’t recognize them and got hit again. Finally, the third time we knew, sat them in the bar area where you’re pretty much on a display for 50-300 people. They requested to sit somewhere more private and we point blank told them absolutely not, they stopped returning after that.
9. A Proposal
I work in a pretty big tourist beach town, an older couple comes in one night, super nice. They were there for a while, pretty much until close. I come by to ask if they need anything. “Actually, my wife and I were talking, and since it’s our last night here, we wanted to know if you would be interested in joining us back in our hotel room?” I smiled, told them thanks but no thanks, but have a nice rest of your trip. They left me a hefty tip and went on their way.
10. Angel Waitress
A little girl’s (couldn’t be older than 10) dad’s drunk girlfriend calling her fat piece of shit, not pretty enough, etc. When they ordered she asked for a baked potato and the girlfriend said “Really? Do you really need that potato, Hailey?” The little girl was holding back tears all night.
I messed up her order and brought her the potato. Then I brought her a free dessert to make up for the mistake. Just to piss off the drunk girlfriend.
11. “It’s all Ova Me!”
Not a waiter, but was sitting next to a booth of people at a restaurant having the most awkward exchange of words.
Imagine two very Italian older guys with the most stereotypical South Philadelphian accent possible.
Guy 1: Accidentally spills iced tea on table
Guy 2: ahh it’s all ova me.
Guy 1: I’m sorry it was an accident. Ahh I’m sorry.
Guy 2: but..it’s all ova me…
Guy 1: I said I’m sorry. It was an accident, guy 2
waitress comes over to help
Guy 2: Napkins please, butter fingas’ ova here spilled this all ova me.
Guy 1: You’re embarrassin’ me, guy 2. You’re embarrassin’ me.
Guy 2: I’m embarrassin you? You wnna take this outside?
they stand up
Guy 1: no you’re like a brotha to me, guy 2
Guy 2: Come here.
they shake hands and hug.
I literally could not help but to keep looking over and my uncle was begging me to stop starring because he thought they were actually going to escalate into a fight. It was so weird I’ll never forget it.
ova = over. Tried emphasizing how hard the accents were.
12. Speaking Vietnamese
I was busting this table and I can hear these two guys speaking in Vietnamese to each other. One asks the other what they think about me. The guy responds and said I’m cute but I have a flat chest. Also in my defense we had to wear these oversized unisex shirts that was not flattering. But anyways, I just keep doing what I’m doing and continue on. When they came to the register to pay one asked me what nationality I was and I smiled and said I’m Vietnamese . They looked shocked; then asked me if I spoke it, which I responded I did. Then he asked me in Vietnamese if I’m understanding him right now and I responded back in viet that yes I do. They didn’t say anything else and left.
13. Straight To The Point
“Alright babe lets get out of here, this dick ain’t gonna suck itself,” says attractive early 30s woman to SO.
14. Ordering For her
This isn’t really fucked up but it’s definitely the time I said WTF the hardest.
Couple at the table. I greet them. Get drinks. Everything is normal. Lady’s voice is a little hoarse but not too bad, like maybe she’s a teacher and she was lecturing all day? I don’t know. So they’re ready to order food and the conversation goes like this. Keep in mind that I can hear every word that both of them said.
Girl: are you going to order for me?
Guy: oh… um. What do you want?
Girl: big sigh the house salad
Guy (to me): um she’ll have the house salad.
Girl: no egg!
Guy(to me): no egg…
Me(to both of them because I’m so confused): what kind of dressing for the salad?
Guy: looks at girl
Girl: big sigh ranch on the side.
Guy(to me): ranch on the side.
He ordered normally and I finished out the table with no other notable incidents. I think about this all the time. Why did she make him be the middle man when I could hear everything she said? Was this a first date? Did it last? I loved that he was just as confused as I was.
15. Bitches
Not a waiter, but a barista. I once overheard two teenage girls waiting on their drinks talking about whether or not they think that charges would be pressed against them for beating up a developmentally disabled girl. Apparently, they think they won’t because “she deserved it.”
16. Running Into Walls
I’m walking down a long hallway carrying a tray of food. A kid comes running from an perpendicular hallway and run face first into the wall without putting his hands up. He starts crying. The dad walks behind him very calmly and kneels down and says,”Buddy, you just can’t go running into walls.” I muffled my immediate laugh with my hand. It brought tears to my eyes.
17. Slapfight At The Pizza hut
I used to be a manager at a Pizza Hut. Big extended redneck family comes in, with parents and kids. Standard visit, and they stood up to leave when 2 of the guys started yelling at each other. Their wives/gfs got in on it and turned it up a notch by getting in a vicious slapfight. Best part? Both of the women were holding babies at the time.
18. Sex And Drama
I’ve been waiting tables for a little over a decade now, and I definitely have some favorites:
- I once had to wait on a table where the mother and father were trying to calmly explain that they were getting a divorce to their 8-10 year old son. They started the conversation before the appetizers even hit the table, crying by the time the entrees came, and still stayed for dessert. The little boy kept asking if he did anything wrong. So uncomfortable.
- I used to work at a nice bar in a really nice part of town, so a bunch of stories there. I was propositioned by a woman and her husband definitely old enough to by my parents, more than once. One table had two couples negotiating a swingers contract. Overheard a couple discussing pricing for the evening (which wasn’t surprising, she was stunning and he was about 40 years older than her).
- The worst, though, is waiting on a table where you just know some kind of abuse is regularly occurring. I listened to this 20-something guy tell his girlfriend that, because she didn’t want to order what he told her to, she was a selfish bitch and he would ‘fix’ her attitude later. I told my managers what I overheard, but because he didn’t do anything while in the restaurant, there really wasn’t much we could do.
19. Just Golddigger problems
Was waiting a table a couple days ago for a group of older ladies. While I was walking back to the kitchen, I overheard one of them say “You don’t know what it’s like to be married to such a fucking ugly man” and then said something about waiting for him to die so she’ll gain his money. It shook me up inside.
20. I Want Apples
I sat a table of three: a mom, her daughter, and Grandma.
After sitting, Grandma left to order spaghetti at the Italian place next door.
Mom seemed to be having an existential crisis. I asked her what she wanted to drink.
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Can I get you some water?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you want me to come back later?”
“I’m not sure.”
The daughter, who was getting impatient, stood up on her chair.
“Hey!” she said. “I’ll have you know. I want apples!”
“But first I have to get you something to drink. Would you like some water?”
“I want apples!”
Grandma ate Italian food in silence while Mom stared at a menu for an hour and a half and the daughter ate apples. When they finished, Mom paid, and they left. She tipped well, considering all they bought was $.50-worth of apple slices.
21. Unsolicited Information
My girlfriend waits tables. One time a creepy man said to her “when I have sex with my wife, I think of you instead.”
The wife sitting at the table didn’t seem bothered by this fact.
I also bought my girlfriend pepper spray and a taser soon after.
22. Changing Baby
Not overheard but saw when I bussed tables in high school:
I watched someone change a poopy baby diaper directly on the vinyl booth seat, then leave the poop smeared wipes and poop filled diaper on a plate on the table!
23. Innocence Lost
Just the other night, had a 6 top (2 adults, 4 kids) apparently talking about the afterlife. They stayed almost an hour after close so I was right there with them in these thoughts. There was an older girl around 11/12 who said she wasn’t scared of death and figured that once you die, that’s it. You’re gone. I was wiping tables around them as this was going on, so I missed the middle part here. I came back to the smallest girl, around 6/7, looking at her dad with big eyes and wailing ‘you LIED to me, daddy!’
So I’m guessing that’s how she found out heaven was something some believe in and some don’t. At like 12:30am, in a closed down restaurant.
24. Wife Doesn’t Care About The Rules
This was over 10 years ago and I had no idea what swinging and wife-swapping was… working breakfast fairly early at a downtown hotel in a big city.
Husband is clearly upset and wife is acting half-sheepish/half-annoyed and they’d instantly get very quiet whenever anyone approached. Their conversation was clearly heated and the restaurant was pretty empty with high ceilings and marble walls (old bank) … so even slightly raised voices carried.
I’m walking towards the table and they didn’t see me coming…
Husband: “How could I not be upset?! You let him fuck your ass! Why did we even talk about rules if they don’t matter?”
………
Couples fighting at breakfast on Saturday or Sunday morning after a night of debauchery was always pretty common… but this was the only time I ever heard a fight about unsanctioned ass fucking with a third-party.
25. The Simplest Of Loves
Not a waiter but overheard at the table across from mine…
(In the strongest Welsh accent you can imagine)
“What d’you mean I don’t luvs you!? I fucks you an’ I buys you chips!”
26. Covering Her Bases
I worked at a restaurant where you pay at the table and if you wanted a receipt, the server would go print it out and bring it back to you. I was waiting on a woman who every other server refused to deal with because she was such a hassle (she came in all the time). Complained about everything, basically made up her own menu items, etc. At the end of the meal when she was paying I asked if she needed a receipt, she said yes because she wanted proof she was here at this time in case she was accused of murder that night. Probably not the weirdest but the first one that comes to mind.
27. Asshole Parents
Late afternoon I had a 3 top family older couple and their adult son. The parents both ordered a cocktail, the son ordered a mocktail, then told me he had just (that morning) came out of rehab and COULD NOT have alcohol in his drink.
The other two proceed to order alcoholic drinks a few more times during their lunch, he was their sober driver apparently. They talked to him about rehab and his recovery and how he needed to straighten out his life.
I obviously didn’t say anything but I judged the drinkers hard for drinking in front of their fresh-from-rehab family member while lecturing him on being the black sheep.
28. Sugar Tits
I served at Olive Garden for a few months during college. One table stands out. A Nascar redneck wearing a shirt that wouldn’t quite cover his beer belly, covered in sweat stains, and all amounts of neckbeard kept calling me sugar tits, sweet lips, candy ass etc. during the meal. I am a man. He then tipped .86 cents.
29. Brotherly Betrayal
It was a slow Tuesday night behind the bar. I had one of my new guests come in, I had tended on him a few times. seemed like a supper nice guy. Tipped well, drank well and ate well. On this particular night, a woman came and sat down next to him. They seemed to know each other pretty well, so I’m thinking work buddies because I knew he didn’t have a girlfriend. (Honestly, I thought he was gay). So an hour or so goes by they have had 2 bottles of really nice wine, ordered basically everything they could off the menu, everyone was having a great time. Then my hostess comes around the corner of the bar and motions for me to come talk to her.
“There is a man on the phone who is extremely upset and needs the bartender to answer the phone” so I go for the phone, having no idea what this man wanted. “Hello sir thank you for holding, what can I help you with?” The man starts with a question, “is there a man with dark short hair, brown eyes, a bit on the bigger side sitting next to a short blond women with blue eyes at your bar?”
I turn around to get another look at them and reply to the man saying “yes they have been here for a while, what’s up?” They man doesn’t say anything for a few seconds then in a very unhappy tone said “That’s my wife and my brother”……. just as he said it I turn to look at the couple one more time only to see the end of a kiss. I told the man I wasn’t sure what I should do, or what he should do. I felt so awful. Seeing this mans life literally crumble.
I told the man I thought I should hang up and he should call his wife. After that, the man at my bar asked for his check, tipped well and the 2 of them left. I haven’t seen them since.
30. A Clown Engagement
Party of 5 or 6, its a group of friends having dinner. In walks a clown. Clown starts randomly walking around the restaurant doing balloon animals for kids and shit like that. I have no idea what the fuck is going on, we didn’t hire this guy. He walks over to the table of 5 or 6 and selects a man from the table to perform a magic trick for. He did the trick, a small flash of smoke and fire happens and then magically there is an engagement ring on a rope. The man takes the ring and the woman gets on her knees and asks the man to marry her. The man says no, tells her to get up and they continue dinner. This table now has the attention of the entire restaurant (like 300-400 people on our busiest night). Everybody just turned away and started awkwardly eating like nothing happened.
31. So Fucked Up
Well, I was a manager of a restaurant for a few years, not that long ago. There was this particular woman that came in from time to time, always with 2 boys around 13 or 14 years old. She wasn’t unattractive exactly, bu there was something about the way she “eyed” me up that even as a man…made me uncomfortable. I was sitting with a couple regulars at a bar top, and she and the two boys were at the table behind me…my back was to hers. One of the boys gets up to go to the bathroom. I assumed they were both her sons, but after the one boy left, I heard this exchange:
Woman: “We’ve got to be more careful. He almost walked in on us this morning.”
Boy: “I know. I’m sorry.
Woman: “We can talk about it tonight after he falls asleep. Shhh…here he comes.”
Anyway, at the time I assumed maybe they were planning a party or something…my mind definitely did not go to some place sinister. Turns out it should have. She was a teacher for a local school, and apparently, the boy she was talking to was a friend of her son’s. They knew each other from church. The boy told one of the church elders (I think that’s what they were called, Jehovah Witnesses) that he and she were having a sexual relationship. Turns out it had been going on for a year or more and they had sex 40+ times. She was sentenced to 6 years. It was really, really bizarre.
