What Rude Waitstaff?

Ok seriously... HUGE pet peeve of mine when I'm reading a book - the rude waitress who completely ignores the heroine, heavily flirts with the hero who (somehow) is completely oblivious, and is occasionally outright nasty to the heroine.

No.  JUST NO.

First of all, I've never seen this happen.  Ever.  I spent years working in the restaurant industry.  I have friends who still work in the restaurant industry.  I have never seen / heard of this happening.  I've never talked to anyone to whom this has happened or even seen anything on Facebook about this happening... so why the heck does it happen in like, every other romance novel?  As if this is somehow common?

A server might flirt, if they think that the person they're flirting with is single, but no one is going to jeopardize their tip money just because someone is hot.  Tip money is INCOME.  Servers don't make that much.  Income is important.  Insulting a chick who is out with a hot guy is not as important as rent, food, utilities, etc.  Not even to the younger servers who are still living with their parents or going to school.  They are working for a reason, and it's not just for fun.  Jeopardizing that, especially by being awful enough that a manager should really be called over, is NOT GOING TO HAPPEN.

Also, as an aside, if you're ever out with someone, and the server DOES completely ignore you and act like a total jerk, and your date "doesn't notice," ditch the date.  Because they should notice if you're being completely ignored or if the server is being rude to you.

But it won't happen.  Because it doesn't happen.

Do you have any idea how many hot men I served every day in the restaurant?  Plenty of whom were single and wanted my number?

Besides which, TIP MONEY.  No one's going to jeopardize their income to flirt with a dude, who will probably then leave a shitty tip because you've been rude to his girlfriend.  Or sister.  Or friend.  Or whatever.

It's one of the stupidest romance tropes and it drives me nuts.

On to my own writing... Bound to the Past is going slowly but surely.  Real life has settled a bit and so I have more time to write.  Yay!  =)  I'm really enjoying Kate and Andrew and getting into both their past and their present.  They're fascinating to me, especially because they really did both get over each other and yet they're still connected and have all this past history, and new feelings for each other.  So much is the same and yet different.

It's fun =)

So that's what's going on with me now... ranting and writing WOOT!