Christmas Eve Eve Medley

 'Twas the night before the night before Christmas and all through the house, the only sound was the sliding noise of the cheap computer mouse. So, I will share a few thoughts on the eve of Christmas Eve.

Jack Shit, the alleged Special Counsel, got bitch-slapped by the Supreme Court the other day without as much as an explanation. Jack wanted the Court to speed up the prosecution of Donald Trump but won't say why. The Supremes are smarter than Jack gives them credit for. It's back to the Court of Appeals for Jack Shit.

Meanwhile, former Attorney General Ed Meese and a couple of Constitutional professors filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court pointing out that Jack Shit is not legally a Special Counsel according to the law. Even if the Court does nothing with this right now, Trump's attorneys are free to file a similar motion with Judge Slutkan in the District Court and start the entire process over. The Meese brief makes an excellent case for the dismissal of Jack Shit and his case. The government is also compelled to follow the law, even for Donald Trump, the Great Satan for Democrats.

Tomorrow will be Christmas Eve. If I find myself at home and bored, I will think back to more than forty years of chasing customers out of restaurants on Christmas Eve. About twenty years ago, I was telling a guy that it was time to go, and we were closing. We had seated our last customer more than an hour earlier. He said, " I am just trying to spend some time with my friends on Christmas Eve." I told him that the staff had that same desire and to get his ass out. He told me that he would never return, I told him that I was willing to take that chance rather than lose my employees over an inconsiderate customer. Three days later he was in for breakfast. He kind of apologized for the misunderstanding. I told him that it was okay. I asked what had caused his viewpoint to change. (That's as close to polite as I could get,) He told me, "My wife said that I was being a jerk." We both laughed. I comped his breakfast check and he walked over to the waitress who had waited on him and his friends on Christmas Eve and gave her a twenty-dollar bill and shared his wife's wisdom with her. She may still be laughing.

It's not a problem unique to full-service restaurants. One Christmas Eve as I was locking the door at Taco Bell #1265 at 7911 West Hillsborough in Tampa, a guy ran to the door and said, "I have to have a Burrito Supreme and a Beefy Tostada for dinner on Christmas Eve." He was obviously crazier than I was, so I let him in.  

At Casa Gallardo, we didn't have problems with diners on Christmas Eve. The problem was with morons in upper management who wanted us to stop seating customers at 7:00 PM. That meant that it was after 9:00 PM when the last customers left. It was almost 10:00 PM when the managers and the last of the employees left. We got a new VP of Operations the next year who had us close down at 4:00 PM. Problem solved. We were out by 6:00 PM.

We never had those problems when I worked at the Waffle House, we never closed. Christmas Eve at the Waffle house was not very busy after 5:00 PM. The late-night shift was busy from 11:00 PM until about 4:00 AM as those who were celebrating Christmas in various bars and clubs stopped in for a meal on their way home or wherever they were going for Christmas. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were both big days for tips for the waitresses. That didn't help me, but there were a lot of regular customers who gave me cards with money or gift certificates in them. If I missed telling you then, Thanks!!

From 4:00 AM to 6:00 AM on Christmas morning, we rarely had a customer. It was incredible how quiet a busy city like Tampa could become on an early Christmas morning. As I sit here more than fifty years later writing this, I am having flashbacks to those times and the peacefulness of those moments.  I haven't been out at that time on Christmas Day since 1977, so I won't speculate about what happens now.

What's the good news about being older on Christmas? The kids are grown. To accommodate various in-laws, we are having our family get together the day after Christmas Day. Maybe on Christmas morning I will get up and head out to a Waffle House around 4:00 AM? The world has changed a lot since then so my main concern will be "How much gun do I need to carry on Christmas Morn?"  I don't remember reading if the shepherds had Concealed Carry Permits.

I would like to wish a Merry Christmas to a bunch of folks that I worked with at the Waffle House. I don't know how many are still alive as I was one of the youngest there, but Merry Christmas to Grace Swank, Earline Reaves, Gail Hubbard, Archie Morgan, Robert Patrick Frazier, David Riley, Elmer Gagner, Carol Morris, Linda Erwin (who is now Linda Erwin, M.D.), Kimberly Ashley, Chester Albert, Bobby Riggins, Doris Antrobus, Randy Palmer, John Earl Blodgett, John Smith (really), Hilda Gagner, Gurney and Evelyn Jones (no relation to me), Lake Anderson, Darcy Anderson, Judy Lomax, Mary Lay, Rick Love, John Reagan, Larry Martindale (who is probably still an asshole), Bionic Bonnie Sammons in Brandon, Pat McConnell, Jerome Weldon, Robert Criss,  Linda Black, Sandra Coulter, Sharon Schulte, Ken Hibner, Ed Wetherington, Connie Rudolph, Michelle Eskridge, Debbie Gable, Judy Miller,  and hundreds of others whose names escape me more than 45 years after leaving the Waffle House. Merry Christmas y'all!!!