musings on being lame.

I’ve just been accused of posting something lame by one of my “friends.”

You know what, dude? I try really really hard not to be lame. In fact, one might argue that I am the least lame girl in town.

The following are examples of how not lame I am.

• I sport like 6 bracelets at a time from (chain stores) all over the world.
• I didn’t get the anti-reflective stuff on my glasses so as to fully achieve the “nerd chic” look, which is all the rage right now.
• I wear Tory Burch flats to work because I work in Plainview and in this town, conformity rules.
• My babygirl wears a vintage charm necklace and can perform a one-man version of Macbeth. She’s 2.
• I can’t remember if in the olden days when I wrote these posts, I used all lowercase letters or not. I feel like I did to be stylish, but it goes against nearly everything I believe in. (If you spell a lot as one word, please stop reading now and never ever ever ever try to contact me again. You are dead to me.)
• That’s all I can think of. Maybe you’re right, Sandy.

In other news, being a mommy to two restaurants is really annoying for me, and potentially interesting to you. So maybe I’ll actually write about the business again.

Today was my first day back from vacation (Naturally, we went to Disney World. Because there is nothing more relaxing than chasing hungry and tired babygirls/stepkids/dads around multiple theme parks and hotel lobbies for 7 days. The highlight is a tie: the Jr. High Miss America Pageant and a child talent scouting conference, both held in my hotel. Exploiting children is one of my favorite hobbies, that and car singing). I spent my first 4 hours back at the restaurant working on a list of things to do so that I can be focused and completely on my game. It currently consists of the following items:

• call farms.
• make an about page on the website.
• plan a beer halloween party.
• reboot hashbrown harry’s. 
• “email.” (I don’t remember to whom I am to send one)
• find miniature disposable tongs.
• refinance house.

The to-do list was all I did. Oh no wait. I also bought a stamp and a smoothie. I was trying to do other stuff but then the whole lame fiasco went down and now all I can think about is how true it truly truly is.

The new restaurant (Wait, have we even talked about the new restaurant?? Ok, we opened a new restaurant. It’s fucking baller. There’s incredible beer. My belly is like, dude, stop drinking that shit, you look preggers and it’s too hot outside for more than one layer of Spanx.) is getting on nicely. We’re yet to be reviewed by the newspaper. The food is yummy and I play Lumineers radio on Pandora, so basically we’re guaranteed a perfect rating. If we don’t get a perfect rating I’ll basically go into a state of depression so deep that people will confuse me with Wednesday Adams and my daughter will cry every time she sees me. I sure hope the reviewer is reading this so she realizes the potential damage she’s doing to an adorable Shakespeare-performing babygirl.

On Tuesdays we have Taco Tuesdays, and it gets super crowded,  which I find really confusing since the menu is in no way Mexican and we don’t have guacamole, and why would you want to go someplace that doesn’t have guac for your tacs? Alas, people are entitled to make the decisions they make, even if they are wrong, and show up at my restaurant on a stupid night of the week. Fools.

The new restaurant is in a town so deeply Jappy that I started talking like I’m from Long Island again, a habit I happily kicked when I was in my tweens. I sound like Fran Drescher. I constantly make myself want to puke. It’s so Jappy that I think I’m going to have a CAMP viewing party on Friday nights. Oh shit! Something to add to my to-do list! No, like I really think I’m gonna do that. Not taking advantage of being a Jewish business owner in this town is like not taking advantage of being an Eskimo on a college application. For instance, I’m currently planning a “Jews and Brews” charity event, and there’s a farm-to-table Rosh Hashanah menu on the horizon. Also a weed dinner (dreams do come true!!!) but I probably shouldn’t talk about that because my mom totally reads this and she’ll be all disappointed in me and lecture me and say “Shelby you can’t sell weed!” and I’ll say “But moooommmmmmm!!!” and she’ll say “I said no.” and I’ll say “I hate you mom! You ruin EVERYTHING!!!” And then I’ll do it anyway.

OK. Let’s talk soon, alright? Because seriously, I really do miss you.

 

 

 

ode to my newborn. (a harried post.)

It was pointed out to me yesterday by a douchey reader/friend of mine that I’m being selfish by not documenting the intricacies and antics involved in opening a restaurant (as that’s what I’m doing today. You? Slacker..). 

But something really interesting about opening a restaurant is that by the time I get done with what I need to do for this opening… oh wait. I’m still not even close to done yet and we crack the doors in 7 hours. So, sorry dudes but you’ll just have to believe me that it requires a lot of the following:

• arguing
• crying
• shopping for a good outfit
• picking a nail polish color that’s “professional, yet me”
• wiping up your kid and/or puppy’s urine off the floor because they’re protesting the 70 extra hours you’re putting in a week
• drinking beer for research
• convincing your husband to double park on the side of the LIE to pick up 3 kegs of superman beer that maybe MAYBE 1% of your customer base will give a shit about from the back of a truck
• eating bagels at 2am because you forgot to have breakfast, lunch and dinner
• being sad about how bloated you are because you keep eating bagels at 2am
• writing a blog post instead of finishing the cocktail list, kid’s menu, bar menu, dessert menu and programming the computer for all of them
• tweeting, or as I like to call it “how the fuck to I tweet?”
• forgetting to make a google place page until just now so basically I’m using this post as a to-do list. 
• wishing you had time to do the laundry so your spanx were clean (they make man spanx so this applies to all of you except skinny people and you don’t count anyway)
• making all the cocktail recipes a few hours before you open and consequently being wasted by the time anyone gets there. 

If it weren’t for aforementioned reader/friend whose name I won’t mention until the end of this post, I’d have taken a few moments to relax with my ukulele instead of writing this, but I didn’t, and now I don’t feel centered and I’m going to be a drunk, uncentered business owner off the bat, and SERIOUSLY GOOD LUCK to anyone who shows his or her face tonight to “be supportive” because it will most likely in a violent bar fight involving me, my dad, and some seriously impressive looking beer bottles. 

You can thank Sandy. 

an open letter to spring celebrations. (aka fuck you, party season)

Dear Party Season,

I hate you. You are destroying my life, one child bride at a time. I must’ve missed the memo that every communion, shower, PTA meeting and bowling end-of-the-year dinner needs to go down in the same 8 week span. My brain has melted into a peanut buttery pile of mush. Please, please, please end as soon as possible. I need to catch up on Mad Men.

Thanks,

Shelby

PS. See you next year! Can’t wait!

~~~

Something really interesting about the restaurant business is that sometimes you get so stressed out that one day you wake up deaf in one ear. Which is really annoying because I AM SO FUCKING BUSY and I really really don’t have time to do things like figure out why I can’t hear anything out of my left ear. Plus it is putting a MAJOR damper on the new Spotify list I made, as I have an inability to listen to it. Also I was horrible on the audio round at trivia this week.

When did I get to the point in my life that I’m too busy to watch the first episode of So You Think You Can Dance? I don’t understand.

The following is a list of things I’ve been busy doing because my job is super important and exciting:

• Beer Pong. Because when you’ve got nothing but no time on your hands, a really good idea is to spend 8 hours figuring out how to draw the perfect bracket.

• Instagram. 90% of this is just refreshing my feed and being sad that there’s no way to easily toggle between two accounts.

• Opening a new restaurant. And by “opening,” I mean “obsessively searching for cool fonts.”

• The beer list. This takes up a good majority of my work week, because EVERY TIME I print a list, another keg kicks.

• Tattoo brainstorming. As we’ve established in the past, I’m all talk with the tattoos. However today, I really think I came up with THE ONE. I’m going to have a blank to-do list tattooed onto the inside of my wrist. Because girl’s clothes (the good kind, at least) never have pockets. And Harry told me I have to stop using my bra as a wallet in public. So there’s no place to hold my damn to-do list. I mean, I can write it on my hand but then it looks unprofessional. Unless it’s on my to-do list tattoo! Genius!!

• Avocado. My mom got me Beats headphones for my birthday and they’re so baller that I felt like I should go running (walking) at the park all the time, which made me feel obligated to eat more avocado so I can pretend to be healthy. Let’s face it. Running a restaurant is basically a holding area for heart attack victims.

• Locating the perfect Mint Julep Cup. So important, you guys. So important.

• Shopping for the perfect stick to skewer pickles. Softball tournament on Sunday. Nothing says ballpark like a pickle on a stick.

Seeing as it turns out I have no creative energy left in my short little self, and we have a 350 person charity event in like 5 hours from now, how about you just read some other post I wrote a really long time ago.

a note on baby toting.

Once upon a time, a really tall dude and his regular-sized wife walked into the restaurant looking to book their newborn’s post-Christening blowout kegger or whatever. In his arms, the giant man held said infant, who wore a modest beanie and fuzzy blanket thingy. I screamed and fell over at the mere sight of such a bare-handed family. You see, until today, I’ve truly believed that the following items are 100% necessary for bringing your babygirl or babyboy on the long and treacherous 30 foot journey from parking lot to door to table (preferably a booth.. no not that one, there’s a draft… no, not that one, it’s too far from the bathroom… ugh this one is WAY too close to the kitchen):

• Infant seat – The infant seat is surgically implanted to a baby’s ass at birth, and removed at some point between like 7 months and a year, depending on whether your kid is extra bulky or wants to be one of those show-off “active” brats. There is a special removal system for diaper changing and crib sleeping, but the infant is otherwise permanently adhered to his/her seat. 
• Huge ass Stroller – Although no actual strolling takes place whilst a family eats their dinner, a baby must, must, must always be within drooling distance of his stroller. General rule of thumb: busier the night, bigger the stroller.  Insider note: a stroller is actually a rolling Mommy storage unit. 
• iPad – Every baby needs an iPad. Fuck Leapsters and Windows based tablets, baby needs to save her work on the Cloud and do FaceTime with her other baby friends and work on her Spotify playlist. 
• Snacks – Specifically these magical little Cheerio ripoffs called Puffs. Babies must constantly be eating Puffs, specifically when they are about to eat 2 jars of baby food, little itty bits of french fry, ice cream and a bottle. Puffs MUST always be distributed evenly between baby’s mouth and the floor. 
• A diaper bag – Back in the olden days, I used a diaper bag. It was the size of my camp trunk and I was prepared for every season on land, sea and in space. If I left home without it my babygirl would cry and cry and cry out of desperation for and extra pair of socks and Baby’s First Words flash cards.  One day recently, I looked in the diaper bag and it was filled with outgrown diapers, dried up wipes, a moldy sippy cup and about 35 pounds of powdered Puffs. 
• High Chair Cover – If you ever decide to become a parent, this will be the most important thing you will ever own other than those disposable placemats that stick on restaurant tables. I’m totally kidding. They’re seriously useless except for making fun of babies. Every parent wants to protect their angel from germs and nasty caked on food bits, but let’s be honest, my friends. Babies consume some seriously nasty shit. My babygirl dropped two cherries in the holes of the mats behind the bar today (we were changing a keg and doing inventory together) and I swear I had to pry them from her clenched teeth less than 2 seconds later. 

And so, the ogre daddy booked his kid’s party and the kid survived 7 minutes without a fuckin’ laptop and swing. And they all lived happily ever after. 

The end. 

evolution of a new hire.

Holy fuck, it’s been so long since I’ve written on here that I forgot my username.

Something really interesting about the restaurant business is that I totally loathe new people. They make me want to puke, for the most part. Occasionally there’s one with a personality or a magical air about him/her and I don’t want to punch him/her. But as a general rule of thumb, I wait :

• 2 days to speak to a new hire
• 5 days to make eye contact with the new hire
• 10 days to smile at the horrible jokes the new hire keeps making to try and impress me
• 2 weeks to joke around within earshot of the new hire (although never directly to them so they don’t get the wrong idea)
• 3 weeks for simultaneous smiling and eye contact (although not everyone ever gets to this point, I’m extremely selective at this stage).
• 4 weeks to ask the new hire any personal questions, such as “what’s your name again?” and “how was your weekend?”

Once we’ve conquered these hurdles, we’re good to go. Unless you give me a nickname prematurely. If you develop a pet name before we have worked at least 20 shifts together and you have told me how much you love country music and we have bonded over that fact, you suck and I hate you eternally.

This post is dedicated to the fuckin’ waiter who keeps calling me Shelbs. I’m going to fire you tomorrow, just so you know.

blind dates for crazy bitches.

A woman wearing sunglasses walks really really slowly into the restaurant tonight like fifteen minutes before closing. I’m like “Fuck, dude, why can’t you wasted people go to the druggie bar across the street? Why do you have to come to my classy establishment?” She inches towards me at the host station, and even though she’s wearing shades I swear she’s giving me the evil eye. Time stops. I realize that this is how I’m going to die. This woman is the mother of a waiter I fired yesterday – I thought he was a lose canon but it turns out it was his momma. Or maybe she had a bad meal and I didn’t buy her a dessert and she was pissed. Either way, she looks at me like she’s going to kill me.

Then I realize she’s blind, or something like it, considering I could’ve SWORN she got out of the driver’s side of the car.

“I’m here to meet a man who says he looks like Derek Jeter,” she tells me. I still think she’s going to strangle me, I don’t believe her. But Brittney my bartender directs me towards a lone non-Jetery man.

“Can you help me over? I can see a little, but it’s very very dark in here.” (It is not dark in here.) I hold her hand and lead her to the bar stool of a man who clearly does not have any clue that he is going on a date with a blind woman.

Why oh why did I not record the ensuing conversations? Why could I have not captured the glorious moment of the dude begging the woman to let him drive her someplace, because blind people should not be driving at night? Or the spectacular “feel-up” session in which she ran her hands up and down from his forehead to his knees for like five minutes? How could I have missed out on owning documentation of a man making choking death faces to my bartender while talking to the blind lady about her taste in music? WHY WAS I SO SELFISH TO NOT PROVIDE THIS FOOTAGE FOR YOU???

Because honestly? I was way too busy staring and sneaking into the kitchen with Brittney to piece together the mystery of the weirdest date ever ever ever. (Other than the one or two where couples went to third base whilst sitting at the bar. I’m not explaining third base, ask your teenager.) Because HOW DO YOU NOT MENTION THAT YOU’RE BLIND? IS THERE NOT A CHECK BOX FOR THAT SHIT ON THE DATING SITE??? How do you drink your wine every other day if you don’t have a blind (seeing) date to assist you in holding your glass? Why does your date have to feed you? What is going on right now???

After ordering a third glass of wine (this time “with a straw”)  and making more nasty faces at his date, the guy goes to pee, leaving Brit alone with the blind lady. Who proceeds to lift her sunglasses, look dead at Brittney and tell her that her date looks nothing like Derek Jeter.

Because the crazy bitch can see!

 

 

 

THE WOMAN FUCKING FAKED BLIND. “Because blind dates should be fun!” she said.

Then they ran off to have car sex in the parking lot and lived happily ever after.

I think it’s safe to say that match.com did an INCREDIBLE job matching up a couple of wack douchebags. Kudos to you, match.com!!! Thanks for the giggles!

 

i just got locked inside the restaurant with the motion detector on. nobody move a muscle.

Once upon a time I got to work in the morning with a huge ass to-do list and was so busy for the entire day that I not only got zero things done, but also added like 5 bullets to it. I’m not even talking about work-y tasks, I mean like normal human being stuff (brush hair, put on makeup, pee). This business is like the occupational version of ADHD – it is literally impossible to focus one one thing for more than a fleeting moment. Just when you think you’re gonna have some time to sit down and make a flyer for your “Afternoon Delight” Valentine’s Day special promotion, some bitch finds a hair in her salad that CLEARLY came out of her own head, but she wants a bunch of free shit to compensate for the resulting emotional trauma.

As a result of my inability to get shit done, I’ve decided to start outsourcing some of my roles here at the restaurant.

• Customer Service. (Unless customer is providing accolades or awards and/or going to provide a decent blog subject for that evening)
• Employee Relations. (Unless said employee bears any resemblance to Ryan Gosling, Jimmy Fallon, Jason Bateman, the guy who played Marius in the Les Mis movie, Freddie Mercury or Ellen Degeneres and said relations involve a “private meeting about a private matter”)
• Peeing. (There’s just no time for that shiz, plus the sink in my bathroom is always so cold)
• Flyers. (I get to choose all the fonts, which actually takes up the majority of my design time, so maybe nevermind on this one)
• Internet stuff other than Facebook. (This includes Instagram, because I actually LIKE being in my photos every once in awhile. My boobs aren’t going to be like this for much longer, I need to get them some screen time. I’m specifically looking for somebody who can get me like 10,000 more Facebook likes in a week. Also I don’t want to spend any more than $150 total on this person.)
• Blogging. (I’m not even kidding, please somebody write a fucking guest post so this place is actually interesting again. In fact, it doesn’t even have to be interesting. I just don’t want to take the time to write it)
• Selling Parties. (I’m just feeling so over false enthusiasm for your fucking wife’s fucking 40th birthday and what fucking colors the fucking balloons should be.)

Since I’m going to have so much free time with all this outsourcing, I’m going to do really exciting things that I’ve been dying to do. Such as:

• Drink more beer.
• Wear mascara so I don’t look like I’ve been crying for the past hour, even though chances are that is actually the case.
• Drink another beer.
• Make a Pinterest board for the next 5 restaurants we plan to open, as well as our Hashbrown Harry’s food trailer we’re now planning on opening in Austin because it’s the best place ever and we’re totally moving there and I don’t care if you think I’m just bullshitting you plus I’m also getting a tattoo so whatever.
• Make a seasonal menu, which I have literally been planning to do since late August but I swear it’s really coming.
• Load photos on a digital picture frame, as well as the awesome flyers Mystery Flyer Man is creating for me.
• Write a book.
• Talk nonstop to people about beer, even the people who don’t give a shit.

That’s pretty much it. I just fell asleep on my keyboard, luckily the dishwasher woke me up to tell me he ADIOS. I was like ¡HOLY MIERDA! ¡AY DIOS MIO! ¿DONDE ESTAS MI BABYGIRL Y MI TOTALLY ANNOYING PERRO???? NO ME GUSTAN RESTAURANTES. HASTA MAÑANA.

 

The moral of the story is: If you want to be in the restaurant business you’re a turd.

all my daughter’s future exes live in texas because we’re moving here.

Something really interesting about blogging in Texas is that it’s nearly impossible to do with a piece of pork in one hand and a beer in the other. And while I typically blog at night, and could perhaps aim for an AM writing session, the bacon/beer scenario still holds true mere minutes after we’ve arisen. Luckily today Harry’s food coma seems to have been a little more severe than mine, so I’ve bought myself some writing time before we head into Hill Country to explore hidden BBQ pits and donut places and backyard brewers. What I’m trying to say is that all I plan on focusing on for the rest of my life (or until it happens) is bothering Harry about moving to Austin. You should come too, Mom and Dad!! But enough about my goals and aspirations, let’s talk about the food!

As I may or may not have mentioned, Harry and I headed to Austin with the intention of eating, drinking and stealing enough good ideas to open 100 new restaurants in NY. Also we came to hang out with Nicole, one of my oldest dork friends from Elementary School. She moved out here some years back and now carries a handgun in her Burberry bag, as well as about a dozen calligraphy pens and sometimes a puppy. She quilted my babygirl a blanket and made jewelry out of bullet casings from the gun range that she frequents on the daily all in the same week. Her most admirable qualities are that she’s really held her own with me and Harry’s eating marathon this week, she shot the FUCK out of a target when we went to the gun range (I shot a Glock! I’m a girly spaz!) and she is designing a tattoo for me to get while I’m here with some of her new fancy pens.

Shit man, I keep getting distracted from food. Maybe it’s because I know that if I write just how much we have consumed over the past 3 days, you will vomit and never read this shiz ever ever again. So I’ll just stick with the highlights (which will still  be vomit inducing so just let that be known. Read this by a bathroom.)

We ate 1 pound of fatty brisket, 5 ribs, 2 sausages, pulled pork, 1 side of cole slaw, 1 side of potato salad and 2 slices of white bread after waiting in line for 2 hours at a place that was declared by Bon Apetit magazine as the best BBQ in the world. And guess what. It was. (We had leftovers so shut up)

We ate at Uchiko, where Nicole is a regular, so she brought us on a culinary tour through the place. The most hardcore Brussels sprouts ever known to man, kale chips with candied quinoa and trumpet mushrooms. A yellowtail hand roll that I had a sex dream about. Some jar of duck that when it was opened at the table, shot us with a blast of rosemary smoke that lingered for like ten minutes. Bourbon and birch dippin’ dots with other shit on a plate. Heavenly meal.

We ate at a hot dog place where Harry had a bacon infused bloody mary with a piece of peppered bacon, chunk of cheddar cheese and other shit on the side of it, and a hot dog stuffed with cheese, rolled in bacon, fried and topped with cole slaw. I ate a freshly made sausage with a whole bunch of shit, topped with spicy BBQ mac & cheese and served on a pretzel roll. It was called the Notorious P.I.G. That’s why I ordered it.

We went to a gastropub to steal ultimate ideas for the new place. Chicken fried chicken egg. WHAT??? You don’t even know. Trio of pig – pork loin, bacon, pig face sausage. Yeah, pig face. All of it. We asked the chef at this particular place (you sit at a counter and watch the kitchen, so we were next to him while he put out all the food, it was very very cool) why he didn’t have any beef on the menu. He told us that he couldn’t find cows as much as he liked the lambs of this local woman, but he’s working on it.

We ate at the food truck of Paul Qui, that dude who won Top Chef Austin. It was in the back of a college bar where I got carded 3 times.  It was also mere hours after we inhaled ridiculous amounts at Uchiko, but all decided that we had digested enough to give it a go. Ramen noodles with a fried egg, pork belly and REAL corn (no dehydrated foods to be seen in this puppy!!). More off the hook Brussels sprouts!

We ate at a doughnut burger place (and watched Syracuse win!!) where we got donut burgers and donut desserts.

I’d say I’m gonna go on a diet the day we get back to NY, but that’s not going to be possible because my stomach has stretched to the size of John Goodman’s. It might take a few weeks to ease back into less than 4000 calories a day…..

In conclusion, I have a tummy ache.

Just for the sake of comparison, I’ve compiled a list of places on Long Island that are as serene as the lakeside ledge on which I’m composing this post:

The lakeside ledge is so serene, in fact, that Harry referred to it yesterday when we spotted it from the pool as “the perfect place that someone would dispose of a body.” Naturally it was where I decided to head this fine morning, knowing that it is the ultimate place to feel inspired, second only to a crowded Starbucks. It took me twenty minutes to find it, and I passed zero people which means that nobody knows I’m here. On my way there was a door decorated as a reindeer, so probably nobody has even walked down the hallwayI’m so far below the hotel that the wi-fi isn’t even an option on my laptop, and the seats are sopping wet with morning dew and my ass is FUCKING FREEZING.

Speaking of the pool, it’s a multi-tiered infinity number, which he used as a “sea lion act” and rolled over the top ledge of into the next pool down subsequently throwing me over the side of it and giving me a boo boo because according to him I’m much heavier than him and didn’t contort into the proper rolling position, which duh, Harry, how am I supposed to do when you are literally forcing me against my will? And so what if I’ve gained a few pounds while I’m here? IT WAS WORTH IT.

Oh man, a boat is coming to destroy my peaceful existence. Luckily the fog is so thick I can’t see twenty feet in front of me, so my view is still unobstructed. However I no longer have feeling in my ass and I’m starting to wish Nicole were with me because the trees are rustling and I feel naked without a firearm. Talk to you later when I may or may not have a tattoo and a new pair of (larger) jeans.

Addendum: On my way back up from the lakeside ledge I realized that the rustling was a deer! It’s a good thing Nicole wasn’t there after all.

memoirs of an invisible blogger.

Something really interesting about the restaurant business is that January is supposed to be a little bit calmer than December and I’m supposed to have time to do some writing, or perhaps parenting or movie watching or January bargain shopping or sleeping. Instead, life seems to have gotten more hectic. All I really want to do is send out the 4 thank you cards I wrote out for gifts I received over the holidays and see Silver Linings Playbook. Modest aspirations, one might think. But the thank you cards have gone missing, never to be seen again. And three extra hours simply do not exist, except at 9am when I drop my babygirl off at school, but the movie theater doesn’t open that early.

I’m not sitting here having a pity party for myself. The pity is really for you, because you don’t get to read my genius musings with any sort of regularity. It’s just not fair. Seriously, fuck these people who keep calling to book their communions! I have fans to produce semi-sensical works of blog for! Screw trying to build my craft beer empire! You are losing sleep over the lack of entertainment in your life!

Anyway, these are the following reasons that I don’t have time to become a world renowned blogger:

• I became an activist. I really can’t explain this. Somehow I’m this like political person, even though I totally don’t know the difference between a republican and a democrat. It all started when I found out that thermal receipt paper contains a staggering amount of BPA (google it. This isn’t a science blog, ok?) and my mom and I (and the rest of my employees, and you and your whole families) handle the hell out of receipts on a daily basis. So I switched to BPA free paper at the restaurant so that my mom and I can die from some other cause and I told a local Breast Cancer activist and somehow we became the “sample” business when it got introduced at the legislature and I had to go speak in front of these elected people even though I was dressed totally inappropriately and blah blah de blah, now thermal receipt paper is banned by law in Suffolk County.

• I consequently became a movie star. Exaggeration? Um, yea, obviously. But I was on the news on 3 different channels so I think that counts. First the CW came to the house, giving us only about 15 minutes to prepare (Harry “cleaned the kitchen” by dumping any loose object in the trunk of his car, and I changed out of my pajamas and into a maternity shirt because it made me feel less nervous). Then a couple days later, they decide to sign the bill at the restaurant, and also decide that I’m to sit at the table with the politicians, and then, what the hell, they decide that I should say something. Which shows up on Fox and News 12. And now I’m a household name practically everywhere, and hopefully before that ever happens again I will have more than 1 day’s notice so I can lose 28 pounds or so.

 

• I got fired. It totally sucked. You see, sometimes in life you say stupid shit, and occasionally it’s during a family business meeting about opening a new restaurant and your father fires you. Next time I get fired, I hope it’s from both locations. Because I’m in way over my head, and nobody seems to be recognizing this fact. Like, hello, I have absolutely no business running a restaurant. I really just want to hang out with my babygirl all day doing puzzles and teaching her how to spell her name. I’m a socially awkward film major hippie who is like shorter than most of the kids who order off the kid’s menu. I didn’t even brush my hair today. Like not once. I tried at the end of the night, but it was too far gone. It’s one giant dreadlock. So really getting fired made sense. Unfortunately I think I was rehired. I was so looking forward to puzzles. 

• I caused my father to go deaf. It’s one of those moments that “I meant well” really means nothing, because your dad can’t hear you say it. I got him tickets to see Queen (except that Freddie Mercury is deceased, which should have been the first indication that this was a bad idea) for Hanukkah because I’m like the best daughter and so so so cool. After purchasing 2 tickets that were on exact opposite sides of the venue from one another, we endured the most horrific cover band ever. During the intermission (fancy pants shit right here) I told my dad “This is a very special concert for us to be at together because Queen is the band that made music such a big part of my life, and you’re the reason I started listening to them.” He didn’t hear me though, so he bought me another beer because I guess that’s what he thought I said. So that part was cool.

• I threw a wedding. Ok, it was really just a big giant party that just so happened to be a total replica of my nuptials sans religious ceremony and first dance and porta potties and sweltering heat. If you were at the party, you’d have thunk that an actual professional planned it, not just some girl with a gift for creating inspired Pinterest boards and buying old farm equipment. You’d have thunk it was the sweetest combination of rustic and elegant. In fact, I may have to give up my day job and switch my career over to planning hardcore amazing parties in barns. Hopefully there is no BPA on craft paper or burlap, otherwise that would have to be a whole new legislative hurdle.

• I missed my first blog birthday. This is possibly the most devastating thing that’s ever happened in my entire life. I mean, I vowed to not give a fuck, I really did. But the fact is, writing on the regular is like the sort of thing that actual writers do. Like, as in writers who write professionally and publish things and call themselves writers and I did it! Still truckin’ even! (sort of) So really I missed out on a really good opportunity to publicly sing my own praises and have some sort of party with milkshakes and noisemakers and wear a sparkly dress (Restaurant people don’t participate in New Year’s Eve. We rely solely on bigtime parties where we are the guests of honor to break out sequins. It’s true.) and do showtune karaoke and eat the shelbytown cake that some of my biggest fans (of which there are at least one) baked for me, anything but red velvet because that shit is literally just food coloring.

 

• I got eaten by a puppy. This is actually the real reason I can’t write anymore. As a result of literally being consumed by a lab pointer mix, I have resorted to writing this blog post in the dark hallway outside my bedroom door. There’s simply no place left for me to turn. 

In conclusion, thank you to Brad and Jen for the cell phone case. Thank you Susan for the platter. Thank you Mom and Dad for the Clarisonic, seriously my skin has never looked better other than all the stress breakouts I keep getting but that totally doesn’t count. Dad, sorry I’m an asshole and drag you to concerts. Next time I will give you ear plugs and a weed brownie, so it won’t be as bad. Mom, thank you for watching the Golden Globes with me after the concert. It’s the best having a mom as nocturnal as you. Thank you Harry for the trip to Texas that we are taking in less than a week. I am thoroughly looking forward to eating and drinking more than ever thought humanly possible, and also to not having my body parts ruptured by puppy teeth. Also thank you for the skateboard, you sure know how to keep a girl young.

heavy petting: secret to my success.

So lately at work, like for the past year or so, there’s been some heavy petting going on between Harry and Thing 2, one of my middle aged spinster party waitresses. I let it happen because I like to keep morale up in my joint, and what the hell do I care if some weird lady wants to pet my husband’s hair?

Oh wait, did you think I meant that he was like feeling her up or something? Yeah, no. She just really likes to run her fingers through his thick locks. And I’m like “Whatever, Thing 2. I’m just gonna sit here and watch you pet my man,” and she’s like “Oh man, Shelby. Thank you so much, it just makes me feel all hot and bothered” and me and Thing 1 just sit there rolling our eyes at them.

That’s the thing, you guys. You need to keep your employees happy. An upbeat work environment makes for a productive staff. Even if said employee is unhealthily obsessed with your spouse and it requires essentially pimping him (his hair, let’s not be dramatic) out.

This weekend Harry and I are catering our wedding for some other couple in a barn someplace on Long Island. An event like this requires a team stronger than titanium (and I need like sooo many Xanaxes and weed brownies) to run smoothly. Naturally, Things 1 & 2 are vital components to this team, because they know that I’m an anal bitch when it comes to certain party details (angle at which to place tables / level to which water glass should be filled / EXACT time candles must be lit) and that they should BACK THE FUCK OFF and just do whatever I say, and they always have a good stash of pot for the end of night. Knowing these facts, I remain content, which, in turn, keeps Thing 1 cucumber cool. Thing 2 is a different story. She gets a little snippy if I don’t let her fondle my husband, so that’s a concession that I make. Just for her.

It also keeps Harry feeling young and virile, like he’s some strapping pornstar celebrity chef. And in case you didn’t know this about the restaurant business, a cranky chef is a FUCKING DOUCHEBAG. Ask anyone who works with Harry. I mean, a chef. Not Harry, he’s like never cranky. Like ever.

Anyway, Charlie is also working the party. I got him to do it by telling him that I knew for sure that there are going to be some hot guys as guests. Charlie never turns down the chance to rip a heterosexual out of the closet, even if it’s only for a few hours. I’m paying him in bottles of vodka and condoms. There’s also a redhead working the party. But if I write about him he may lose his day job. So we’ll just call him Gregory and say that he would also like to be paid in vodka and condoms, but substitute the vodka for Charlie.

Do we know how to throw a party or what?????

Ya we do! We’re so good at throwing a party that I WROTE A HAIKU ABOUT IT!!!!!!

PARTY PARTY PARTY

Hire us for fun.

There may be weed in your apps.

Pigs in a blanket.

Also, this happened today. It is a clip of me being interviewed by the CW 5pm news about something really crunchy and professional. Which proves that you can be a hippie who wears inappropriate footwear to a legislative session and skateboards around her development on a custom neon pink Penny Board, and still occasionally appear to be somewhat of a responsible adult.

Disclaimer: I like never ever ever associate my blog with my actual restaurant, but due to extreme vanity and egomania, I am doing so this evening. Kindly do not sue me because suddenly you’re putting 2 + 2 together and you realize that I’ve been writing shit about you all along. Moreover, don’t be scared to bring your children to my restaurant just because I talk like a sailor and have a brain like a pervy fifteen-year-old boy. Thanks dudes.