The Importance of Diplomacy

People! I am seriously proud of myself! I've come to learn the lesson of how important diplomacy is and how it can be really easy if you just take a second to organize your thoughts. I learned this over a few specific episodes this past week.

#1 How to get people to get over themselves and not be hurt by their incredibly rude actions and/or comments

I have a group staying at the inn this week composed of two couples. They checked in last Saturday and will be here until this Saturday. El Momm-o checked them in, as she's been on duty during the weekends for a while, and I didn't get to meet them until Monday morning. I was warned by her that they had had a problem with the heat in their rooms (which took me until yesterday to resolve), and that one of the women only wanted fresh fruit for breakfast on Monday morning. Being the ex-stoner that I am, I forgot that she only wanted the fruit and made her a coddled egg that day, but remembered at the last minute that she didn't want the egg, so I left it off her plate and started to have thoughts of eating it myself. The only time I eat things I actually make for breakfast is if no one else eats them. I was about to chow down on this egg when this particular woman, let's call her Skinny Ass Freak (SAF for short) runs into the kitchen and asks if she can change her mind and eat food that morning. I rose above my selfish desires for egg & cheese and smiled warmly, telling her it wasn't a problem and brought the egg out immediately. That day, many people checked out, and I was left with the foursome and another foursome of women only. The women were great and delightful, no qualms there. Both groups signed up for the 9 am breakfast seating. I then had a group of identical twins check in. These sisters were lovely and they wanted to eat at 9 am as well. Unfortunately, my table only fits 8 people max, so when more than that want to eat at the same time, they're either out of luck, or I can fit two people at the "chef's table" aka, the kitchen counter. This doesn't bother me, I just feel bad that the people eating at the chef's table miss out on the breakfast banter. When I told the twins it was the chef's table or nothing they looked crestfallen, but agreed to it. Tuesday morning, I set up everything for the 8 people at the main table and the twins in the kitchen. The next thing I knew, the foursome (including the SAF) was leaving for the day without eating breakfast. I was pissed, really upset that the cool twins got shafted for people who weren't even going to eat breakfast. As the foursome were leaving through the kitchen where the twins and I were chatting, I struck up a conversation:

Me: "Are you guys taking off? I wish you had told me you weren't going to eat breakfast!" (Cheery, I swear, not negative at all)
SAF: "Well, we're not eating breakfast. We're leaving for the day." (Bitchy, real freaky bitchy.)
Me: "Well, have a good day, but please let me know ahead of time if you decide not to eat, as I had these two women who would have taken your seats with no problem, but they had to eat in the kitchen today because the breakfast table was already full."
SAF: "To tell you the truth, we were planning to eat breakfast, but we didn't like the crowded feeling that 8 people at the table was going to give us. So we decided not to eat."
Me: (Furious, thinkng, isn't the amount of people at the table MY call? and I've never had a complaint about it before. This is not to say that no one else in the history of the B&B has ever felt that, but that no one has ever said it.) "Well I can't take care of problem if you don't tell me there is one. I wish you had told me!"
SAF: "Well, breakfast wasn't ready on time, so it goes both ways!" They left after that, conversation over.

What the fuck? What was her last comment supposed to mean? If I had known they needed to eat and get the hell out of there I would have made sure everything was ready on the dot of 9 am, but usually I've found people like to take a few minutes to get their coffee and sit down and get to know people at the table. It helps to introduce yourself without food in your mouth.

I was so mad. When the SAF foursome walked out, one of the twins, who had witnessed the whole thing, said that she thought those people were very rude, and how could I take that shit from someone? I asked her if she thought I had been harsh at all, and she said no. I then explained to her that in my business, you take shit from everyone if you can; only when it's straight up offensive or physically harmful do I not take shit. Even though the twins were on my side, I was boiling about it over the next few hours. I tried to think of some way to turn the whole thing positive, and it never came to me. I called my mom for advice, but her suggestions just didn't make sense for this situation. I didn't think making chocolate covered strawberries and randomly leaving them in these people's rooms was going to make the situation any better. I had to figure out something to do, as these people were going to be with me for such a long time and I couldn't just throw them out on their ears! I hemmed and hawed about it for another couple of hours. I had to sleep on it to solve this one.

This morning I figured out a solution. I thought about exactly what they had said was their problem. They felt crowded. I called them at 8.30 to find out if they would like to have their breakfast in another area of the breakfast room, usually reserved for lounging with coffee, but not a formal breakfast "arena". They said they'd have to discuss it and I told them to let me know. They waited until the absolute last second, which I knew would happen, cause that was a possible screwing me moment if I wasn't prepared, and then agreed. From the second I served them their scrambled eggs, they were friendly and outgoing with me, as if yesterday had never happened! The twins were happy too, as they got to eat breakfast at the main table with the other foursome today. I'm so happy I only have to cook breakfast for these shitheads one more time. While I'm still appalled at their behavior, I know I got them and I'm super proud of myself because I always kept shit under control. Which brings me to my next point:

#2 It's all about keeping your shit under control.

I have to throw in some personal stuff here. I know this blog is supposed to be about the inn and what's happening, but you don't get my perspective if you don't get me. So here's a big lesson it's taken me about 2 years to learn. People respond to you if you keep your emotions separate from your feelings when you express them. No matter how offended you might be when someone tells you they don't like the way you did something, you have to "out-nice" them. You come back at them with smiles and solutions, compliments and courtesy. And you keep it simple. You don't give excuses, and you try to be as honest as possible in a positive way. Now, if you know me, (which most of you people do, since you're my friends and no one but my friends reads this blog), you know that I am divorced. I made a bad choice when I was 20 and married a very depressed person who freaked out and caused all sorts of strife (the ugly restraining order type strife) when I decided not to be married anymore. Ever since then, I had a hard time finding someone cool to date, even selecting someone and being able to trust myself to make that choice, since I had done such a good job of it to date. I dated some horrible guys, a few good ones, and some big losers. The good ones glazed over and took off at the mention of making things more serious. Now I know why. I never took one second to ask them what they wanted out of the relationship portions of their lives at that moment. When the relationships would go sour I often wondered what the hell I did wrong, and I think now it had nothing to do with me, except that I was "ready" for more serious and they just weren't. So now, I'm single again, and it's been real hard to meet new dudes ever since I've been throwing myself into work. I've been working long hours and dedicating myself to dog training so my bar time is quite limited. I don't get a chance to meet my friends' guy friends, (I don't know why this is Salena!) so I decided to try the online dating thang. I met an utter dud. Then I met another. But the second guy I was able to tell immediately that nothing was happening there. I found myself able to say out loud to him, "I don't think this is going to work." I was scared to say something like that, as it's kind of hurtful. But I think it's better to say something than to lead a guy on, especially with the way this guy was trying to touch my arm all the time and basically communicating to me that he was interested. It turned out not so bad. He totally covered up and said that he felt the same way. So I went home without a guy, but felt good about my eloquent honesty, aka diplomacy. Then I went on another date with a different dude, and the same thing happened, only this time, I got to tell him he wasn't my cup of tea right off the bat, (I spent two hours with him, definitely gave him a chance, don't worry, I'm no frigid bitch). Now I don't have to worry about that guy calling or emailing me. I'm ecstatic.

#3 Now I'm stuck about what to do.

I've given up on the online thing. I don't want to pay to see the same dudes over and over again. I also just feel like I want to meet someone more organically. I'm not searching for my future husband. I just want to meet someone down to earth who has a job, doesn't live with his parents, and eats meat. Goddam you vegetarians out there are crazy. Anyway, I went on a "hurrydate" tonight. It's one of those speed dating things where you're supposed to meet between 12 and 20 people, and have 4 minute mini dates with each one. At the end you decide whether or not you'd like to see any of those guys again and if you both said yes, you get each other's email addresses and you can take it from there. I did this speed date a few months ago with my friend L, (a completely different ball of wax, not enough space or time to discuss here), and we had a great time but all the guys we met were losers, BIG TIME. By the end of it, I was drunk as a skunk and saying inappropriate things to the guys. Maybe I was the loser by that time. The company decided we hadn't had the requisite number of dates, since we only met 10 guys, and they offered us another free date to use up to a year later. We finally took them up on it tonight and got another friend to come as well. The Hurrydate took place in a larger city (but not The City) and parking was a little difficult to find. My friends went to park the car and I went into the bar to check us in, as we were skidding in only just on time. I met a guy who was doing the Hurrydate too, and it was his first time. He actually bought me a drink, and he was cute, so I was excited this time. The date started, and it was a ball. This time most of the guys were losers too, but not as many of them were, and I even talked with one guy I had met last time. Let's call him RePeter. Even that time he had mentioned that he does this a lot, so I can only guess he just hadn't met the right lady yet. That mini date was fun, cause we remembered each other and I remembered that RePeter had said yes to seeing me again but I had said no. Here's how our conversation went:

Me: RePeter! What's up? How've you been?
RePeter: Hi! I forget, where are you from and what do you do? (I hate these questions, they're so run of the mill and unoriginal)
Me: Like it matters! I'm an astronaut and I'm from Texas.
RePeter: Oh....I'm a kung fu instructor and I'm a 10th degree blackbelt.

I can't remember the rest, but it was one of the funniest conversations I had with the 10 guys from tonight. So finally the cute guy who bought me a drink rolls around to my table. He buys me another drink, refuses to let me pay for this round, and then tells me that buying him a drink, or even paying for my own would be just wrong. I forget what we talked about, but he finally told me he owned a pizzeria and then the whistle blew and it was time to change tables. I said "fuck. Are you going to be around later?" He said yes so I figured I could catch up with him. After the event was over I still had some beer to go. I left my beer inside, went out to have a smoke and when I came back in, the cute pizza guy was talking with some other chick by my beer. Now, I don't expect this guy to be waiting for me, so I wasn't mad or anything. I rescued my beer and introduced myself to the girl, who was totally great. My friends came over and we all started hashing over the date experience. Then some blonde came up out of the blue and snagged the cute pizza guy. She walked away and he got up and said something about some sisters at the other side of the bar wanting to tear his clothes off and do a girls gone wild type of thing with him, and if any of us wanted to come, we were welcome. We all gave him that side long questioning glance and he went over to talk to who I can only guess were the sisters. I ended up talking to the girl, and we exchanged numbers, and that was that. Now I never even looked at that guy again, and I think I was attracted to him all the way up until he said the girls gone wild comment. I started writing this section with an "I don't know what to do" now statement, but I know now that I've written it all out. That guy is totally into something I'm not into. He's toast. I guess the question is, what comes next?