Product Description: Warning: May contain material offensive to vegans, pharmaceutical lobbyists, and those on a low-sodium diet. Animals were harmed during the writing of this book.While Phoebe Damrosch was waiting for life to happen, she supported herself by working as a waitress...read more

The stereotypes of waitresses are broken down in an entertaining study that is part oral history and part journalism, revealing American waitresses through intimate, illuminating, and humorous behind-the-scenes stories about serving. Reprint.

"Ginsberg got her education in restaurants and she doles it out just right in this entertaining account." - PEOPLE MAGAZINE "Funny and ultimately satisfying." - ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY Ginsberg takes readers on an intimate journey of her twenty years as a waitress at the dingiest of diners, a soap-operatic Italian restaurant, an exclusive five-star dining club, and more. This book chronologically takes you through Debra Ginsberg's career as a waitress. Through her wonderful stories, you get to see her develop as a waitress, and more importantly, mature as a person. Over her twenty-year span of waitressing, you get to live through her struggles, financial woes, and life awakenings. For her, waiting tables was a career which she struggled with while seeking a "true job". But the money from waitressing was just too good. Her tips were essential in the raising of her son as a single parent, and waitressing also allowed her to spend quality time with him. (view table of contents)

An intimate, funny portrait of life behind the swinging tin-plated doors of a restaurant explores the diners, Italian family eateries, and five-star restaurants that employed the author over her twenty years as a waitress. 20,000 first printing. (view table of contents)