On smiles and tips

"So how are you doing?" my friend Reinfeldt (not the actual Fredrik Reinfeldt, Prime Minister of Sweden mind you, but someone fairly similar) asked. "You look good. Not that you didn't before or anything, but you look happy. It's hard to put my finger on what's different. It's like your smile lingers in the corners of your mouth."

It feels nice that the changes I feel in me compared to how I felt this spring are making me look as content as I feel. I had a dumpling lunch with Reinfeldt and his toddler son with the puffy hamster cheeks, and spent a nice crisp fall day going for walks and just chilling before work. It was a really nice day. I didn't even mind hanging out with Puffy Hamster Son, and Puffy Hamster Son didn't seem to mind much either, as he tried to feed me his fruit purée and pat my hair and face in that awkward toddler way. Reinfeldt gave me some delicious home-grown apples from his mom's summer house on Gotland. They're totally going to turn into pie one of these days.

I was totally out of sorts at work today though, for the first two hours or so. I dropped a tray of glasses, shattering what felt like millions (although in reality, probably closer to six), and accidentally fucking up an order pretty bad because I was too busy being pissed at myself for not paying attention. Ironic, huh? I told myself to knock it off and stop being so spastic, and then proceeded to breathe a bit and be nice to myself, and apparently that must've done the trick because the couple I'd wronged ended up tipping rather generously. I still felt good about the day, all in all, once I stopped being weird about everything.

A group of four Koreans on what seemed to be a double date swung by too. While I on one hand love having the Asians over, I always feel kinda ambivalent about it since they're always nice and easy-going but never ever tip. It's a culture thing. If you were to try to tip in Japan, they'd chase after you to give your money back. It's cute, but obviously impractical for me. Americans are better customers that way - less exotic but far more generous. They always tip, generally at least 10%, so even days as slow as the average Tuesday end up pretty profitable tip-wise.

Money - the real reason your waitress is so nice and accommodating to you.