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Fashion Advice

Miss Pinkie Shears Dear Pinkie, I am a bartender in the Marina, and I have a work-related problem. Recently, a disturbing number of female customers have been asking for a Sugar Shack--it's like a black & tan but half Amstel Light and half Diet Coke. It's my job to serve customers whatever they ask for, but this trend is really testing me. The Sugar Shack is foul and goes against the bartender's oath I took to create alcoholic beverages that increase the appreciation and experience of drinking. So my question is how can I get out of serving this disgusting beverage before I lose my mind--without losing my job? --Dan Dan the Bartender Man Dear Pinkie Shears, I'm hoping you can help me with an etiquette question. I'm a bartender and recently a lot of women have been ordering a drink they call the Sugar Shack (half Amstel Lite/half Diet Coke). It's a nauseating combination of low-cal beverages that should be illegal just for its dual brand-name promotion. I'm sure that the noxious Nutrasweet and alcohol combination creates brain-damaging chemical reactions if the women who keep ordering it are any indication. How can I politely steer these women away from their order to something less repugnant so they take no offense and I can keep my job and not have to reach across the bar and slap them? --Ms. Minna Dear Dan and Minna, The City certainly is sounding a bit raw these days. Since this seems somewhat out of my purview, I asked a young gentleman named Brian for his insight and assessment. After eight or nine of these Sugar Shacks, he seemed to believe that "goddamn yuppie chicks should always get what they want--especially when it's something they truly deserve." This concoction definitely had the effect of inducing coarseness. Before expiring on the couch with a burst of effervescent, Aspartame-scented belches, Brian shared his fantasy of putting "just a little tinkle" in their glasses. He also insisted that he just couldn't be a social worker for the rest of his "fucked-up life" and demanded that I let my readers know that "some things really are unnatural" and finally something garbled that sounded like "web dinero." In the name of science, I persuaded Brian to repeat his consumption of Sugar Shacks for the next four evenings. These provided some vulgar new arrangements and choreography for Oklahoma!, a diatribe on the potential sexual side effects of blackboard dust on child development, and an intimate and sinister portrait of his neighbor's dog-sitter. Aside from a wee suspension of these so-called bartending ethics, I can't for the life of me figure out what you two are on about. In need of advice? Send all queries and comments to Miss Pinkie Shears at San Francisco Metropolitan, 1776A 18th St, San Francisco, 94107. Miss Shears cannot be reached by phone. [ San Francisco | MetroActive Central | Archives ]