AUCKLAND "PUMP HANDLES" WISE UP

The Kiwis have joined the fight! As we speak, a small black and red torpedo is hurtling across the South Pacific towards Auckland, New Zealand where the island's "fat cat restaurateurs and bleating cheapskate guests" are about to get fitted for a rather uncomfortable money syphon.
It's official- this has become an international movement overnight. New Zealand waiters are ordering Scam Bibles and God help the jack-ass managers and restaurant owners that tried to keep them down for all these years. I'm sure the boys were already sticking it to them pretty good, but now they are really going to turn the hose on. Ahoy, Mates! Let us know if we can help.

THE WORD IS OUT ABOUT THE "SCAM BIBLE"

Originally uploaded by deglinkta.

"This is the "Anarchist's Cookbook" meets Sun Tzu's "Art of War" for bartenders and waiters!"

- Mr. Shing-a-Ling, Legendary scam master

"Finally a book about and for waiters not endorsed by those Food Network whores."

- The Waiter, "Waiter Rant"

"The most dangerous book in America."

- Alexander Young, New Orleans writer

"Equal parts "Anarchist Cookbook" and "Chicken Soup for the Broke-Ass Waiter's Soul", the Scam Bible is one-of-a-kind resource for waiters all over the country."

- Lance Vargas, "The Chicory"

"The enlightened waiter makes his own luck."

- R.C.DeGlinkta, Scamming waiter

"A rare book...(Readers) will be overwhelmed at the sheer volume and complexity of many of the schemes described.

-Fritz Esker, "WHERE Y'AT" Magazine

Banned In New Orleans

Feeling like Maurice Girodias of Grove/Olympia Press circa 1959 ...the black shadow of censorship once again snarls its toothless yet ugly snarl..and today the stench emanates from a highly surprising corner...BOOKSTORE OWNER!

There was a time in this great country of ours (theres) when books like 'Lady Chatterly's Lover' where tossed on to a presidents desk with a paramount air of importance and disgust. "This writing constitutes a grave menace to all and any Sir. It must...I repeat...IT MUST BE BANNED!" This from (true story-check it out) Arthur Summerfield, Postmaster General. He dropped the tome onto the president's desk and had all the dirty parts underlined for him. Ike was quoted in TIME and Newsweek "Terrible, we can't have that" giving the go ahead to Summerfield, "Go ahead and prosecute anywhere possible against LADY CHATTERLY".

This rabid attitude towards readers and writers, free thinkers and free persons from a sitting president.... and a man who willfully supported the atom bombing of two non military cities in Japan just a few short years before, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians in a grandiose attempt to make a point. Obscene is of course a matter of degrees.

Fast forward 45 years, in an age of self actualization and an advent of tolerance and acceptance the last place one expects to encounter the braying Ass of censorship is in a small bookstore on Maple Street in old New Orleans. Much less from the owner of the bookstore. The editors of Promethean Books where banned from the store proper and the new release they were placing was BANNED by the owner with a hilariously narrow-minded scolding , tongue-lashing and finger waggling that rivals the real.

The book HOW TO BURN DOWN THE HOUSE: THE INFAMOUS WAITER AND BARTENDER'S SCAMBIBLE has now joined its illustrious forebearers in CENSORSHIP....very least among them Nabokov's 'LOLITA ', Genet's 'OUR LADY of the FLOWERS', Hank Miller's 'TROPIC OF CANCER' and 'SEXUS, NEXUS, and PLEXUS', William S. Burroughs' 'The NAKED LUNCH' , Ginsberg's 'HOWL' not to mention Swift's 'A MODEST PROPOSAL' and so on. Being in with this group is an honor and we remain indebted to Maple Street Bookstore for their small mindedness, shortsightedness and utter lack of imagination.
Hope the cookbook's selling BIG for ya!!!

PRESS RELEASE: WAITERS OF THE WORLD UNITE!

A revolution is raging across America, a revolution of the working man rising up against his tormentors. The common food and beverage server, held down so very long under the wretched heel of his oppressors, must eventually take to arms...or wallets as it were.

For many years now, in eateries and gin mills throughout the country, a vanguard force of silent organizers has been hard at work, laying the nefarious groundwork for their coming legions. These few good men and women, our fearless brothers and sisters, have pioneered, refined, and perfected the only feasible recourse to such hostile aggression: the subtle art of Scam.

At last, waiters and bartenders nationwide are cutting their own slice of the money pie and striking back at those who mistreated them so severely: the fat-cat restaurateur, his pack of frothing managers, and of course, the bleating, cheapskate guest.

Want in, you say? Well, of course, but like all great movements of the people, ours is guided by a manifesto, a doctrine, a plan. In this case, it comes in the form of an underground manual, a cult guidebook coveted by waiters and bartenders, chock full of step by step instructions on how to secretly turn the tables on your unsuspecting targets and take what is rightfully yours. Two veteran Bourbon Street waiters have finally taken this manifesto and put it into print. In How to Burn Down the House: The Infamous Waiter and Bartender’s Scam Bible, authors and fellow revolutionaries Peter Francis and R.Chip DeGlinkta have raised the red lantern and are leading the charge to redemption. Join the revolution, study your little red and black book, and onward to victory forever!

"The Chicory" Interview

Interview with Lance Vargas for "www.thechicory.com", November '04

What was the motivation for the book? Civil disobedience? Tomfoolery? Rascalism? Other?

R.C.DeGlinkta: All those things and more. Primarily, the book is a roast and a parody of incompetent, jack-ass managers, whom we're all familiar with. But, not only does it deliver a well-deserved insult, it also provides the hard-working server with a means to revenge himself, and further, to profit by it. It's biting satire that actually bites.

Peter Francis: Essentially it's a parody of the whole "How To" genre. A satirical lash-out in the humorous vein of Swift's "Proposal" and Miller's pair of "Tropics". With just a dash of Genet for sport.

Publishing How to Burn Down the House under your own names in the city where many of the skills in the book are undoubtedly practiced has to be a somewhat risky endeavor. Any backlash from restaurant owners?

R.C.DeGlinkta: I'm used to taking responsibility for my actions, and I encourage others to do the same. I welcome and am flattered by any backlash that results from that.

Peter Francis: Yeah, but if the whole shit house goes up in chunks remember what he said!

Being former waiters, isn't what you guys have done here essentially biting the hand that fed you?

R.C.DeGlinkta: On the contrary, this book is a long-awaited memorial to waiters and bartenders, and after the dust settles it will be seen as a blessing. While initially both managers and waiters will benefit, the diligence and intelligence of conniving servers will long outlive the short attention span of incompetent management, and in the end it will be the waiters that come out ahead. The Scam Bible will bore its way into in the annals of underground literature and managers will return to their usual dimwitted state of denial.

In your own opinion, who is more easily-fooled the customer or the manager?

R.C.DeGlinkta: It's six of one, half a dozen of the other. In practice, the customer is generally oblivious, like the props in a shell game. The manager is almost always the one being deliberately misled.

Peter Francis: The manager of course though it can be a little betwixt and between, ahem, Floordick has a way of walking into the punches, God bless him.

Without naming real names, bestow upon the readers of The Chicory a few of your favorite all-time scammers in the industry.

R.C.DeGlinkta: I remember the first time I recognized scamming as a valid art form, I was watching a legendary scam master, known to his friends as Mr. Shing-a-Ling, put a customer on ice. That's when you pretend like the credit card machine is broken to force a cash transaction. The guy was pissed and pulling his hair out and all that, but Shing just spoke calmly, assuring the angry guest that this happened all the time and it was likely to be a while, as he performed a variety of meaningless card swipes and key combinations for effect. He drove this guy to the very brink and in the end was paid in cash. He deserved an Oscar for that performance.

Peter Francis: One guy comes to mind although there were so many, this guy was the best....and smoooooth. His name was Anthony Adams and he was truly talented, even sold the menus.

Of the 20 or so scams listed in the book, are there any you are particularly fond of for one reason or another?

R.C.DeGlinkta: Not really. I take Bruce Lee's approach: whatever works. Adapt. The most yield for the least effort. That's all that matters.

Peter Francis: I looked at it a little more like Aleister Crowley, that flamboyant old fraud from the other side of the pond, "do what thou whilst is the only rule". Our Man In Amsterdam was especially appealing to witness, from a safe distance that is.

In the history of these scams what was the biggest repercussion you were witness to after being discovered?

R.C.DeGlinkta: That's the beauty of it. I have never seen any dire repercussions save questioning or termination, which is really amazing if you do the math. To a waiter with a good angle, two or three hundred extra a week is a meager take. That's 10 grand plus, per year. Year after year that adds up to a tidy embezzlement. For instance, in 10 years that's over a hundred grand! What other criminal gets away with a slap on the wrist and a pink slip for stealing that kind of money?

Peter Francis: I've heard some stories about scammers who got on the wrong side of a certain family of restaurateurs on Bourbon St. who ended up retiring hastily.

How about a ballpark estimate of the biggest take you have ever been privy to?

R.C.DeGlinkta: No can do. Vanity gets a person collared.

Peter Francis: Skip it, next question.

Tell us what the modus operandi of your "In the Know" series is.

R.C.DeGlinkta: For some reason we have acquired a bunch of underworld experience that we think might be useful to our readers, and with the help of Promethean Books, have decided to organize and release it in a series. How to Burn Down the House is the first of that series.


Take this time to praise or assail your publisher, Promethean Books.

R.C.DeGlinkta: The have been very open-minded. Many people were convinced that we wouldn't find a publisher, that the book was too inflammatory, poorly written, etc. So, we are thankful they stepped up. It's been a good experience so far.

Peter Francis: I've enjoyed working with them. When we were shopping the manuscript around it was easy to get discouraged, to start second guessing yourself. Promethean Books 'got it', thought it was funny, and rolled the dice. Let's hope it comes up a winner for them...and us.