Diagnostic

Kristy Barnes
Professor Paul Gasparo
Diagnostic Essay
ENG-111-55
23 March 2009
Bartending:
The Good, Bad and Ugly
Trashed. Wasted. Housed. Drunk. These words are often used to describe nights, or even days, of high levels of intoxication followed by unruly actions. Chances are, many have encountered such a rampant feeling due to being served by a bartender. Mesmerizing customers with brisk, dance-like maneuvers while creating enticing concoctions and speaking with a sarcastic tongue, this is the profession that many are curious to possess. After only two years of holding such a commendable position, I had experienced the good, bad, and ugliness of bartending.
When applying for just about any job in the restaurant industry, it is all about who you know. Based upon my physical appearance, I was lucky to have landed a job on a busy, popular street. Informing the employer that I had currently attended a bartending school might not have been a good idea. Most restaurant employers with a dedicated reputation prefer employees with previous experience. To my dismay of being hired a bartender, I had started as a food server . My luck had changed for the better after a few months when the two primary bartenders had been fired for their own personal intoxication behind the bar. The opportunity was there to finally prove to not only the employer, but to everyone else that I could be a good bartender.
Accepting the position, I had surpassed their expectations and goals in amazement. Listening to customers, using the abundance of food and beverage knowledge, and most importantly, making everyone laugh were three things that made me into a great bartender. These things also increased revenue and sales, thus making the employer satisfied with their decision of my position. In the beginning, I had the time of my life working as a bartender. Entertaining others by being myself, while getting a great full body work-out and ending the night with lucrative tips, I couldn’t ask for more.
Now worthy of being called not only a bartender, but a superb one, my reputation on the popular street had grown into a marvelous one. Commended by customers and even highly experienced bartenders, I still kept a modest composure. There had always been a doubtful reason in the back of the mind of whether bartending would lead me to my success in life. Modesty, however, did not suppress greed. Keeping record of my earnings each night, monthly earnings totaled up to almost more than what people pay in ridiculous mortgages. Possessing all of this money led me to purchase materialistic items and spend foolishly. I assumed that making up the difference would come along the next night. This assumption was a terrible one that I had come to depend heavily on and later came back to haunt me when I had lost items of great importance.
Not only had greed been a bad attribute, but my own personal well-being had taken a toll as well. Working nights, the body and mind become accustomed to the nocturnal schedule and so, days become non-existent. In my own words, I had become a vampire; only I was sucking the life out of myself. As I became acquainted with other ‘ vampires, ‘ the nights after work grew longer and more exhausting. This caused sleeping throughout the majority of the day until the sun set which made communication difficult through my family and other significant others who had the ‘ normal life ‘. This saddened me, yet by the time the tips accumulated to a significant amount, I was ready to celebrate. I had eaten, lived, and drank this lifestyle for a long while and soon became a self-absorbed creature who had lost touch with herself. The lifestyle and aura that I had gained was an unpleasant one that soon caught up with me. If it weren’t for dramatic short-comings and dire financial straits, I would not have seen the ugly creature that I had become. Greedy, artificial, superficial, and self-absorbed, I was ashamed to present myself around my family or friends. The genuine, moralistic young woman I once was had been jaded through an immoral lifestyle that was in desperate need of change. Through time and help from a dearly loving family, I am now the genuine person that I had been almost three years ago.
To this day, I often wonder if bartending could’ve been the key to my success. The question of whether it was the lifestyle or nativity that led me down the wrong path I often fathom about, but never try to fully resolve. If I had the opportunity to bartend again in life, there’s a possibility that I would chose to do so. Only the second time, I would remember the painful hardships and grief I had once caused myself and others.

Kristy Barnes
Professor Gasparo
English 111-55
Revised Diagnostic Essay
3 May 2009
I Just Don’t Give a Rat’s Ass
Society today sickens me. The media primarily speaks of things like new clothing, music, and famous people, along with other useless mundane items. A few examples would include what Britney Spears is doing with her life, Lauren Conrad’s new Dolce and Gabbana purse, and Souljaboy’s new single that repeats the same annoying, demanding style of music but with a new dance of shame. (Really, people? The Superman dance was truly ridiculous and stupid- and so was the song). The media focuses on what exactly is new, hip, or in modern talk, “the newest, illest shit around.” People who are easily convinced often focus their attention, and lives, on such simplistic topics. With so much of these things being advertised and talked about, how is a person supposed to live a normal life and still be included in society? Based upon personal experience, shutting yourself out of society in order to not conform to such materialism is the wrong way to go about this problem.

There are two sides to this topic. On one side, a person might state that people should be able to think for themselves and reevaluate actions and decisions. The opposite side will have a more sympathetic view, stating that if all of this materialistic bullshit is continuously advertised
and displayed through the media, that it is the media’s fault to blame because it is all that is exposed to human beings. On the contrary, we as individuals should be able to step outside the box to see what we should not be influenced by nor become. Through my own personal assumptions and experiences, there are only a few people who are mentally and socially able to step outside the box. Often when this happens, the outcome is laughter. It is absolutely ridiculous that people revolve their lives on materialistic things and neglect the important subjects in their own personal lives.
Here are more examples that I want to elaborate upon:
1. Rhianna and Chris Brown’s recent domestic dispute. I think MTv should bring back Celebrity Deathmatch and do a spliff on the fight. When I had first heard of this event, I had no sympathy for Rhianna. She should have remembered of Tina Turner whooping Ike Turner’s ass.
2. Celebrities naming their children ridiculous names. Bronx. Apple. Pilot Inspektor. The list goes on. It seems like just because you have money that when you produce spawn, you can name them as cities or inanimate items. Don’t children of celebrities have enough to worry about? Now they must go through life with a bogus name. And it gets better, normal people are soaking up the trend naming their kids weird, awkward names. Shame on these parents for thinking this trend is a positive influence in their lives as well as their children’s.
3. Ryan Seacrest. I don’t even know what the hell he looks like. I don’t know who the fuck he is or what he does.
4. Lindsey Lohan, Paris Hilton, Tara Reid and the sluts who yearn to be on the Girls Gone Wild videos. Such women give the female race a horrible name. They’ve snorted so much yayo that they breathe out dust. They’ve had so many sexual escapades that even Wilt Chamberlain says, “Damn.” These women should not be exposed to the public eye at all. Thanks to them we have little girls who look like miniature whores that want to be spoiled and only focus on their looks and the opposite sex. And we wonder why there are so many underage mothers…
The list goes on and on, but I won’t continue. You get the idea. The title of this essay is “I Don’t Give a Rat’s Ass”. Based on previous text, a person might fathom that I did actually pay attention to such nonsense. This is not true. I actually had to look up information on Yahoo and ENews. Truth is, I do not give two shits about these simplistic events; they just annoy the hell out of me.
Thinking outside of the normal, or rather, not conforming to materialistic subjects has positively influenced my life. When I had stepped outside what is considered to be the “norm,” I realized that I, as an individual, had more to focus my attention on than such superficial crap as this. It is an absolute shame that the majority of the human population cannot do the same. I believe that if society could focus on the more important things in life and not worry about the next new thing, major issues would be solved and people would have the ability to see that there is more to life than materialistic items.