I understand when someone starts a new job and his performance isn’t exactly up to par.

This patience extends into the service industry: when a waiter may not be keeping up with the crowd or open the bottle of wine with extreme ease, I understand.

However, in the past month I have encountered two different waiters at different establishments, both of whom gave fair warning of the dining trauma that was to come.

I immediately lowered the bar in my expectations. In fact, what each of them warned about turned out to be true.

The first waiter brought us food in the time I could have gone to the grocery store and cooked it. She also couldn’t remember if we had sweet or unsweetened tea, and I didn’t even bother complaining when the wrong side came out.

The second waiter took nearly 10 minutes after ordering to tell us the restaurant didn’t have the wine we wanted. He then proceeded to break the cork while opening the bottle of our second choice Cabernet before pouring me and my date glasses (without letting my date taste it.)

These less-than mediocre experiences wouldn’t be worth remembering if the waitress and waiter had not given me the warning beforehand.

When coming to my table and saying, “Hi, I’m sorry if your dining experience is inadequate because I’m new,” I translate that to, “Hi, I hope you don’t mind wasting your money because I just started this gig and am not even going to try to do an impressive job.”

At least both people were nice. I’ve worked in the service industry, I know it isn’t a blast 100 percent of the time. But at least put in the effort and don’t give your performance an excuse before the appetizer.

Taylor Adams is a senior journalism major. She can be reached for comments or questions at [email protected].