When I was young, I worked in a drug store in the mall, which wasn't nearly as hellish as it sounds to me now. Malls were fantastic back in the days before the internet; every one of the stores had both a bunch of products we couldn't afford to buy, and there were also pretty girls who we could moon at through the windows. I found my first "serious" girlfriend at the mall at the ripe old age of fifteen (if you must know, she worked in the Hello Kitty store). I loved my job, but as good as I thought I had it, I always knew my friend Bill had it better. Attached to the mall was a restaurant in which he worked as a busboy. More

I've got one hand on a stroller, and one keeping a pre-schooler from falling off of my shoulders, which is a perfect time to talk about balance. "It comes from the stomach," I told her. "You've got to keep your head up, your eyes forward, and stay flexible enough that you can move around as I'm walking." More

When you are young and you work in hospitality, you often date in hospitality. Perhaps it is because of the strange hours of your job, or maybe it's because of the types of people attracted to the industry. I dated within my profession for both the convenience and for the personalities I met. Cooks were fun for nights of video games and standing in the back of smoky bars drinking Budweiser while listening to them perform with a band, waiters for their tortured monologues of how they would one day be famous actors. But my favorites were always bartenders. More

Things get complicated when you factor in one of the major tools that bartenders use to connect to their clientele: the buy-back. Buy-back, comp, promo; call it what you will. In every bar, there is a certain budget that allows for giving a customer a drink that they do not have to pay for. For those of us who work behind bars, the buy-back is a double-edged sword. More

Just under a year in, I was opening up one afternoon and a friend walked in with someone else in tow. The man was introduced as the owner of a hotel in Times Square which had an old bar on the first floor. After telling me in no uncertain terms how negatively he regarded his hotel's bar, he mentioned that its current owner would be losing his lease after more than forty years, and would we consider stopping by to check out the space? More

There has been an interesting comment that that keeps popping up in the threads of these columns. It goes something like this: "I'm sick of the trend where bartenders think that they are god's gift to humanity. Your job is to make drinks, not to educate, babysit, or judge people. So do us all a favor; stow the attitude, and do your job." More

Bars are societies writ small, and each has iron-clad regulations governing what will and will not be considered acceptable behavior. At one bar, patrons might be encouraged to dance on the bar and take shots with the bartenders. At others, the slightest exhibition of rowdy behavior might get a guest shown to the door. More

Your life sucks. Sure, you make good money, but you're never home, you hate your boss, whatever industry you're in is either uninspiring or downright evil, and you want to take your ill-gotten gains and leverage them in to something that gives you the lifestyle you've always wanted. Do you open a Subway franchise? No way. Where's the fun in that? You want to do something fun. You want to open a bar. More

We met our Behind the Bar columnist, well, when he was behind the bar—SENY editor Carey Jones was on assignment for New York Magazine, reviewing Ward III when it first opened. Carey found her way back there often enough to become a regular, and soon the rest of us followed. Now Michael is an important member of the Drinks team, sharing his insights on bartending and the cocktail world each week, so we decided to give him a little Q&A treatment so y'all can get to know him a little better. More

It's 2012, and bartenders the world over are heaving sighs of relief after successfully surviving the mother of all nights out. I have been a bartender too long to hold much sentimentality for the champagne, horns, and streamers that comprise New Year's Eve, but it is a party, and someone has to throw it, so I spent this year the same way I've spent most others: slinging drinks and counting down to midnight. More