Stephanie Molina, Empire Pizza and Pub

Weirdest, strangest thing you’ve seen go down at the bar?

It’s regular to have people fall asleep, stumble in and out. I had a woman try to throw a shot glass at me because I tried to cut her off. She was an ex-stripper, and she had been complaining the whole shift about how she couldn’t get a job at any strip club downtown. She got wasted and I cut her off, and she tried to throw her shot glass at me.

I had another gentleman that I cut off who threatened to rape me. I wasn’t scared. He was kind of out there and was hammered, and that was his comeback, that was his threat.

Do you have to put up with a lot of that? I mean, not to that extent, but with men?

As far as men being creepy like that, here and there. It’s hard as a girl bartender, because you will get stalkers. You get these stalker-types because you give them that attention, and they feed off that and they get coming back to you and they tip you really well, so it’s like, “I’m making a lot of money, but is it really worth it?” A couple of us have had that kind, who come in just to see you and it’s creepy, and they’ll wait until the end of your shift, so that happens.

Do you enjoy your job?

Yes. Yes, I do. I served for a very long time, and … I don’t hate serving. I like interacting with people. Bartending’s hard because you’re stuck there. At least when serving, you can duck out of there. If someone’s upset with you, you can go hide. You might drop your food on them and be like, “OK, bye.” Bartending, you’re kind of stuck there if someone’s upset. I’ve never had an issue. I don’t think I’ve even had anybody upset except for people I’ve caught off. I’ve never had people upset service-wise.

Is there a drinking trend you’d like to see go away?

Besides binge drinking? I would love to see that go away, but that’s doubtful. I do want binge drinking to go away. … I don’t speak for every bartender, but I don’t enjoy serving to the point that they get tanked. I don’t like it. We’re asked to upsell, and I’ll do it to an extent, but if somebody doesn’t want to drink, I’m not going to make you drink. That’s just the way it goes. At that point, I don’t really care about tipping.

@FilmandEDM