Not to give the impression from my earlier post that I am a bad tipper, I normally fall into Martin's group 1, an over 25 white male who dosen't bother to calculate the percentages. I tip whatever I feel like based on how much I like the server and for even reasonable service I will throw down something over 20% but when the service is horrible I make it a point to tip accordingly. A couple of years ago I dined in an upscale Houston restaurant with a party of 6 including myself and my girlfriend. The service was about the worst I have ever had. The waiter was friendly enough but he would tend to disapear for long periods of time. I found out that he was sneaking outside to catch a buzz when he should have been there to take more drink orders and serve our food. The bill came to over $250 which I put on a credit card leaving nothing for a tip. My lady friend who overtips even bad service happened to notice that I had put zero on my credit card for a tip so I explained to her that I was going to leave the waiter a one dollar bill in order to send him a message. I put the dollar on the table and when we were leaving she put two twenties of her own on top of my dollar. When we were walking out I made a point of being the last one to leave the table and when she wasn't looking I picked up her $40 and left only my one dollar on the table. When we got a few miles away from the restaurant I handed her her $40 and told her what I had done and we got into a huge argument. I should have just kept the $40 but who the hell understands women.
