We are a upper class Jamaican family, so last week, in keeping with our status we took some friends out to a new restaurant, and noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket. It seemed a little strange,but I ignored it. However, when the headwaiter brought out water and utensils, I noticed he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket, then I looked around the room and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets.

When the waiter came back to serve our soup I asked, "Why the spoon?" "Well," he explained, "well sah, the American restaurant owner dem recently hire some expert an' dem lay dung procedure fi everyting whe wi duh. Them look at di statistics an' find dat customers drop them spoon 73.84 procent more orffen than any ada utensil sah, whe dem call a "drop frequency" of 'bout 3 spoon ah table ah hour.

So ef di waitah carry spoon, we can reduce the numbah ah trips back to di kitchen and save 1.5 man-hours ah shift."

As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he was able to replace it with his spare spoon. "Mi wi get a nex' spoon next time mi go inna di kitchen instead ah mi fi mek ah extra trip figo get it right now."

I was rather impressed.

The waiter served our main course and I continued to look around. I then noticed that there was a very thin string hanging out of the waiter's fly. Looking around, I noticed that all the waiters had the same string hanging from their flies. My curiosity got the better of me and before he walked off, I asked the waiter, "Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string right there?"

"Yes sah!" he answered, lowering his voice.

"Nobaddy else eva notice di string! Di consulting firm mi tel you bout, dem fine out sey wi can save some time inna di restroom."

"How?" I asked.

"Yuh see," he continued, "by tying di string onto di tip of wi you know what, we can pull it out over the toilet widout we haffi touch it and that way we noh haffi wash wi hand, an cut dung pon di time wi spen' inna di restroom by 76.39 percent.">

"Okay, that makes sense," I responded. "But ... if the string helps you get it out, how do you put it back in?"

"Well," he whispered, lowering his voice even further, "Mi nuh know 'bout dem ada one, but yu see mee sah...ah di spoon me use ."