I work in a restaurant, I know children can be hardwork, I have two and they are no angels but I would never dream of leaving the table in the absolute states that many parents do! I'm talking food and rubbish all over the floor - literally piles of it - stickers stuck to the furniture and pen/Crayon marks on the tables, walls and menus, half chewed food left for us to pick up (and occasionally other bodily fluids left for us to deal with too!), food smeared everywhere and general rubbish ALL over the table. Just why? I'm assuming these parents wouldn't allow it at home.
It's not just the mess either, it's the parents who come in and enjoy a bottle of wine between them while their darling 2 year old is running around unattended into the kitchen and out to the carpark - of course the parents get extremely irate when we point out how unsafe this is. It's so common!
To make it worse, the majority of parents who do this always seem to treat the waiting staff like scum - looking down their nose at us like there's a bad smell and speaking extra slowly as though we are too stupid to understand basic English. It's becoming very hard to give the same attitude back sometimes.