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There’s a pretty good chance you’re also stuck in your house and not working behind the bar right now. Without our normal structure, it’s easy to fall into unhealthy habits, but it’s also an opportunity to form new ones. It’s easy to start small and practice new health and wellness habits during quarantine. Preparing one healthy snack a day or doing five minutes of breathing exercise when you wake up can vastly improve your wellbeing, especially during this challenging time. These are things you can carry forward into your daily routine when we are allowed to go back to work again.
My guest today is Amie Ward, aka The Healthtender. She’s a Chicago based industry veteran and an ACE certified health coach. When not behind the bar at Neon Wilderness, Amie travels the country to help educate bartenders on how to care for themselves physically, mentally, emotionally, socially and spiritually. She had a ton of advice about simple things you can do to stay healthy and form good habits during this crisis. From preparing healthy snacks and short exercise routines to keeping a food journal, it’s easy to start forming new healthy habits.
Listen to our conversation in the player or wherever you get your podcasts to find out more about quarantine health and wellness for bartenders. Don’t forget to check out our homepage for much, much more, and stay tuned for more great conversations during this challenging time. Thanks so much for tuning in! I’ll see you next time.
We are living in uncertain times. Running a bar in a pandemic is one of the biggest challenges we’ve ever faced as an industry. As restaurants and bars across the world are being forced to close or pivot to pickup and delivery sales only, many are struggling to survive. One of those bars is Paper Plane in San Jose, Calif. in a county that has seen both the earliest and highest numbers of COVID-19 cases in the state.
My guest today is Mary Palac, bartender at paper plane. She’s been in the industry since she was 15 and holds such accolades as Season 7 Ms. Speed rack California, two time Bar Mania champion, president and founding member of USBG Silicon Valley, and much more. She’s been a huge inspiration to me, and she had a lot to share about how she and Paper Plane are handling this crisis.
One of the things that impressed me the most about Paper Plane was how they didn’t react immediately and they instead took the time to do things right, and that’s really paid off for them. With circumstances changing daily, it’s really important to slow down a little bit and do things safely and correctly.
If you’d like to help Mary and her colleagues at Paper Plane, you can donate to their employee relief fund, or order food and cocktails to go from their Tri Force menu.
Check out our conversation in the player or wherever you get your podcasts, and be sure to visit our homepage for much, much more. Thanks so much for listening, stay safe out there and I’ll see you next time.
So this is a pretty weird time to be a human in society. I’ve been struggling with it, as I’m sure you are as well. First of all, apologies for the radio silence. It’s been a bit of an adjustment for me too. I typically do in person interviews, but as you can imagine, that’s not possible right now, not to mention everyone in our industry is a little preoccupied. I’m working on a system for remote interviews, and hopefully we’ll have some conversations in the coming weeks about how people are handling this crisis. In the meantime I wanted to just share some of my thoughts about what’s going on, how it relates to our industry and some internal work we can all do.
As you might expect, both of the bars I work for are closed, which is a bit of a reality check. I usually feel like, “Well, if things go sideways I can always pick up shifts.” And now here we are. I know this is a scary time, and one of the scariest things is the uncertainty of it all. It’s such a bad feeling to be powerless and have no control over the situation. Will we have to shelter even longer? Will we have a job to go back to if and when this ends, will we get sick? Will someone we’re close to get sick? What is the world going to be like on the other side of this?
It’s scary to think about and we want to do something about it, but there really isn’t anything we can do, on the outside anyway. Hoarding toilet paper and pasta isn’t going to change anything, except maybe the amount of available space in our closets.
What we can do is work on what’s going on inside of us. I’ve done a few episodes about different mental tools that help us get through our shift behind the bar, and those are absolutely applicable to our current situation, even though we are not at work. Listen to this episode in the player below and Episode 31, Episode 24, Episode 22 and Episode 19.
One thing that has really been helping me is focusing on all of the positive things I see, and you aren’t going to see those things in the news. That’s just not what the news reports. So if you must read the news, it’s important to keep in mind that all of the news is going to be bad. It doesn’t mean that everything happening in the world is bad though. In fact, I believe there is a lot more good happening that we think.
Hello everyone! I hope you are weathering this storm well. This is a challenging time for our industry across the world and we need to stick together more than ever now. We are only beginning to see the effects of this and we will all have to continue doing our best, day by day.
I’m doing my best to continue to support our industry through You’re 86, and I wanted to share a list of COVID-19 resources for the bar and restaurant industry I received today from the United States Bartenders Guild, in case you don’t receive their mailing list. Some are San Francisco Bay Area specific, but most are applicable to everyone. I would also recommend joining your local chapter of the USBG, as it’s an invaluable resource for our industry.
Scroll down for the list of resources and please do stay connected. Feel free to reach out to me and share You’re 86 with your friends and colleagues. This is a great time for learning and personal growth when we can’t be behind the stick, and our guests in past episodes have so much amazing experience to learn from. I’m getting a system for mobile interviews set up and hopefully we can start sharing conversations soon. Please reach out if you would like to share what’s going on in your area. Stay safe, stay healthy, stay strong and stay connected. We’ll get through this!
Resources for bartenders
Financial Support
California Unemployment Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19)
BARTENDER EMERGENCY ASSISTANCE PROGRAM
ARAR Emergency Assistance Application
One Fair Wage- SUPPORT WORKERS IN CRISIS
Restaurant Workers’ Community Foundation Announces COVID19 Crisis Relief Fund
Project Ellis- WE PAY BILLS FOR FOLKS.
Food
Where Families Can Get Free Breakfast, Lunch and Supper in San Francisco During School Closures
A Running List of San Francisco Restaurants That Are Open For Delivery And Takeout
Hello everyone. The world is a bit crazy and uncertain right now, and I wanted to let you all know what’s happening here at You’re 86. Both of the bars I work for and use to record in person episodes are being forced to close for now. Everyone in our industry is struggling right now, and it has been understandably difficult to schedule interviews. We are all going to have to take this day by day.
I am working to implement a remote recording system and I intend to continue to produce episodes, especially related to our current situation and the immediate struggles our industry is facing. Please stay tuned and bear with my as the situation unfolds.
We will all get through this together. The community and camaraderie is see in this industry is what keeps me serving. This is a time to stay connected and support each other and our communities. Please feel free to reach out with any questions or if you would like to share what’s going on at your bar or in your market. I will do my best to help from home.
I know one of the biggest concerns we have is financial hardship. I will continue to post resources as I find them. California at least has waved the one week waiting period for unemployment benefits to those of us affected by this emergency. Also The USBG National Charity Foundation has set up an Bartender Emergency Assistance Program which you can apply for whether you’re a member or not.
Stay strong, stay healthy, wash your hands and we will all get through this together.