Roanoke Times Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc. DATE: SUNDAY, July 3, 1994 TAG: 9407050111 SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: F-2 EDITION: METRO SOURCE: Matt Chittum DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It's 1 a.m. on a Wednesday at Gary's Little Chef on Williamson Road in Roanoke, possibly the only place in town with brains and eggs on the menu.
"Everybody has to make a crack about the brains and eggs," Tucker says.
Two portly gentlemen in a booth call her by name and tell her a joke as she leans over their table. "Oh, me," she says innocently and zooms off to the kitchen.
Tucker, the only waitress on the 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift, is the queen of this neon-encrusted palace. There's another waitress on the weekends, but Tuesday through Thursday, she's it.
"I've been at it nine months, and I've gotten pretty used to it by now," she says.
Tucker likes the people she serves in the middle of the night. She says there's a camaraderie.
Most of the customers, like the third-shift post office regulars, are midnight workers like her. She says they all tip well because they understand what it's like to work in the middle of the night.
The rowdies from bars don't bother her, either. She says they're just having a good time.
"I've waited on some of them professional wrestlers, too, but I didn't know who they were," Tucker says. "I don't get time to keep up with that stuff."
Tucker moved to Roanoke from Lynchburg last year to take the job at Gary's.
"I didn't know anybody whatsoever when I moved here," she says. "But the people I've met, it's unbelievable, and right there at the Little Chef."
Tucker is 41 and divorced. She has two children back in Lynchburg, both in their twenties. She says her job doesn't keep her from seeing her family, though. She has Sundays and Mondays off, and sees her kids then.
Tucker hasn't always been a waitress, but has worked as one off and on since she started working as a teen-ager.
"It's good, quick money," she says. "And you can always find you a waitress job."
She says she took the graveyard shift because she was staying up all night watching TV and sleeping until 2 p.m. anyway. She figured she might as well make a living at it.
So far, the nighthawks at Gary's are treating her pretty well. Tucker says she makes a comfortable living, and doesn't mind the tiny two-room efficiency she lives in.
"There hasn't been a slow month yet," she says. "I should have made this move a long time ago."
by CNB