I’ve been reading Waiter Rant periodically for a little over a year. It’s a funny, poignant, always telling look at life in the service industry. As such, I’m glad to see the mainstream media pick up on this blog, as the Chicago Tribune (registration required) did earlier this week.

“Waiter Rant” who is writing a book based on his blog, will divulge only that he’s 38 and has lived and worked for seven years as a waiter in the New York metro area. He went to seminary and worked in psychiatric health care when younger, which may explain his saintly composure in dealing with customers.

Q. How often do you get a problem customer?

A. Eighty percent of the customers are nice, normal people, and the other 20 percent are psychotic.

Q. Why do you keep doing this job, when it’s so rough?

A. When I used to work in health care, I would get physically ill from the stress and politics of my job. The nonsense I went through in the corporate world was far worse than this. At my job it’s like a family environment; we all take care of each other.

According to Reuters, well-heeled tourists, eager to rediscover the romance of an earlier era, are taking to the rails in increasing numbers. 

Passengers boarding the Royal Scotsman at Edinburgh’s Waverley station are greeted by a piper, a red carpet and glasses of bubbly, and ordinary travellers gawp in astonishment as the nine red and gold carriages pull out sedately, heading for the Scottish Highlands.

The Royal Scotsman, which carries a maximum of 36 guests, charges 2,990 pounds per person for its all-inclusive four-night “Classic” journey through the Highlands.

The train includes a refurbished carriage used by Prime Minister Winston Churchill towards the end of World War Two, has a crew of 14, including a top-flight chef.

I wonder if this is a totally unplugged trip, or if the train provides Wi-Fi. It seems like a perfect setting for writing thoughtful letters, not hasty emails.

One might think a beverage marketer would be content to be an official sponsor of a pro sports team. Or if they wanted to go further, stadium naming rights, might do the trick. Red Bull thinks bigger than that—much bigger.

According to USA TODAY, in 2005, Red Bull purchased a soccer team in the Austrian first division, formerly known as SV Wustenrot Salzburg. The company also owns Formula 1 and NASCAR racing teams.

But it’s the Austrian company’s latest acquisition that is getting a lot of attention in the U.S. Earlier this month, Red Bull purchased the MetroStars, one of five Major League Soccer teams owned by Anschutz Entertainment Group. They promtly rebranded the team, Red Bull New York.

Red Bull is pursuing an $85 million new soccer stadium for the team in Harrison, NJ set to open in 2008—a fact that has some New Jersey legislators calling for Red Bull to include “New Jersey” in the team’s name.

Bluevend is a wall-mounted Bluetooth-enabled vending machine designed for the distribution of creative mobile phone content.

Bluevend’s developer, Lisa Roberts, devised and produced Pocket Shorts in 2004, commissioning a slate of new short films, which enabled filmakers to explore the new medium of the mobile phone and to consider the impact of mobile technolgy on the future of film making and distribution.

She recently spoke to We-Make-Money-Not-Art about Bluevend:

It was developed initially to solve a problem for our Pocket Shorts filmmakers who, though they made films for mobiles wanted a presense and a chance to promote their work during key film festivals.

We needed to find a solution that didn’t involve showing them on big screen as that would have defeated the object of the scheme so Blink came up with Bluevend with Daniel Blackburn (from carbonbased games and Tile Toy fame). We also worked with the Designers Republic on the interface design.

We tested it first in the delegates centre at 2005 Edinburgh International Film Festival as we have a Pocket Shorts partner in Scotland. Then we went down to Brief Encounters in Bristol and then Rotterdam. It has been part funded by Nesta, University of Huddersfield and Arts Council of England and continues to evolve.

I have a lot of interest from San Francisco Film Fest and SXSW in Texas but there are very few smart phones in use in America compared to here so it would have only been something to marvel at rather than of practical use.

According to CustomWheel.com, The PimpStar is a huge leap forward in the evolution of the wheel. With the PimpStar’s built-in full color LED lights, microprocessor and wireless modem, you can display virtually any image, including text, graphics, logos, and even digital photos!

The included software allows you to create your own images and send them to each wheel individually or all wheels at the same time as you drive! You can even pre-load up to six images into each wheel and program them to change automatically at the time intervals you select. The wheels are environmentally sealed, so you don’t have to worry about going to the car wash; and they are powered by the vehicle electrical system so there are no batteries to run out or change, ever.

We all know how hot podcasting is at the moment. It’s scorching!

Evoca, one of the new players in this arena has recently garnered some positive press. According to Saul Weiner, “What really sets it apart is that it doesn’t force you to be in front of a microphone to make your recording. You can just use your regular phone.”

Here’s how Evoca describes themselves:

The democratic impulse of the Internet, the ubiquity of the cell phone, and the power of oral expression have convinced us of one thing: it’s time to mobilize the voices. Our concept is simple. Just call one of our world-wide numbers from your cell phone or Skype account and record a message. Or you can upload a recording from your digital recorder. We’ ll automatically store whatever you give us in your account. From there, you can organize your recordings, you can share them with the world, or you can keep them all to yourself. It’ s spontaneous, it’ s far-reaching, and, most importantly, it’s so easy. At Evoca, we intend to enrich the world by empowering your voice.

Oh, and this tech startup is not in Silicon Valley. It’s right down the street in Savannah. I’m wishing them well, for the sake of podcasters wordlwide, and for the sake of the local business community.

There’s alot of talk about MySpace helping to break out bands. That’s all fine and good, but I’m not a MySpace user, so I’m more interested in what Last.fm—The Social Music Revolution can do for bands.

According to their site:

Last.fm is the easiest and fastest way to get your music heard by the right people. Each user builds up a music profile to get custom radio stations, make personalized recommendations and hook up with people with a similar music taste. On Last.fm unknown artists get the same exposure as those with million-pound advertising budgets and of course it’s free for labels, artists and listeners.

There are many positive things to say about this service. I’m not going to list them all here, but I will mention that the stream comes in loud and clear at 128kps—providing much better sound quality that many streaming stations.

Seed Magazine takes a look at Thank You For Smoking, a new film from Fox Searchlight Pictures and director Jason Reitman.

The Academy of Tobacco Studies, a fictional research institute in the surreal world of Thank You for Smoking, inundates America’s children with the pro-smoking side of the tobacco controversy, all in an effort to let the consumer make up his or her own mind. And unless you want to discourage critical thinking in our youth, you best be on their side.

Ah satire…what a wonderful approach to the day’s weighty topics.