For the past two summers, I had the distinct pleasure of serving steaming hot Italian food to hordes of good ole Southerners in my hometown of Kennesaw, Ga. Romano’s Macaroni Grill, a fine establishment serving only the highest quality ingredients at an affordable price (There, I said it…Can I have my free pasta now?), allowed me unprecedented access to some of the most prime people-watching on the planet. Through my observations, I learned one very important lesson: People suck.

As a formerly shy and awkward customer at restaurants, here are my tips for how to be the best damn patron in the dining room:

Be friendly

In the words of the man that shouted at me from a black Nissan on Forsyth Boulevard last Friday, “Smile, baby!” Imagine if every time you said “Hi” or “How are you?” to someone, they stared down at a sheet of paper and blatantly ignored you. Not a super nice feeling. Sometimes, TV shows and movies are shockingly accurate. If you’re rude to me, I will remember you, and yes, I gossiped about you with my friends in the kitchen. So, please, be nice. For your own sake. Think of it this way: who would you be more willing to help if they had a desperate need of artificial sweetener for their iced tea—your best friend or that Bear’s Den worker you unsuccessfully tried to charm into giving you extra tater tots?

Tip well

Unless your server spits in your food and insults your mother, tip 20 percent. Always. There is no worse feeling than bringing someone eight sides of sauce, a soda AND a water and extra napkins and feeling no benefit from it. Is the $2 difference between 10 percent and 20 percent really going to break the bank? In most cases, probably not. And if it is, consider staying home. In most states, servers make below minimum wage because of the reliance on tips (For example, I made $2.13 per hour). On top of that, a portion of a server’s nightly tips is often distributed among hosts, bussers and bartenders. When you hear that someone is “working for tips,” chances are they actually are. If your excuse is that you don’t know 20 percent of $85.16 off the top of your head, here’s a hack: Take the decimal point of your total, move it over once to the left, and multiply that amount by two. Voila! Happy server.

Be a decent human

If you’re 13 years old, and you have a lot of friends, cool! That’s great! Have fun in 8th grade. But please don’t come in during the dinner rush, order off the kids’ menu and ask to split the check 17 different ways. For proud residents of a Bible Belt state, many people in Georgia don’t know the Gospel of Luke in the Bible very well: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” It’s not that hard, people. If my hands are obviously full, I probably can’t take your stack of dirty dishes. Oh—and, never, ever, ever steal my pens.