It all depends on whom you speak to really. How are you my loyal readers? I am well. Tired. Drawn and feeling like I have been wasted for a year. Yesterday the sun was so treacherously hot that I truly felt as if Cerberus had hit me. Fortunately today I feel as if it was just a little case of sunstroke. Though Cerberus still haunts my dreams a bit currently.
I took a brief interlude there to pour my self a nice glass of Shiraz. There is something extremely civilized about having a glass of wine while I write these posts. When I get the chance that is.
I worked the grill all weekend. It started on Friday with me arriving at work an hour late. It was an honest mistake and I made up the hour the next morning anyway. When I arrived, as I had said in my post last week, I sought out the Director of Operations and asked him about getting my life saving certification and a defibrillator on site. The life saving he had no problem with and in terms of the defibrillator he told me that we did have one on site. That caused me to start playing the what if game with regard to what happened last Tuesday (http://newbieintheweeds.blogspot.com/2008/07/grill-file-under-im-not-mcdonalds.html ).
Cerebrally, which I have never had a problem with, I can intellectually understand that I did everything that I could. Emotionally is a whole other can of worms and one which I have promised myself that I will purge in the coming week. I have never been one to deal with death well and of course when it confronts you other things also pop into your psyche and cause you to consider other events of the same magnitude. I know there was nothing else I could have done that would have made an impact.
Although that is true, when I came into work on Friday I found that the gentleman, whose name was David, wheelchair was still in the garage area that I work. At first when I saw it I wanted to break down and cry. But I held back. I know that it must sound a little pedantic that the sight of the wheelchair would make me upset but who likes to be reminded of death forty times a day as they are going about their work. I certainly don’t. The saucier K, who sensing my discomfort, was kind enough to put linen over it, though that too was pretty spooky. But now I want to move beyond this event and speak about this weekend.
Friday, care of being late, I was a little behind the eight ball. My station was as I had left it on Tuesday night. As such I had to make sure that the fridges were turned over, plugged back in, brought back to temperature and restocked. That in and of itself is quite a tall order. The “ice cream” fridge as I’ve taken to calling it (not because I’m clever but instead because it is an Old Nestle fridge) can hold up to nine cases of six bag each of French fries (sorry America I still call them French, though freedom does have a nice ring to it). It can also hold four cases of two bags each of chicken fingers and one case of empanadas. I had to make Quesadillas, which I never got around to as well as make some hot beef sandwiches.
The process of setting the station and preparing the Mise en Place is not overly taxing, it is just time consuming and truth be told my head was not really in the game on Friday. Of course they wanted me to be open by five o’clock and I think I was finally set by five thirty.
Friday was smooth though mentally I was challenged and did not want to be there. It seemed cruel and unusual to me and in every sense very much a Daliesque surrealism that stretched my limits as a human first and a cook second. I was quite grateful when the night had ended and though I did not get pounded I did prepare for it.
Saturday I was scheduled for 12 but as I had come in late the day before I came in early to ensure that all my Mise en Place was ready. Although I had gotten there early it is virtually impossible to set up the station in only an hour. I was finally set by about one pm and ready to go.
I was extremely busy on Saturday. I had to call for help at one point because I had more than thirty five chits and found myself so deep in the weeds that for a moment I thought I could understand what it was like for Moses. M arrived and we quickly pulled me out of the weeds which felt great. I did more than 1200 distinct orders on Saturday. At one point I had no chicken fingers and orders for 17 batches of them, on top of which I had four pulled pork, three hamburgers, three nachos and two fries. ALL AT THE SAME TIME. Of course most people are good natured and recognize that I have only two hands and that I am only capable of so much. Some people make the comment that I should have a helper, others complain and some are just downright rude as I will express to you now.
At the height of my day I had about fifteen chits on the board and about three quarters of them were multiple orders. I had a middle aged woman who was married to a man who appeared to be Arab or Iraqi. He was well dressed and seemed to be f the upper crust. They had children that were with them and were clearly hungry. From the moment that they handed me the chit to the moment that the rudeness began was less than sixty seconds. Of course, good naturedly, I told them that I was not McDonald’s and that there is only so much that I can do with these two hands. But I was more than happy, I advised them, to make them smile and of course sarcasm is free. Well, with that, to say that she became indignant would be less than accurate. She was downright vitriolic and her venom would usually have affected me had I not noticed her husband shrinking faster than a Lilliputian at the sight of Gulliver. Of course when I finally had dealt with the order her attitude expressed well its about time. I looked at the chit as I punched it, it had been eight minutes from the moment they ordered to the moment I put it in her fat little fingers. Internally I was thinking where is Cerberus when you need him. At any rate, most people take it all in stride and love the way that I deal with it. As I will recount for you right now.
Those of you who know me well understand that my previous existence has left me a little jaded, a whole lot cynical, but always with a smile on my face and an infectious laugh. So to go along with my McDonald’s line I always explain to people that I was only born with two hands and that unfortunately because of my cooks defect I can only move so fast. I always with a smile let people know approximately how long it is going to be and invite them to either come back or stand by as I can be quite entertaining. I would say it is about a seventy five percent to twenty five percent split. Twenty five percent stick around and talk with me, laugh jovially and always leave with a smile.
On Saturday I did have a girl come back after I had given her a burger about two hours after the fact. She looked at me and told me that she had a profound respect for what I did and that she had never had a better burger in her life. She then proceeded to give me a five dollar bill that I politely declined but she forced me to take. I said that she was being too kind and she explained that she was not. That instead in this age of instant gratification too many people don’t appreciate the simple things. She thanked me again and said that she would be back again. It was my second tip that I have ever gotten there.
I do have five or six repeat customers. One is an Iranian who I always end up talking about Iran and the state of world affairs. He is a tenured professor with a degree in applied physics. Though we often disagree, as I come from a schooled political point of view and he from a personal belief we are always friendly and enjoy the five minutes we get to talk. I have another customer who only orders when I have the Tuna burger but he makes a point of getting of his bike, shaking my hand and asking how my day has been. He always offers to buy me a drink that I always say no to. I also have another man, we’ll use his name because there is no harm, Nick. Nick is a fifty one year old man who comes every week and orders a burger with his daughter Chloe and his wife and nine month old son. Nick orders the burger and Chloe diligently watches as I make it. We always chat for a few minutes and this weekend I got his recent history. Nick had a quadruple bypass which has left his wife shaken and him concerned about his children. We spoke for about ten minutes this weekend as I was preparing food. I felt for his wife and his children but was hopeful that all his problems are behind him.
It is too easy to become a robot doing what I am doing. I think that so many people get to what I am doing and just go through the motions. But, one of the things that I am grateful for, is that although I am new to the kitchen, I, unlike everyone else, have to face my customer each and every moment. I get to see their joy or their dislike of my food. I get to speak with them, to feel them, to understand who they are and why they are in front of me. I am not nor have I ever been a robot. Though I am becoming a robot in the sense that I can produce what is expected of me.
Sunday was relatively easy though it still had some moments. My next post is going to deal with some of the emotional things that I am considering at the moment as well as some generalities with what I am doing.
For some reason I feel that this is an appropriate quote to end with. Dante Alighieri once said; “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of great moral crises maintain their neutrality”. Something I never have or will do.
Are you dreaming inspired? And big? Do you know where today will lead? Remember we are promised nothing so appreciate life for what it is, an ill defined finite moment that can be gone, just like…
A la prochaine,
SDM
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