Burgers, Boneheads and Books...

I have held several jobs over the years, the most memorable being a spell at McDonald's as Chief Patty Sauté Engineer. Actually, that's a bit of an exaggeration for my resumé...I wasn't allowed anywhere near the grill, that's men's work. I was relegated to the ill-defined position of "Dressing". That meant I was allowed (yes, allowed) to squirt ketchup, mustard and a substance called "Chicken Sauce" on the incoming patties. I was also permitted to lay two pickles on each burger and massage the buns lovingly into little wrappers. Every single one of them was to be treated as I would my own child. If I had one slivered onion out of place, I was back to the serving counter where all women (in their opinion) belonged. My position in Dressing was much envied and covetted by all of the girls, and if I arrived late I would have to wrestle the sauce guns away from them, just to be spared the agony and humiliation of having to actually serve customers.

There were worse positions to be had. I spent a good few shifts hovering over the frying tanks (that's in an area that you usually can't see from the counter...for good reason) where we would deep fry the McChickens, Nuggets, the grammatically challenged Filet 'o' Fish, and finally, for kicks, the Apple Pies. The buzzers went off every 42 seconds for no aparant reason. At that point, I was meant to either flip and/or remove and/or replace the item and/or reset the buzzer. This station had a Mensa membership as a pre-requisite. Every 89 seconds, a McChicken would explode in a ball of molten hot greasy rage, followed at 91 seconds by me requesting a break, again, to remove batter from my eyelashes.

Here's a tip if you go to McD's in England. At any point during the day, be it lunch time, dinner time, or whenever, if you order an Apple Pie, the reply will always be "They just went in, it will take 20 minutes". I hate apple pies. I loathed making those little hot f*ckers. McDonald's requires its employees to fish these tiny pastries from hell from the deep fat frying trays with their fingers and stuff them into those ridiculous cartons, while trying to stop apple lava from burning third degree holes in your digits. Why anyone wants them anyway, I don't know. Oh, and there is always one of these too:

Me: They just came out of the fryer, they are very hot.
Plebian: Nah, s'ok
Me: Seriously, they are really hot. The box has a warning and everything
Plebian: Can't be that hot, I'll have a bite...WAAAAAAAHHHH!

Then there is mention of suing and all sorts. They just can't help themselves though, like when you are told not to touch the plate in a restaurant, that it's very hot. Well, you have to touch it now, right?

I have so many McD's stories...I'll get to them later.