As the Burger Turns
Is it passive aggressive if they had it comin' ?
My grandfather was a man formed by WWII. He was convinced that joining the marines was the only way to become a man. You see, compared to him being there when they raised the flag at Iwo Jima, the only hope for me was if we got ourselves in another war and I needed to be in the right place to grab that opportunity. One day he drove me out to a camping park, and spent days pressuring me into joining the military. He wanted to put out of my mind once and for all, that silly notion that college could better my life. After me stubbornly holding onto my dreams of college, we eventually reached a compromise--I would work at McDonalds. You see, in his world--to become a man if you couldn't cut the mustard with the marines, McDonalds was second best. College was something for homosexuals, but McDonalds would teach me the ways of the world. I figured quitting McDonalds was easier than quitting the marines, so I didn't argue.
So I find myself in a McDonalds uniform flipping burgers and mopping floors. I quickly grew bored and got more and more efficient at any task. This caused problems, other workers didn't like it. Management just heaped more work on me no matter how much I did. Things like tossing the spatula into the air, grabbing the salt and pepper shakers and flipping them into the air sending a spray of salt and pepper in a precise pattern across the patties, catching the spatula, tapping the grill, followed by tossing the spatula up again to catch the salt and pepper and set them down, were discouraged. Just because I had dexterity, I wasn't meant to use it. I got pink-slipped by the night manager for "Failure to follow SOP" (standard operating procedure). There was no asking or being told to stop, I just got handed a pink slip. I was sent to a training session, where I was shown that I had to individually shake the salt and pepper over each burger for one shake. I was denied my nickel raise that quarter. I was told another violation and I could be fired.
So here I was at the grill day after day, flipping burgers-- and I followed the SOP to the letter. I was a changed man, I had seen the light my grandfather had hoped for. There I was on a slow Tuesday night when the night manager yelled back over the counter, "There's 3 buses. Twelve-Quarter Turn".
A gasp went up. The infamous "Twelve-Quarter Turn" order had been given. Lesser fry-cooks had been crushed under it's pressure. Once given, one must produce 12 quarter pounders every two minutes and fifteen seconds till being told to stop. I bit into the task at hand relishing the new challenge. I was slinging ketchup, pickles, salt and pepper at the limit of human endurance--all to the SOP requirements. After the mass of children were all served, the night manager, walked down the line and gave each grill worker a "HALT" order--except me. She forgot me on the end. SOP dictates that I continue, otherwise I can get another pink slip. So I did.
I was making quarter pounders at that speed for the next 30 minutes. The trays were piling up on the counter like no-one's business. I actually went through my local case of meat and the case of meat in the staging fridge. I was running for the back freezer when I ran into her smoking a cigarette. "What are you doing?" she demanded incredulously.
"12-Quarter TURN, and I'm out of meat" came my reply.
The look of panic in her eyes was adorable.
"HALT! HALT! I mean, oh god, HALT!" she cried.
I followed her panicked run back into the restaurant. I wondered how many cigarettes she'd had back there while I worked away.
The mound of quarter pounders was impressive. It was over a hundred burgers piled up in a huge pile. She got written up for "Excessive Waste on Shift" with a pink slip and denied her quarter raise for the quarter. Sometimes the best way to deal with a fool, is to do what they say.
My grandfather was right, McDonalds taught what I needed to know. I can attribute my later good grades to desperately never wanting to work for them again.
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