Frozen Lake

Lake Erie was frozen out for some distance, I don't know, maybe 40 yards or so from shore.  Luckily, we had no plans to go ice fishing or walk out on the lake.  It looked too cold.  This was the view from the parking lot of a certain restaurant which will remain nameless but where I once worked.  I was a short order cook, which is ironic to everyone who knows what a tremendously inept kitchen presence I am.  I made toast reasonably well, and I could sort of grill the various sandwich meats without incessant kitchen fires.  I made omelettes for the bar crowd at 3 a.m. and the fishermen at 5 a.m. for weeks before I realized that the stuff in the carton was beat eggs, and that it is theoretically possible to make omelettes from actual fresh eggs.  However, I was prone to the occasional lapse.  One night there was a drive-in order for 15 or so hamburgers from a group of drunken revelers fresh from the bars.  It was drive-in, so that meant work fast!  I worked incredibly fast.  I had those buns laid out, mayo and special sauce laid on, tomato and lettuce and pickles and who knows what else stacked high, and I whipped those burgers off the grill onto the buns, packed up those babies and stunned the already stuporous customers.  And about twenty minutes later, one guy came back and asked at the drive through if it was correct that one of the hamburgers had no meat on it.  He wasn't angry; he just was curious about our policy on what percentage of hamburgers are entitled to having meat and how many were vegetarian.  And that is why I will never trust that particular restaurant.  It entrusted me to cook for it; its standards are clearly suspect.