2000-08-17

Eben's Windmill Cookie

Yesterday's entry about the inextricable link between donuts and mathematics has got me to thinking today about the bad behavior that "good" pastry can inspire.

My first job was in a bakery. I was 15. It was my first real exposure to the utter and complete filth inherent to the Food Service Industry�. I mean, this place was nasty. The bakers in the back were three of the most foul-mouthed, lecherous drunks I'd ever encountered outside my own little circle of friends. They'd stand there over the donut vats, sweating and belching, while cigarettes dangled precariously from their protruding lower lips. They never tired of serenading one another with selected portions of "Roxanne," regardless of whether or not the song was actually playing on their lard-and-flour-caked boombox. One of them would suddenly shriek "Rrrrraaaaawwwwwwkkksssannnn" from one end of the back room, and the other two, in turn, would either complete the stanza or parrot the plaintive cry. This call-and-response could last up to an hour. It was never not funny to them.

More disturbing, though, were some of the regular customers.

Weird Change Man made it a point to make all of his purchases at the coffee counter register, an antiquated piece of business incapable of displaying the amount of change. Weird Change Man genuinely relished tripping us up by paying for his stuff with strange, random combinations of bills and coinage, huffing with righteous indignation if the transaction lasted longer than 10 seconds. "Whatsa mattah, you can't make change wit'out th' registah telling you what t' do?" he'd crow triumphantly. I hated him a lot.

Crazy Mary would pedal around on her bike all day, bags and bags of dirty string and newspapers tied to the handlebars, before she'd come in at 4:30 on the dot to have her coffee. She had to have her coffee with just a little milk, "the precise color of that sign behind you." If it was a shade darker or lighter, she'd make you pour it out and start again. Many a counter girl was reduced to tears trying to satisfy Crazy Mary's bizarre need to have her coffee this way. I was the only one who could replicate the color of the sign on the first try, so I was designated the Only Person Who Could Make Crazy Mary's Coffee.

Eben and Eben's Mother came in every Saturday afternoon. Eben's Mother was a Health Nut� who apparently fasted on weekends, because she'd order a cup of hot water for herself, explaining every time how "clean" it made her feel to drink it on an empty stomach. Eben's Mother didn't hold Young Master Eben to this rigorous fast, though. Eben's great joy in life was to have a windmill-shaped sugar cookie every Saturday. Eben's Mother would coo, "Would you like one of those windmills, Eben?" and Eben would immediately go into paroxysms of spastic joy. Something was wrong with Eben.

Here, though, was the thing about Eben's windmill cookie: it had to be removed from the case by a gloved hand, placed on a paper plate and then covered with a napkin. Failure to adhere to these exact steps resulted in Eben's Mother loudly lecturing the entire bakery about the Importance of Keeping Eben's Windmill Cookie Untouched.

It was very, very difficult to not lead Eben's Mother into the back room to show her exactly where Eben's Windmill Cookie came from.

lisamcc at 21:59:26

1 comments so far
Kristin
2008-12-08 16:38:35
I remember Crazy Mary! At Montilio's I had Snobby Ascot Man (really! an ascot!). On the Hull to Hingham bus we had Snorkel Jacket Guy who'd sit in the back of the bus and eat sugar cubes and carried around a trash bag full of stuff. Chris Calvi and I would having staring contests with him.
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