SEAMAN

Mindy, the cute-and-perky-and-perpetually-bobby-across-the-street neighbor, got me my job at Long John's. Let's face it, this job sucked. I had to scrub large fryer vats, sqwack out orders into an oily microphone, and serve up dishes of "crumbs" to people for whom deepfried cod was not sufficiently greasy. I would come home with blisters on my hands, an aching back, and I could never get the smell of fish out of my hair. Mindy quit after my first week. I also had to wear a name tag that said LISA: SEAMAN THIRD CLASS which, according to LJS corporate protocol, was a very generous rank indeed.

However, my boss Steve (a corpulent red-headed fellow) made working at LJS a rich and rewarding growth experience. His specialty was the Hush Puppy effigy, a football-sized pup he would fry up when the owner wasn't around. When the outside was sufficiently crunchy, he would pull it from the vat, tenderly shake off the excess oil, and plant it on a pole in the kitchen. Once it had suffienctly cooled, he would give it toothpick eyes and a ketchup smile. Then he would spell "A-L-B-E-R-T" on the forehead--Albert was the owner of the franchise. Then Steve would take one of the steel fryer baskets and hold it like a baseball bat, his eyes narrowing as he regarded Albert. "Are you ready for this one, fucker?" Then WHAM WHAM WHAM! Albert would explode with undercooked guts and crunchy skin.

Once Steve even made hush puppy effigies of Albert's entire family, including his wife and three retarted children (they really were retarded. Steve refered to them affectionately as "The Tards.")

The best part was that once Steve made the hush puppies explode, he would make Robby, the oily and often sulky busboy--clean up the mess.

 

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