Reflections On McDonald's

For the last, eh, three and a half days, I have been an employee of the great McDonald's corporation. Personally, I think three days is plenty of time to judge every last aspect of their business and clientele, don't you?

1. People are cranky in the morning. I've always been a morning person and I guess I've mostly hung out with morning people, because somehow this basic fact of life has more or less escaped my notice until now. I think I will start putting something in the coffee, such as Prozac or amphetamines. This isn't really an "I think I'll write a letter to McDonald's and make a suggestion" kind of idea; it's more like an "I think I'll just DO this and make everyone's lives easier in the short run, never mind the long term consequences" kind of idea.

2. People are gluttons. Seriously. Help. I'm losing respect for my own species here. No one human being in the entire world needs to eat six McSkillet burritos, hot cakes with sausage, four Egg McMuffins, five hash browns, a bacon biscuit, a large Coke, a large iced coffee, and two ice cream cones in one sitting. Perhaps you think that I am exaggerating for comedic effect. Perhaps you are a fool.

3. Beef = yuck. Yes, I'm a vegetarian, and yes, I loved the shit out of cheeseburgers back before I drew my arbitrary line in the sand and stopped eating them. But even back then, I basically never ate at McDonald's. Now I see them being mass produced. Icky. They're all skinny and sad looking and, basically, sorry cuts of meat. Needless to say, this opinion does not stop me from piping up with a cheery, "Yes of course, our Angus burger is delightful!" at every opportunity. We get a pizza party if we sell the most Angus burgers.

4. The world of minimum wage is a sad, scary place. There be madness behind the McSmile every employee is required to wear at all times, stapled on if necessary. Beware. Also, standing up for eight hours straight is more painful to the feetsies than you might think.

5. I never ate fast food before I started working here. I still don't, really. But when you're in college, you're kind of programmed to accept free food. As we all know, the point of college is to make oneself both broke and pretentious, so one sort of gets the feeling that one is giving one's finger to half of everything that college stands for when one doesn't. Plus, after one too many "WHY can't I have my McDouble Cheeseburger RIGHT NOW??? I don't CARE if you don't start serving lunch until 10:30 and it is only 7:45 right now. I AM TOO SPECIAL AND IMPORTANT TO WAIT AROUND" suddenly a Cheesy Ketchup McFishy Surprise and nice, identifiable Coke is rather seductively appealing.

6. I am having fun. Really! I am! It's all I can do to keep from dancing a happy jig. This is both a pathetic reminder of the fact that I haven't been gainfully employed since February and a tribute to one of my biggest personality flaws: I have no slack-gene. None whatsoever. Believe me, there are times when I feel like doing nothing but vegging out in from of the TV-- and I can't do it. It really sucks, and as for being unemployed when you were made this way-- how bad? Sooo bad.

But yeah. It really is fun. There's something satisfying in the repetition, the routine, the changing customer faces, the dirty jokes flowing freely behind the counter, the somber looks on the faces of the Zombie Teens, the plaintive mooing of the cows (I installed a machine yesterday), the Seriously Unhappy Once The Kid Learns We Are Out Of THE ONE TOY HE NEEDS TO COMPLETE HIS COLLECTION Meals, the drama that I am officially old enough to enjoy and find amusing rather than get caught up in and upset over, and most of all, the amphetamine-laced coffee.