…for American youth! I mean, just one semester of “Common Sense 101” before they get through the 12th grade would make a world of difference in their ability to handle all sorts of life's challenges. Oh yeah – that’s right…a whole lot of them never get as far as the 12th grade before they drop out. SO sad!
Case in point: This evening I stopped at my local grocery to pick up a small square piece of Tuxedo Cake (which, if you’re not familiar with it, is a very scrumptious marble cake with chocolate mousse and other sinful substances in it). Well, it was 6:30pm, and since the bakery section is literally attached to the service deli section, and I know the service deli is open and manned until 8pm, I figure I’ve got a pretty good chance of coming away with that little slice (literally) of heaven.
Not as easy as that, Missy.
The first thing I notice at the deserted bakery section is a sign, helpfully saying, “Open from 7am ‘til ___“. Hmm. ‘Til when? Thinking quickly, I scour the surface of the counter and the nearby floor with my eagle eyes to see if there’s maybe a lone number floating around that might give me a hint about when they think they’ll close. Nothing.
Meanwhile, I notice a lone man behind the service deli. I catch his attention and ask him to please call a bakery person to assist me. “Oh,” he says dubiously, “there’s nobody there right now.” I expect he thought I’d go away defeated at that point but nope, if he has secretly assassinated the bakery person he’s going to have to hide the body under my scrutiny.
At last, convinced that I’m not going away, he indicates that he’ll be with me after he's helped some other customers, which is fair enough. I smile in a patient, cooperating manner.
Aha - the plot thickens! As I wait, a slim, blonde, recent-high-school-graduate type of guy appears and carefully chooses a hair net as he tells me he’ll help me in a moment. I nod as he puts on his mandatory apron however I notice that he does NOT put on any mandatory, disposable, plastic gloves. Okay – his hands look clean, so I’m hoping for the best.
“How can I help you?” he offers, and I point to the glass cabinet and tell him about wanting a small square of Tuxedo Cake. I helpfully point out that I don’t see any small squares in the in showcase but I DO see three whole cakes, and could he maybe cut a nice, small square out of one of them for me?
He looks at me blankly for a moment then explains that he actually works in the SERVICE DELI (as though it’s on a separate planet from the bakery) and he really doesn’t know where the bakery people keep anything or how they do anything. He says he doesn’t know if he’s allowed to cut the cake up but he CAN put one in a box for me. Hmm. This remains to be seen.
Well, okay, I’m willing to help the kid out, since he’s clearly close to panic. “Not to worry,” say I. “I’ll just take a whole cake this time.” (I’m despairing of my and Al’s diet as a result but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do).
Slightly relieved, Captain Efficiency looks into the showcase for a moment and starts wandering from side to side. It becomes clear that he has no clue what a Tuxedo Cake looks like. Hey, why would he? He’s a Service Deli guy! They don’t know from no stinking Tuxedo Cakes! I helpfully point them out to him, and he reaches in and takes one of these 8” by 5-1/2” cakes and moves it to the counter. From here he proceeds to hunt (rather like the quest for a unicorn) for an appropriate box.
Nothing.
Vast wasteland.
There appear to be clear, plastic containers of various sizes, and upon the intervention of the other service deli guy (remember him?) a black, plastic “bottom” is miraculously located. Now to find the lid…
Ahem - Now to find the Lid.
The LID, Captain – the cover-of-the-container.
No.
Not happening.
The kid looks at me in despair, and tells me he can’t find a box!! He quite clearly is hoping I will now give up my quest for the cake and just turn around and leave so he can put this trauma behind him. No, I’m more determined and stubborn than he is, and besides, Al specifically asked for a piece of Tuxedo Cake, and since he rarely asks, I want to satisfy his sweet tooth. “Look,” I said, pointing to Cabinet #2. “There’s a pile of some kind of paper objects in there that you just fold up and it becomes a box. Take a look.”
Aha! That’ll work!
Sort of.
Nearly at his wit’s end (a short trip, that) he grabs one of these flat contraptions and makes a valiant effort to fold it into a cake box. Clearly he’s never read “Cake Boxes For Dummies” because the darned thing is giving him a world of trouble! After about a minute and a half he succeeds in getting a kind of rectangle out of the bottom half, and he lovingly places the 8” x 5.5” cake into the bottom of this 15” x 11” box. I’m shaking my head but hey, the kid’s giving it his best shot.
After another minute of awkward and fairly ineffective origami, the kid succeeds in closing the top over the bottom! Well, never mind that there are two flaps on the rear end of the box waving in the wind like sea lion flippers – he’s got the box closed over the cake!! YAY!
Now he’s got to produce the price label and slap it onto the box. Thankfully, these labels are self-adhesive, so he’s ahead of the game. I watch him approach the scale/label maker and punch in what I assume is the code for the Tuxedo Cake. Optimist that I am, I was fooling myself. I now see him locate a pen and write something on the label. Okay. It’s progress.
He lifts the box and turns to me, looking as though he’s entirely aware of how foolish his entire effort has appeared but still hoping I’ll grab the box and leave him alone.
Nope. Can’t do it.
“Don’t hand that box to me,” said I, “until you tape it down. Obviously nobody has trained you on how to fold that thing, so please let’s give me a fighting chance to get it home in one piece?” Well, that makes sense so the kid hunts for and finally locates the clear tape, and tapes the box closed.
“You know,” I say in a friendly manner as he hands me the cake (which I’m trying to hold still so it doesn’t slide from side to side in its huge coffin) “it probably would be a good idea if you asked for a little cross-training.” “Oh, I’m not in bakery,” he points out for the second time, “I’m actually in Service Deli.” I smile encouragingly. “Tonight you were in Bakery, weren’t you?”
Turning from the bewildered Captain Efficiency and trying not to notice that there’s a fly celebrating its good fortune in the pastry showcase, I wend my way to the checkout aisles, holding my prize in both arms.
Happily, I notice the guy who not only checks out customers but is also one of the Assistant Managers, so I got into his aisle. When my turn to pay comes along, he looks at the ludicrous box with something close to despair. Luckily he recognizes what it is, because the hard-won label Captain Efficiency has slapped onto the box doesn’t have any item name or price on it, and just barely has SOME sort of barcode on it. As he shakes his head I recap my Adventure in Bakeryland for him and once again suggest that a little cross training might go a long way. With his apology bolstering me, I carry away the cake and take it home.
Like I said at the beginning – just a small dose of Common Sense would’ve saved this young man a world of embarrassment and me about 15 minutes of dumbstruck incredulity. All he had to do was ask the manager for help. HE knew precisely where both halves of the appropriate container were kept.
Oh well. I hope the kid grows out of it and comes to some sort of sense some day. If not – well, who knows what’ll come next? I left the store sort of sad, wondering if the kid would’ve been able to learn some common sense if it was embedded in a video game… Sigh. What a pity.
The cake tasted wonderful, by the way…
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