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Slivers and Snippets: I would like to apologize ahead of time for the number of times I use the word "cup" in this post. It annoyed me.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

I would like to apologize ahead of time for the number of times I use the word "cup" in this post. It annoyed me.

Cups at work have a habit of disappearing. Not the glasses or coffee mugs we use for customers, but the staff cups. The staff has to use plastic cups with lids, because we are klutzy people that break and spill things all the time.

That may sound like sarcasm, but it's totally true. Remind me to tell you about the time a certain anonymous commenter on this blog accidentally knocked/pushed over an entire stack of full glass racks. Or when she broke an entire shelf just by walking past it.*

So anyway, lots of my cups have gone missing over the last (almost) 5 years I've worked there. One incident that sticks out in my mind was the week when TWO of my favorite Baja Fresh cups disappeared. That was a rough week, you know, emotionally.

No one knows where the cups go. The situation is similar to socks in the dryer, you know you had it there earlier, but now it's just gone. But instead of being left with a spare sock, we're left with random things like plastic lids and those thick plastic straws, all thrown together in a bustub** with the cups that have managed to hang on. And also? Silverware that doesn't match the restaurant silverware. Who knows where that comes from. Maybe there's some sort of fairy that trades out our cups for mismatched silverware. Like the toothfairy... Wish she'd leave cash instead of spoons.

As of right now, I have been using the same blue plastic cup for, oh, probably 6 to 8 months. The lid is long gone, which has resulted in many spills, because hey, I'm JR, that's how I roll, but the CUP HAS PERSEVERED. It's covered in scratches, probably from all the times it's had to fight off would-be thefts, but it is mine and I love it.

But this is a story about a few weeks ago when my blue cup went missing for THREE WHOLE DAYS.

I thought it was gone forever. I threw a hissy fit, as I am wont to do. I wandered around the kitchen, yelling something to the effect of, "Why can't we keep any damn cups here?!?!?! This is some BULLSHIT! That was MY CUP! What am I supposed to drink out of now, huh? WHAT?!?!?"

It's okay, I work with my friends and they are all used to my histrionics.

In a brave effort to calm me down, risking life and limb, our head chef told me I could have one of the brand new cups.


I am awed. "We have brand new cups? Where? How?"

"Somebody sent us a bag of sample plastic cups like they use at fast food joints. Since we don't use those I threw them in the back, but you're welcome to take whatever you want out of there."

I think I may have hugged him because, as everyone knows, I am my mother's daughter and I gotta have my beverage with me, yo.

So, I go running to the back, and there it is, a bag just chock full of brand new cups. And I see it. The first cup in the stack. It's beautiful. It's amazing. It's the biggest cup made of flimsy plastic that I've ever seen. It claims to be able to hold half a gallon of the beverage of my choice. And not only does it have a handle, the handle is on top, like a bucket! It's a bucket cup!

I promptly claimed it as my own, and began calling it the MEGA JUG. People laughed at first, but I'm pretty sure as the night wore on and all I would say to anyone was, "Look at my MEEEEGAAAA JUUUUUG!" it got a little old.

Man, I loved the Mega Jug. It was awesome, in the true Eddie Izzard sense of the word.

The Mega Jug was the source of much humor that night at work. Like the time I lifted it off the drink shelf to have some soda, and literally grunted like an old person lifting weights. Mid sentence. Dude, the Mega Jug was heavy.

Or the time I had just taken a drink, and my hand was wet from the outside of the Mega Jug. So I wiped it on the back of Boss' chef coat as he walked by.

"What the hell?!?!?"

"Don't worry, it's just MEEEGAAA JUUUG condensation."

"BOOB SWEAT?!?!?!?!?"

Apparently he was the one person in the restaurant that hadn't heard me talk incessantly about the Mega Jug.

The next night my blue cup was still missing, but miraculously the Mega Jug was still there. All was somewhat okay with the world. The jokes about the Mega Jug continued, and I was happy.

The third night, the Mega Jug was gone. Just like that. The blue cup was still missing. And me? I was a wreck. I mean, come on people, drinking vessels are serious business.

Someone pointed out to me that we still had some of the other brand new cups, I should go through those and see if there were any I could stand to use.

I went through all the brand new cups, and I finally found one I thought I could make do with. It was the smallest cup in the batch, and it was covered with pictures of farm animals, which I found endearing. Certain other people thought that some of the pigs might be doing something dirty on the cup; I choose to believe they were hugging. I named it the Micro (Farm) Jug.

The only thing I didn't like about the Micro (Farm) Jug, aside from the fact that I had to refill it every time I took a drink, was that it had no handle whatsoever. Luckily, I have great friends***, and Chrissy promptly took it in the office and fashioned a handle for me out of cardboard and masking tape. It was very cool and could hold the cup up if there was nothing in it.****

But the Micro (Farm) Jug was only barely a tolerable substitute for the Mega Jug. There's not as many jokes that go with a Micro (Farm) Jug. But that didn't really matter, because the next day my blue cup magically reappeared.

I still have the Micro (Farm) Jug, safely stored away from the thieving hands of fairies. The handle fell off when the dishwasher tried to wash it for me, but that's okay, it's not a very functional cup anyway.

But I tell you what, if I ever find a fast food place that uses the Mega Jug, I'm so gonna stock up on that, it's not even funny how many Mega Jugs I will buy.

I will be the Queen of Mega Jugs.

Which I think was actually one of my nicknames in high school.




*The shelf actually did fall ON her, which caused a bit more injury to her than the shelf. But she's fine now. Well, as fine as she ever was, really.

**I'm sure everyone knows, but those are the big black tubs busboys carry dirty dishes around in. Only the one that holds our cups is clean. Really.

***Or they just hate to listen to me bitch.

****Obviously I realize that some pictures of the Mega and Micro Jugs would have been nice for this post. And I did take pictures of both vessels at the time. But I took the pictures on my cellphone, emailed them myself, and then tried to add them to this post, and Blogger won't let me. It will let me add any other pictures, but not ones from my cellphone. So if you want to see the pictures, if your life is so revolving around my cup adventures, email me and I will send them to you.

6 Comments:

At 10:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I am completely distracted that non-matching silverware APPEARS in the restaurant.

HOW? WHY? It's so weird.

 
At 10:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I gave up on the cups a LOOOOOOONG time ago...and by fairies do you mean crazy new waiters with gay tendencies that sing dixie chicks "Cowboy Take Me Away" when they think no one is listening? Because I could totally see that.

(and that handle kicked ass!!!)

 
At 10:24 AM, Blogger JR said...

Whinger - The only thing I can think of is that it either comes from people who bring their own silverware in, staff that might bring their own in, although why they would do that is beyond me, or some of it might get brought back from catering events. No one ever claims it, though. There's lots of strange shit that goes on in that place...

Chrissy - OMG, I forgot about that! Man, that was funny when we caught him singing in the PDR... And that handle WAS kick-ass, I loved it.

 
At 10:45 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Junior - why don't you email me the cup pics and maybe I can convert them in to a usable format for you.

 
At 11:16 PM, Blogger JR said...

Jack - Done. Go for it. And thanks.

Whinger - I tried to take a picture of the silverware today, to prove it, I took my real camera to work and everything. But there was none! Stupid fairies. Maybe tomorrow.

Chrissy - Today Brit and I witnessed certain new waiters singing other girlie country songs, and dude, we could not stop laughing everytime he walked by. Also, did you know Manager brought me presents!!??!! I love presents! He should go to Cyprus more often. But not during wars, then I might not get my presents. And I would have to close every night FOREVER and then I would die.

 
At 11:14 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

LOL!!! Not worried about him dying so much...just the fact you would have to close, but I'm with ya man.

Oh wow, you would think it would be a one time thing but that boy keeps on suprising me.

And manager brought me a few things too!!! He got this keychain that says "Brilliant Bartender" on one side and "Happy to be a beverage serving, glass collecting, late night working, glass cleaning, UNDERPAID Bartender" on the other side...and a mini vase thing.

 

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