Exhibit A: off the menu items

A precariously fashioned sundae/parfait. Layers of hot fudge, nuts, whipped cream and topped with a cherry. Available after being dumped or breaking small limbs (ie fingers, toes, nose)

Good things come to those who wait

We had just worked through the busiest period of the shift and were waiting on one more family to declare the rush over. There was a woman juggling 4 toddlers and a preteen. Her husband lingered several meters away from the fussy children. "What can I get you guys?" I asked her.

"A kid's size of Cotton Candy in a cone, please," she said.

I nodded, and got right to scooping. I took the instrument and began measuring out the scoops. I was halfway done when one of the toddlers who had broken free was bouncing up and down beside me. The freezer with the Cotton Candy ice cream is located at the far end of the shop. It's the only freezer in its line. Another freezer is connected at its corner, forming a 90 degree angle in between. This also creates a nice pocket of space in the outside corner. That is where the child was standing. It is also where he began a strange tribe like chant.

"Ooh, ooh, ice cream, ice cream! Me wants ice cream, me wants ice cream, ice cream, ice cream, ice cream!!!" he repeated over and over again.

Kids standing in the outside corner of the freezer isn't a rarity. Usually, I give them a quick smile and let them see what I'm scooping. This time, I averted eye contact and hoped that he would stop.

When I had plopped on the last bit of ice cream, I stood up and passed it to the mother. She smiled and smoothly handed it off to the daughter that she was holding.

The little boy was still standing in the divet. He looked up at his sister receiving the cone, promptly ending his chant.

Good things come to those who wait, little man, and patience is a virtue.

Mysteries of a lifetime

Sometimes I wonder why customers:

1. Have a hard time understanding that “waffle cone” is not a size
2. Put used taster spoons back in the cup of clean ones
3. Kill several trees by taking a mass of napkins bigger than their cones of concern
4. Always try to order based on scoops instead of size
5. Do not educate their children on the importance of holding their cones in an upright position 
6. Don't believe me when I tell them that larges are likely too big for their purposes
7. Don’t understand the difference between hard serve and soft serve and therefore try to order flavours like Chocolate Monkey, Bubble Bubble and Moose Tracks in soft serve. If you don’t know what soft serve is, please educate yourself here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_serve . Humanity depends on it. 

These are all good questions, but none that will likely be answered in my days as an ice cream scooper. Oh, the beauty in the unknown.

Wasted potential

I had just made it into work after my curb incident when a man requested a chocolate soft serve. I hesitated for a moment, recalling that the week before, the chocolate soft serve hadn’t been working. Once my manager confirmed that it was operable, I grabbed a cone and headed to the soft serve faucet. I held down the lever, but vanilla ice cream came out! I looked down at the cone, now full of vanilla soft serve when the customer had requested chocolate.

Kneeling, I looked up into the machine to trace the source of the madness. With great irritation, I found that the chocolate and vanilla had been switched. To say the least, I had been thrown for a loop.

I looked down again into the cone to see the unrequested vanilla. My heart ached with solace as I reached towards the garbage can to let the cone fall inside.

Such wasted potential, such a needless loss of life.

The demography of ice cream girls

It isn’t scientifically proven, but I have my own theory that ice cream girls don’t happen to be the best drivers. In fact, they generally suck. It might just be, but I figure I might as well encompass the majority of the ice cream girl population in my town due to the pride I take in the job. Again, it isn’t scientifically proven, but I have my own theory.

On that note, I’m still figuring out the mechanics of the streets in my city. I also seem to be needing a reminder of the two turns I must take in order to get from my house to the ice cream shop. Consequently, after missing the first turn, I was veering late for work. I came from the opposite direction as usual and put my blinker on to signal my desire to swing into the parking lot. The occasional other car was coming from the other direction. When they stopped, I saw my chance. I did a half decent blind spot check, looked both ways and put my pedal to the metal. My car barreled into the parking lot. It just so happens that it may have jumped a curb on the way. It also just so happens that a crowd of my acquaintances sat at the picnic bench in front of the shop working on their ice cream.

Some days you miss one of the two turns on your way to work, other days you run over curbs on the way and sometimes a group of friends is there to watch you do it. Sometimes, all three of these things even happen at once.

An unexpected visitor

I had turned my back for a few minutes to clean up the counter littered with whipped cream, nuts and banana peels. When I turned around, a Greek woman was waiting patiently to place her order. I approached her with ease and asked what she’d like.

 

“A medium dipped cone, please,” she requested. 

I inhaled. You know how precarious the cone dip tends to be. That’s when I noticed the man standing off several metres to the right.

“Hi! You told me that you worked here but I was just checking up. How are you?” he asked. 

“Great thanks!” I responded, suddenly put ill at ease. It may be important to note that this man is my principal. 

I turned back to stare at the empty cone I had grabbed, suddenly realizing that it was my principal’s wife who had just requested the most difficult venture of the menu. Figures.

Risking embarrassment, I grasped a cup just in case and filled the cone with soft serve before turning back to the dip. With a gulp, I shoved it in. 

Miraculously, when the cone emerged from the heated chocolate, it was perfectly coated in chocolate. More surprisingly, it was still firmly attached to its counterpart.

With pride, I waited for the chocolate to finish dripping on my hand (the sacrifice ice cream girls must make every so often) to hand it back to the woman. She smiled excitedly and accepted the cone with grace. 

Now cocky with my success, I turned back to my principal. “Maybe we can negotiate free ice cream if we knock my marks up to 95% ‘s?”

Sometimes you just gotta try.

You know you're not from this generation when

1) You ask for a 'sugar cone', not a waffle cone
2) You order: pralines and cream, black cherry, plain vanilla or chocolate, rum and raisin or apple pie and get the same one every time
3)      You order your ice cream in a cone, not a cup

34)      You request the hardest consistency of ice cream available

45)      You lean very far into the counter and try to look down at the ice creams from my side of the freezer

56)      You make a joke about:

a)      How strong my arm will be at the end of the summer

b)      How sticky my arm must be when I go home

c)       How hard it must be to work there without eating all the ice cream

67)      You pay in exact change

78)      You exclaim that there is no way you’ll finish ‘all that ice cream’ but get the same size the next time

89)      If you get a sundae, you order it with hot fudge only

910)      You appear stressed out about the act of getting ice cream

111)  You order ice cream for your dog