[Gemme]

Originally Posted by Neen

I was in my late late-late teens, first of the 20's...

there was a 24 hour donut place which was the rage with the college kids, and all the city worked--DPW and the like used it...overnight hang out for a drunk or two and all round destination place for many of the locals...

I was persuaded to go in one night with a friend and met abe...he took me into the back and I fell in LOIVE with the huge wooden work tables...I was going on and on about them, how I wished I could have them at home, and he offered me a job...

I didn't know better....I took it...as I recall $1.20 an hour...I went to work at 10pm and finished crack 'o dawn the next day...

I worked with willie and don...both functional alcoholics both took me under their wings...it was a good place to feel protected in...(there was also a whole gambling thing going on there but it was really over my head)

willie couldn't really read...I got materials from the adult literacy project and worked on things with him...he got to be pretty skilled at reading and it was nice to see him feel good about it...it gave us something to do while the cinnamon rolls were proofing and there were some slow moments...

I was studying classical voice at the time and abe kept telling all the customers I was a great singer since I was full bosomed...he was kinda a pig...he thought it was OK to be a pig with me since he was Jewish, and I am Jewish so that gave us some kind of 'bond' in his mind--it was in his mind alone...

at about 3 or 4 am the donuts would come out of the oil...willie would swing the huge grate filled with dripping donuts out of the oil and I would fill them...the college kids would arrive like locusts, wanting hot bavarian cream doughnuts...they would crowd their way in the back and point well manicured fingers at the ones they wanted and then stand there waiting for me to pick up the still steaming doughnuts and fill them..."I want it Hot" was the constant refrain...'no',I would tell them, they are too hot to touch and I'll get burned..."but I want It H-h-hot"...I suggested that she could fill it herself (it was always the girls who did this)...I'd get the eye-roll and the flounced-hair 'okay'...I just stood back, we all did, and watched as she would pick up the doughnut, and then fling it down with a retort as she cradled her burned hand...I then told her I had to charge her for the donut anyway...

one of the perks of the job was that at the end of my shift when the streets were filled with snow, one of the DPW guys would always plow my way home...he'd drive the big truck and I'd follow in my VW bug, and then when I got home he'd plow out my driveway and in I'd go...

wow...I haven't thought about Abe's for a long time...I didn't like doughnuts when I started working there and don't like them to this day...odd since I do like fried things, just not doughnuts...and I *still* lust after those huge wooden bakery work spaces...

thus ends the ramblings...

I worked overnight at a donut shop for two weeks. Not my cuppa. I was good at flipping the donuts in the grease with the sticks and filling them, but not so much with the lifting the palate-sized trays and fitting them into the cart and some of the other baking duties.

I went home smelling like burnt donuts every morning and that stuff does NOT come out. It was in my hair, bedding, clothes and any fabric I touched, including sofas and my favorite recliner.

Work = two weeks
Time to get the smell out of everything = 8 weeks

I did, however, get to see beautiful sunrises when I was leaving to go home.