Bad for Business?
OK....this is supposed to be a food related blog.....and food is what we do for a living.
In theory, food is an abstract.....independent from the social and political environment. You just order it up......like garbage bags, or printer cartridges.
You eat it....you go home. Done.
Oh, well. Sorry about that....missed that boat.
From our perspective.......food is in the running for the first or certainly the second most important and powerful impulse.....along with sex.
We chefs know things about you punters that we understand must be kept under wraps, just like our allies the sex workers. We are both in whorish professions.
But the hours are long.....and the work is hard....and our exposure to all that raw emotion is something that gives us a certain insight into the good and the bad of human nature.
It is mostly.....not a pretty picture.
Luckily, you gems out there out-shine the scumbags enough to keep us all going.....the hookers and the cooks and waitresses.
It will come as no surprise to you that the sex workers and the food workers get bitter, jaded and de-sensitized.......It take some serious juju to rock our world.
One of my guys.....who I am no longer allowed to indentify on this blog due to privacy issues....works a typical 90 hour week. Most of the money goes to the richest hospital in America, because he is trying to save his credit rating so he can buy some property some day, and he is protecting them from the economic backlash of the bird flu and the motorcycle crash.
His preppy friends are rejecting him because they think he works too hard..........But exhaustion is a sure cure for anxiety-related insomnia.
People talk about long hours glibly. "Oh, I worked a sixty hour week....."
No...this does not include transit time, and lunch in the restaurant, and time in the cocktail lounge winding down.....or time with the hot client after hours.
A ninety hour week with every minute of the ninety hours involving focussed, intelligent, hard-core human labor involving sweat and pain.....is wearing on the body, the mind and the soul. And remember, that all the injuries....minor and not so minor....and the illnesses involved in this kind of work schedule are ignored or dealt with on the side.
Can't possibly go back to the Hospital that you are already paying $750 a month.....on top of the $200 health insurance premium. Borrow some Vicodin.....overload the ibuprofen......try to find some ice for the swelling.
Have another beer........
That is why anything beyond a 40 hour week has been outlawed in all of modern Earth. In France, the legal work week is 32 hours.....and is enforced with helicopter surveillance even in the vineyards during harvest.
It is commonplace in America. And among our young.....entry level ante.
While talking about politics on our jobsite....... in passing, while making fine brunoise Spanish onions.....the Kid allowed as how when he listens to Barack Obama speaking......he tears up. He get goosebumps. His blood pressure rises.....and he tries to figure out how he can work out some time free to go and help the campaign.
I am an old food whore......and I feel the same. I watch these young kids.....innocent and pure and trusting....still believing in the America that we taught them about......
This is what gets my 27 year olds going......and my 15 year olds, that are already working 40 hour weeks in high school to try to save their families.......and my 17 year old, sleeping on the couch, working to pay off his hospital bill and maybe get into culinary school.....after maybe T-Mobile approves him for a cell-phone account.....
When I say "gets them going".....that is old guy talk for "makes them cry......" Tears of hope...tears of ....who knows? Loss? Pain? Anger?
Probably just "Hope". Check out what makes working young people tear up and get goosebumps:
Oh, and I am sorry if this is not business-like. Call the other caterers........Or, call me....and I will give you their numbers.
In theory, food is an abstract.....independent from the social and political environment. You just order it up......like garbage bags, or printer cartridges.
You eat it....you go home. Done.
Oh, well. Sorry about that....missed that boat.
From our perspective.......food is in the running for the first or certainly the second most important and powerful impulse.....along with sex.
We chefs know things about you punters that we understand must be kept under wraps, just like our allies the sex workers. We are both in whorish professions.
But the hours are long.....and the work is hard....and our exposure to all that raw emotion is something that gives us a certain insight into the good and the bad of human nature.
It is mostly.....not a pretty picture.
Luckily, you gems out there out-shine the scumbags enough to keep us all going.....the hookers and the cooks and waitresses.
It will come as no surprise to you that the sex workers and the food workers get bitter, jaded and de-sensitized.......It take some serious juju to rock our world.
One of my guys.....who I am no longer allowed to indentify on this blog due to privacy issues....works a typical 90 hour week. Most of the money goes to the richest hospital in America, because he is trying to save his credit rating so he can buy some property some day, and he is protecting them from the economic backlash of the bird flu and the motorcycle crash.
His preppy friends are rejecting him because they think he works too hard..........But exhaustion is a sure cure for anxiety-related insomnia.
People talk about long hours glibly. "Oh, I worked a sixty hour week....."
No...this does not include transit time, and lunch in the restaurant, and time in the cocktail lounge winding down.....or time with the hot client after hours.
A ninety hour week with every minute of the ninety hours involving focussed, intelligent, hard-core human labor involving sweat and pain.....is wearing on the body, the mind and the soul. And remember, that all the injuries....minor and not so minor....and the illnesses involved in this kind of work schedule are ignored or dealt with on the side.
Can't possibly go back to the Hospital that you are already paying $750 a month.....on top of the $200 health insurance premium. Borrow some Vicodin.....overload the ibuprofen......try to find some ice for the swelling.
Have another beer........
That is why anything beyond a 40 hour week has been outlawed in all of modern Earth. In France, the legal work week is 32 hours.....and is enforced with helicopter surveillance even in the vineyards during harvest.
It is commonplace in America. And among our young.....entry level ante.
While talking about politics on our jobsite....... in passing, while making fine brunoise Spanish onions.....the Kid allowed as how when he listens to Barack Obama speaking......he tears up. He get goosebumps. His blood pressure rises.....and he tries to figure out how he can work out some time free to go and help the campaign.
I am an old food whore......and I feel the same. I watch these young kids.....innocent and pure and trusting....still believing in the America that we taught them about......
This is what gets my 27 year olds going......and my 15 year olds, that are already working 40 hour weeks in high school to try to save their families.......and my 17 year old, sleeping on the couch, working to pay off his hospital bill and maybe get into culinary school.....after maybe T-Mobile approves him for a cell-phone account.....
When I say "gets them going".....that is old guy talk for "makes them cry......" Tears of hope...tears of ....who knows? Loss? Pain? Anger?
Probably just "Hope". Check out what makes working young people tear up and get goosebumps:
Oh, and I am sorry if this is not business-like. Call the other caterers........Or, call me....and I will give you their numbers.
ZOE KRAVITZ SPEAKS OUT
posted by Txacoli at 11:18 PM
2 Comments:
Mikey
You are a CODE Jockey...
Bennie
Merci, encore une fois, Michel le Maquisard......
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