Sometimes I have days in here that I look back on either later that night or the day after and just shake my head and laugh. Like who would have thought that would have happened in a place like this? Who would have thought that I would be doing what I am doing in a place like this? Not me! Well… this past Wednesday was certainly one of those days…
I am leaving work Tuesday afternoon and the last thing that I do before I leave is turn in my dough cutter (this is what we have to use as a “knife” because I don’t have access to a set of knives for obvious reasons) and my spatula. I head into the officer’s office to turn in my “tools” and one of my bosses says… “Thanks Zach. You guys all ready for tomorrow morning?” “Yes ma’am. We will have the burgers prepped… going to cut and caramelize onions tomorrow and fry the French fries to order so we will be all good.” I reply. “No… I mean breakfast. You know we have 60 officers coming in for breakfast burritos, sausage, bacon and hash browns at 4:30am. Everything has to be ready by the time they get here.” My stomach drops… I immediately rewind my day… did I miss them telling me this… I have no recollection of ever hearing anything about this. “Ummm… I had no idea that this was happening but no problem at all… I will make sure that everything is ready when they arrive.” These are the words coming out of my mouth but my brain is singing an entirely different tune… more like “How the hell am I going to make 60 breakfast burritos by 4:30am…. how many eggs do I need for that? Do I even know how to roll a breakfast burrito? Yeah… just roll them like Chipotle. Do I have enough tortillas? I need to cut veggies. I don’t have the dough cutter.” Okay… back to reality. I ask my boss to open the Egg cooler to get a count on eggs and make sure we are all set there… this is also where the sour cream is so I make sure to grab a tub of that so we are set on that front. I head back to the O.M. and start going through the fridge to organize everything so that when I show up tomorrow… at 3:30am (really?!?!)…. I am all set to grab the supplies and get to work. Then… in walks one of my other bosses…
“Hollywood… what’s up? Tomorrow… I’m bring 20-25 “friends” to the compound for a tour… make sure you have that “In-And-Out” style burger situation ready for us. I want the grilled onions… the sauce… everything. Thanks!” And he walks out. I kind of just stand there… in a bit of a ‘calm before the storm’ daze until my brain catches up with the reality of yet another surprise and what that means for my day tomorrow. And what that means is… I need to season and hand prep 40lbs aka around 100 burgers tomorrow after I get through the 60 person breakfast party. I will also need to have the butcher slice me enough tomatoes for this many burgers and I will need to get about 15 or so onions cut up and caramelized in time for service to start around 8:30am. But for now… burger-palooza needs to be put on the back burner because breakfast party is the first hurdle. I get everything in the kitchen ready to “grab and go” when I arrive tomorrow morning and head out of the kitchen for the day… nervous but feeling moderately prepared.
My watch alarm goes off at 2:58am on Wednesday morning (really Tuesday night)… this is an insanely stupid time to be waking up in the morning. I sit up and shimmy off the top bunk just after 3am and start getting ready for the day ahead. I walk into the kitchen at 3:30am… fully caffeinated and ready to rock and roll. I immediately get all of the ingredients out of the fridge and coolers… get the “line” ready to go and start prepping all of the essentials… get the eggs seasoned and ready to hit the grill… get all of the bacon and sausage panned up and ready to go into the oven… all the tortillas ready to fill and roll… salsas and sour cream out… potatoes in the oven… we are making it happen. “Time lapse video” of us serving and smoozing and rolling burritos and making coffee…. And… service goes off without a hitch.
Success.
Now… Burgers…
I get the 40lbs of ground beef out of the butcher shop and start scooping and shaping the burgers… sheet tray after sheet tray… 108 burgers and almost an hour later… burgers are ready to go into the oven. Now time to cut the onions and make the “Mac Sauce” aka the “In-And-Out” sauce. While the burgers are in the oven cooking… I have my #2 cut the onions and I make an insane amount of “Mac Sauce” because not only do they want it on their burgers… they also like to ask for a cup to go or the “actually could you guys do Animal Style fries?”… “of course we can.” 😉 Okay… onions are cut… Mac Sauce is made… burgers are done. It is now time to caramelize the onions and get half the burgers “cheesed” so we have enough cheeseburgers and non-cheeseburgers ready to go. Fast forward an hour or so and everything is ready for service…. the officers start filing in… my boss and his “friends” come in around 9am… everything runs perfectly. Massive success and team win over here in the O.M.
I come up for air around 2:45pm on Wednesday afternoon… after we have cleaned up and I am walking back to the unit… looking out over the ocean… I just smile to myself. What a crazy… insane… surprising… challenging… but weirdly fun day. Days like this make me reflect on the positives of this journey… the experiences that I am having… the lessons that I am learning… the moments that I will remember forever. There are so many negatives behind these walls but I must always remember to cherish the days like this and hold on to them when things get rough. These days make me temporarily forget where I am and focus on the challenge in the front of me rather than the macro issues of this current life…. and I am beyond grateful for these days. Don’t let the fact that I don’t stop profusely sweating all day fool you… I am enjoying myself.
Stay Healthy. Stay Active. Embrace the challenges!