Crap stacked to the ceiling.
By now, Christmas lights
have replaced this year’s impressive selection of talking tombstones and animated
rubber zombies at the local Walgreen’s.
The marked-down bags of “fun-sized” candy bars were broomed nearly as soon as the trick-or-treaters changed back into children. Walgreen's, or maybe it’s just our
branch at the Northtown shopping center, hardly bothers stocking Thanksgiving
decorations at all, preferring to leap right from Halloween to Christmas, or as the holiday is referred to in retail circles, “Hammer time”.
Not so your pals at
Smugglers’ Inn. We remember
Thanksgiving and, if we don’t keep it holy, we make an effort. We decorate. One of our greens suppliers always hooks us up with an
enormous selection of colorful gourds, squash and pumpkins every year. These used to live in an oversized
wicker cornucopia set up on a table by the front door, but the cornucopia
walked off several Thanksgivings ago and we’ve never gotten around to replace
it. (It’s not the sort of item you
can find at Walgreen’s.) It falls
to me or the other manager to place the fall vegetables in visible spots around
our dining room and lounge. One or
two stay behind the bar, but the rest of them are deemed to be in the way and
will be stacked into a neat, warty pyramid by the hostess desk, looking rather
like something the Confederate artillery would have fired when they had run out
of canon balls.
Smugglers’ will be serving
a traditional brunch for those of our neighbors who either can’t or don’t want
to cook. Typically, these are lone middle-aged men or women with their
elderly mothers. The turkey and
ham are what you’d expect, but our cook does a Belgian pumpkin galette that is
quite special. It’s served with vanilla ice cream—the kind with the specks of
vanilla that some ancient grandmother, released for the day from the old folks’
home will invariably refuse to eat. (“Really Grams, it’s NOT dirt. See? I’m eating it.
Mmm!”)
Those are all restaurant
traditions, though. Smugglers’ Inn
is also an ad agency. Agencies
have their own Thanksgiving traditions.
Like, layoffs.
In keeping with a
time-honored practice, Smug’s is choosing this holiday, where we acknowledge
our blessings, to let go those who we deem no longer essential to our
operation. (Thank you, God, for
this new, non-union America.)
Since the goal it to gin-up our balance sheet and start the new year
with less debt on the books, we could have waited a month to dish out the curb
sandwiches. Firing people at
Christmas, though, just looks bad.
Plus, then you have to pay Holiday bonuses.
So here, without further
ado, is a list of people who have touched our lives in so many ways and who we
now salute as they march off to pursue other interests away from us. If you read your name remember: just because
you own an assault rifle doesn’t mean anyone wants to see it.
Michelle Bachman. Michelle, even though Blaine is not in
your congressional district, we at Smugglers’ Inn find the fact that you are
from Minnesota almost as disturbing as the fact that you are on anything called
“The Intelligence Committee”.
We wish you every success in your next job as Ambassador to The Island
of Forgotten Toys.
Tim Pawlenty. Two years ago, the then-governor of
Minnesota was pegged by pundits as the dark horse candidate who was going to
snatch his party’s nomination after the entire front-running field of influence
peddlers, liars, ditzes, know-nothings, health care socialists and serial
sexual harassers had demonstrated their supreme non-electability over the course
of six months of televised debate.
Then, TP was a shoo-in to be Mitt Romney’s running mate. Instead the Mitten chose…well, it was
somebody else. Paw-paw then
slipped from view, but has recently begun turning up on news and infotainment
shows, dutifully parroting
whatever the current Republican party line is on any issue from gun control to
immigration to whether the embassy attack in Benghazi is proof that Hillary
Clinton doesn’t deserve to be president.
Mr. Governor…Tim, give it
up. They just aren’t into
you. If you’re going to be
president of anything, it’s going to be a college. Carlton is nice. Maybe they have a course on evolution.
Jesse Ventura. Jesse, we loved you; you put our state
on the map. You stood up to
religious bullies and the press and the political machines and forever changed
the criteria required to hold high elected office in America. “A pro wrestler governor? That’s AWESOME!” Yes, it was. Sadly, the years on the beach seem to
have fried your brain, judging from your most recent appearances on TV. Conspiracy theories can’t be your
response to everything. And what’s
with that hair? Thank you
for your service.
Peter Lundquist, owner,
The Anoka County Shopper, AKA, “The Mystery Diner.” Pete, here is a dollar. Kindly review McDonald’s value meal and leave food criticism
to people who don’t ask a mid-priced restaurant in Blaine, Minnesota if you can
tour their wine cellar. Or if said
wine cellar has lambrusco.
Pongo the dishwasher. No other employee who was not high on
nitrous has ever asked me for a 100% raise before (and that person had been
kidding). Nonetheless, Pongo, who had not been working at Smugglers’ Inn all
that long, (OK, four years), got it into his head that he should have been
making minimum wage all along and DEMANDED that his salary not just be brought
up to that benchmark, but doubled.
I pointed out to Pongo that had he remained in his native Sumatra, he
would be lucky to find a job outside of drug mule that paid $7.25 an hour, let
alone $13 (See? We weren’t far of MW).
Plus here he never has to worry that we are going to kill him rather
than pay him.
Perhaps that was
insensitive.
Following my out-of-hand
dismissal of his request, Pongo, who previously had to be reminded not to
whistle while he worked, became sullen and withdrawn. He stopped combing his bright orange hair and was given to
long sighs, of the type ejaculated by nerdy school girls going through their
Syvia Plath stages. Pongo is one
of our few employees who counts friends amongst both the kitchen and serving
staff, By playing the aggrieved
party, he effectively drove a wedge between management and the staff as a
whole. Although he has continued
to perform his duties at Smugglers’ Inn with machine-like efficiency, Pongo
clearly would rather be doing something else.
Well, I am happy to
oblige. Pongo, turn in your rubber
apron. You’ll never wash dishes in
this town again.
You’ll need a different
uniform from now on, maybe even a tie. Pongo, you are henceforth Smugglers’ Inn’s first
cook/assistant manager of operations.
I’ll be damned if I’m going to pay anyone $13 an hour to wash dishes.
Happy Thanksgiving, all.
The Management
Smugglers’ Inn
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