The Chicken King

The Chicken King 

As a teenager, I held a summer job. It was for a friend of my mum’s, but a job none the less.

I working in the kitchen of a petrol station that had an eatery, that served fried chicken, potato wedges, chips and had shakes, ice-cream cones. Yes, I was a Fry-Slave.  Now, I’d never worked in a kitchen outside of my own kitchen, but at almost 16, I thought I knew it all and that it wouldn’t be that difficult. I was given a day of basic training: how to prepare, fry and place the chicken, how to clean the fryalator and the basic buttons on the cash register. We’ll get to the milkshake bit later-

At this time I hadn’t become a vegetarian yet, so I practically ate every meal there….Probably, why I became a vegetarian. I out-chickened myself. But no, that’s not the reason. The real reason is someone I really fancied became a vegetarian and I did it in a pathetic attempt to impress him…but as the flames dulled, I kept on being meatless. (I still am.) 

Anyway, back to the story. The first day after training I met the other kitchen staff. It was just two other teenagers, girls…and they were obsessed with their mobile devices. I didn’t have my own mobile phone yet, but I did have an iPod, which was my savior of those days. My co-workers were obsessed with gossip and celebrity nonsense and often left me to do the cooking, cleaning and running the till. It was a lot of work in the back of the house. I had to prep the chicken, the potato wedges, the seasoning, check the coolers…then there was the ice-cream section I had to keep an eye on and make sure everything was in stock there. The worst thing about the job was having to trim the fat off the chicken breasts, thighs and wings. The tenders we served were already „de-fatted“ so I didn’t have to deal with that. I scrubbed the sinks, wiped the floor and chopped up all the veg that was needed for the sandwiches we offered. When I reflect on this summer, it was one of the best summers I ever had. That being said, I couldn’t handle this job on a yearly schedule. I’ve become far more shy since these days and I sometimes panic about working in teams…or people in general. 

One busy day, I was left alone. I’m not gonna lie. I panicked. I was worried I’d burn chicken or myself. I had a deep fear of cleaning the fyalator. It’s supposed to be cleaned at least once a day during a shift, but me being terrified didn’t do it…Then slammed it on someone else the following afternoon. Yep. I threw one of the texting twats under the bus. After all, that entire morning she wasn’t doing anything but texting. This was before the time of duck-face selfie and I consider myself lucky not to have to endure that for 7 hours a day. The day I spent alone was a whirlwind rush of frying chicken and potato wedges, putting some under the heat lamps and serving angry, sweaty customers. I’d been yelled at three times for „not enough chicken“ in the boxes. I knew that I had and when the woman who regularly came in to complain about this came in, I flipped shit. I screamed at her calling her a fat, greedy arsehole. Then muttered some choice words under my breath in another language as she stormed off to find the manager. He told her that she could have the extra chicken this time but she was no longer welcome in the petrol station. I cracked an evil, wicked smile upon hearing this and almost sliced a finger off whilst laughing over it later. By the end of the day I was worn out; starving and tired. I didn’t want to have to go back to where I was staying, so I stuffed my pockets with left over chicken and wedges before leaving that night. 

Anyway, my fear of the fryalator cleaning was my near downfall…I hadn’t cleaned it nor had the lazy twits I was working with and it almost broke! And there was only one in the entire place…Looking back, I probably should have just told the boss I was afraid and worked to get over the fear of it. The boss lady asked all of us about the fryalator and I faked dumb, pretending that I thought I’d cleaned out the oil pan thingie. That wasn’t my only work blunder. The milkshake maker was also an infinite pain in my ass. I could never get it to hook up and blend properly. It was a busy day and I was asked to man the ice-cream bar and shake station, which they should have known was a mistake, but they didn’t feel like scooping that day, since it was hot.
As my luck would have it a group came in and ordered milkshakes to go. I was flustered by all the orders and turned the machine on with more ice-cream and milk that I should have and it exploded, showering me, the counter and two of the kids in dairy goodness. Thankfully, after the promises of free ice-cream cones the kids calmed down and so did the parents, who got their proper shakes.  I never was allowed to work the milkshake machine again, which I was over the moon about. 

It was a miracle that I wasn't fired. When the summer ended, I returned home to continue my studies of psychology, languages and British literature. It may have been a mistake to list them on my resume when I started looking for work, since I never got any call backs...but that's the work force isn't it? 

Tell me about some of your first jobs! I'm curious to hear about other's experiences!
Another lesson I should have learned was to open a bank account and save my money…which I did not. I spent the money on a few games for my GameBoy Colour and an unhealthy amount of manga…a large portion of them I still have and its like 10 years later. Baby seasons change, but people don’t- 

On another note, my herb plants Dan and Phil are doing amazing. I was worried I was killing Dan, but he’s sprung back to life! i’m going to have to ask my sister to come in and water them whilst i’m away. I’ll have to pray to the gods of Bail and Mint that she doesn’t kill them.