#5. The Shake Shield
Why it Sucks
Iceberg is famous for its shakes. This is because they are good. And as any wise old hobo will tell you, good things take time and effort. Now because we are a fast-food joint, the "time" portion of that has been marginalized. But that has effectively sent the "effort" part skyrocketing. The machine we use to mix the shakes has a shield in front to contain high-velocity dairy, which is held in place by a simple rail system. Recently however, this shield has taken upon itself a new mission: to destroy my childhood. I'm forced to assume it's been systematically disabling the essential components of the rail system at night while we're not there. However it accomplished this, the shield now has a 99% chance of falling out of the rail system during use. This results in a lovely spattering of soft-serve across your shirt, arms, and soul.
Comparable Perk
Abusing the machine by making unorthodox shakes for dares (i.e. barbecue sauce).
#4. Doing the dishes
And he wouldn't even help me.
Why it Sucks
I am not a fan of doing the dishes anyway. But take the dishes you do at home, and multiply the quantity (both of dishes and of grease) by about 18, and you have an industrial sized mess. Now I realize I'm getting paid to do this. But when business is slow (fewer people tend to have ice cream cravings when there's a blizzard outside), I end up working the majority of my hours with two managers, and zero normal (see: teenage) employees. Which means I do the dishes every shift I work, often while one or both managers watch obscure college teams play basketball or football on Direct TV.
Comparable Perk
Smelling the sanitized water. I think you can get high off of it.
#3. Working with Crappy Employees
Why it Sucks
There are a number of employees at Iceberg that work hard and get the job done. I get alone just fine with them. Unfortunately, it seems that for every person who works, there are two that don't. My favorite example is the girl who refused to do the dishes on the grounds that "she did them at home." For reasons mentioned above, this didn't fly so well with the rest of us. I won't bore you with the details, but I'll tell you that to this day, she has never done dishes.
Comparable Perk
Not telling them that you just mopped the floor and watching them fall. Especially funny when they are unable to get up.
#2. Last-Minute Customers
Why it Sucks
I want you to close your eyes. Picture yourself standing in a tacky uniform, covered in grease, and smelling like you just finished scrubbing goo off of dishes for two hours. You have been pre-closing in the absence of customers for the last hour and a half, and there are about 5 minutes left until the clock strikes that magical hour when you get to go home. You drain the water/slime mixture from the sink, make sure everything else is squared away, and lean against the wall, trying to regain some energy while you wait until you can leave. Suddenly, a large, overweight primate of indeterminate gender enters the store.
Food?
It says something along the lines of "Are you closed?" and your manager cuts you off in mid-"yes" in order to say "no." Between mental outbursts of swearing, you notice the clock smugly displaying an LED "10:58" in your direction, mocking you.
Not only does this poster-boy (girl?) for obesity proceed to order enough food to re-dirty 16 separate dishes, but he/she comes back complaining about how "I didn't want cheese," and demands a brand new burger. Needless to say, you get home rather later than you had hoped.
Comparable Perk
When they order a grasshopper or mint shake, and you put in enough mint to make Colgate sue for patent infringement.
#1. The Drive-Thru Window
Why it Sucks
Iceberg was an pretty good place to work at until the Drive-Thru was installed. The concept is good - get your food without that pesky exercise and "walking." But the execution could be worked on. Employees must wear a headset with a microphone.
Drive-Thru headsets (artist's depiction)
These devices, invented by Nazi scientists in WWII, emit a shrill beeping noise directly into your ear canal whenever they want to bring to your attention the fact that some lazy blob is sitting outside in their Hummer, waiting to shout their demands for food at you. Now I'm not saying that they purposely beep the second you begin a task or stop to relax, but they do. It's uncanny. It has honestly gotten to the point that hearing short, high-pitched beeping noises makes me subconsciously angergasm before my conscious mind catches up and realizes it's not the headset.
Comparable Perk
The best thing I get to do with these torturous mechanisms is de-battery them at the end of the day. But I may someday execute a plan that involves accidentally dropping them all in the french fry oil. I can imagine the horrible screaming that would ensue now, just before their tiny silicone brains melt.
Hopefully I have done my part to help the economy (namely putting a stop to any future fast-food employee's dream job) with this post. Have any crappy fast-food stories? Leave me a comment.
