Brewing trouble with instant

Yet another rambling post that would have been better with more caffeine:

In my outreach presentation yesterday a preschooler assistant inadvertently spilled some instant coffee crystals onto the floor of the gym. NBD, no big deal. We were all learning about stormwater pollution, and the instant coffee was a stand-in for dog poop. We were also using oregano, dill, and parsley flakes (henceforth ODPF) to represent grass clippings. By the time I succeeded in flushing the soggy ODPF down the preschool potty after the show, the Sanka was surprisingly embedded in the flooring surface.

So there I was still wearing my fish had, trying to remove coffee crystals from industrial flooring with damp dispenser paper towels. When wet the coffee made the floor look more like rain-washed dog poop, a little problem becoming worse under my watch. And, dagnabbit, I was probably swabbing live on the nanny cam!

My first real job was working in the hospital kitchen on the tray line. Wearing a paper hairnet, wielding big ladles, dealing salt, pepper, and Sanka packets onto patient trays next to eating utensils tightly rolled in paper napkins, In many ways, this was the best job ever. Mostly mindless, very social, with opportunities for racing and team-building challenges, mooshing foodstuffs in giant blenders, using steam sprayers like light sabers! A fifteen-minute break with a free canned peach half and a big scoop of hamburger-spaghetti-bake, plus $1.21/hour.

Let's just say the combination of the fish hat and the industrial Sanka mess caused one of those flashbacks our health teachers warned about. My bosses over the years have warned about the dangers of spilling glitter and plaster of Paris on outreach assignments. So far, I've never plugged a classroom drain with plaster of Paris. Hoping the ODPF didn't overwhelm the preschool potty!


© 2013-2015 Nancy L. Ruder