Journals The Tattoo

Cheese, pleeze

BRISTOL, Connecticut, U.S.A. — If there is one thing I have learned from being one of the hundreds of new Lake Compounce team members it is this: Cheese has a mind of its own.

Perhaps I have gotten a little ahead of myself.

First off, let me tell you that I am 16 and this is my very first summer job.

If you happen to be spending a sunny, fun-filled afternoon at Da Lake (as I affectionately refer to it), you may just find me down on the Midway manning a cash register at the critically acclaimed Potato Patch.

Sorry, folks, we don t have baked potatoes.

No. Ice cream is at the Lakeside Doghouse.

A boat of fries with cheese, garlic, ranch, onion … and what?

Maybe that brings me back to cheese.

Down at the Potato Patch, we serve fries with all kinds of toppings to all kinds of people. A favorite among many guests seems to be the boat with cheddar cheese sauce (cheese fries.)

If I may add in a little editorial comment, let me say, um, puke!

But who am I to judge? After all, I am here to help Provide the finest in family fun and entertainment (as the Lake Compounce motto goes).

If that means serving you up a heaping boat with some delicious, drippy (it’s really hot, grab some napkins!) fries with cheese, then, by all means, do not let me stand in your way.

Really, my inability to find that type of fry appetizing is not my problem with it. My beef with cheese comes down to the unpredictable run-ins I tend to have with it.

Let me take you back to my first day as a fry girl.

Picture this … it’s terribly hot out, I am nervous, and my cool new fry friends and I are moving at a snail’s pace getting up orders since we are so new at the job.

I grab the tongs and fish up a bundle of fries for my boat.

I approach the cheese, which is sitting calmly under its stainless steel roof. I lift the lid, grab the ladle, and gingerly scoop the hot cheese evenly over the fries. The hand-off to the customer is complete. Victory!

Or so I thought.

It wasn’t until some time passed that I realized the cheese had actually some how catapulted itself off the ladle, and lodged several clumps of itself in my hair. Fun.

But that is only the beginning.

Cheese has some masterful way of gathering and spreading and moving and sticking to places and things that no other substance I know of in the entire universe can: napkin dispensers, fans,
elbows, bags, walls, ceilings, family pets … the list goes on.

And I haven’t even gone into the cleaning up cheese phase!

Well, don’t let me fool you. There is more to Lake Compounce than just the rough life of one fry chick.

As far as I can tell, my summer at the lake is shaping up to be a good one, with lots of new people to meet and things to experience (aside from all the cheese business).

And cooking up fries, no matter how hot and greasy, isn’t so bad because my co-workers and bosses actually make it enjoyable.

If it comes down to it, the least thing I will be able to say about this whole experience is that, well, it’s been cheesy.

Amanda Lehmert is a Reporter for Youth Journalism International.

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