Human Rule: Don't Hog the Salad Bar

For those of you who expect to see only Man Rules here, let me apologize up front: This one isn't just for Men. It applies to women, and kids, and teenagers, and farm animals, and many species of interstellar life.

So yesterday I went to our company cafeteria to get some lunch. The cafeteria is pretty nice (although true to form, folks like to gripe about it) - there's a deli section, and a hot bar with three entrees and four or five vegetable options, a soup area (which tends to focus primarily on tomato-based soups, which are a tool of the devil, but that's not important right now), and a salad bar. It's the salad bar I want to focus on today.

Our salad bar is fairly well-stocked - we've got a good selection of salad fixins and veggies and such. There are big bowls of iceberg lettuce and mixed greens, so you can pick which kind of leafy vegetable you want. Sadly, though, this variety seemed to cause a problem for one lady yesterday.

See, the salad bar is pushed up against a wall of the serving area, so you can't go down both sides. Normally this isn't a problem, because people with a functioning brain, or a self-awareness level higher than that of the average grapefruit, realize that they need to build their salad and then move out of the way so others waiting behind them can start. Makes sense, right?

When I walked into the serving area, I noticed that there were only two ladies at the salad bar, so I figured a salad would suit me just fine for my lunch. I could build my salad (a mix of iceberg lettuce and greens, broccoli, purple cabbage [LOVE the purple cabbage], onions, carrots, cauliflower, a boiled egg for protein and a dollop of bleu cheese dressing to make sure I'm not TOO healthy) and eat in about 20 minutes. So I grabbed a tray and got behind the second lady in line.

The ladies were talking to each other, which can sometimes cause a problem - nobody wants to stand around while Chatty Cathy clogs the salad bar line instead of moving on through. The first lady had already slid her tray away from the "greens" section and was in the middle of the "veggies" section of the bar, though, so I thought it'd be safe. I held my tray in front of me and waited for the second lady to clear the "greens" section so I could start building.

The second lady wasn't moving forward, though, because the first lady wasn't moving. She had planted herself in front of the veggies and was doing something to her plate. Couldn't really see what, but it was apparently VERY important.

The second lady has put as many greens on her plate as she wants, and now she's waiting patiently for her friend to move, but her friend is still assiduously poking at her plate. So they talk some more. I'm standing there like a bump on a log, holding my tray. Somebody else comes up behind me, waiting their turn.

Finally the two ladies shift apart a bit - not moving down the salad bar line, of course, I would be INSANE to expect THAT - and I can see what the first lady is doing to her plate. She has about 20 leaves of the mixed greens on her plate, and she's carefully examining each one, literally picking up each piece of lettuce or whatever and turning it over multiple times. I don't know what she's looking for - bugs? Mice? Rabbits? The secret to eternal life? - but by golly, she's apparently determined to search until she finds it, and if it inconveniences the rest of us salad-eaters during our lunch break, that's just our tough luck.

Her friend starts reaching past her, almost shoving The Lettuce Whisperer out of the way so she can add a few radishes to her half-built salad. I hear the salad slowpoke say "Sorry, I'm in your way," so she REALIZES she's causing a problem, but SHE STILL DOESN"T MOVE. The person behind me mutters "You've GOT to be kidding."

I wish I could tell you that I waited patiently until the lady finished fondling her food, but I'm only human. I clubbed her into submission with a larger-than-average cauliflower floret, and stepped over her twitching body to make my salad. And I swear that it was an accident that I dumped an entire ladle of bleu cheese dressing on her face.

 

(c) 2013 John Puckett