Lunch Ladies... what the...????

Have you noticed that lunch ladies everywhere have a bad rep? Why is that? I honestly can say that I don't even remember the lunch ladies in my schools. I have a neighbor, who is a head lunch lady, that I think is absolutely amazing and quite adorable, actually. And 2 other neighbors who work in the lunch room as cashiers - again, not even close to the stereo-typical lunch ladies, but darling, with-it women.

But my kids... well, they have stories! They even remember one by name who used to yell "Turn your tray around!!" if they tried to eat food on the far side of their tray. Who does that? And this was in elementary school! And then there's Adam Sandler's song Lunch Lady Land that is hilarious, but I've never known any lunch lady that married the janitor Sloppy Joe. Actually, now that I think of it, I've never known a janitor named Sloppy Joe, either.

I bring up this random subject because I met an actual lunch lady today. Ewwww! She made shivers go down my spine. I had gone early to help sell t-shirts at an undisclosed school during the lunch hour. The lunch lady and all her helpers were holding a meeting. At first I thought all the helpers had special needs or something because she talked so demeaning to them, they had to have some kind of disability. I mean, you don't just talk to adults like they're 2 years old unless they have some kind of intellectual problem. Then I thought, "But you don't talk to ANYONE that way!"

She passed around pictures for them all to look at - each had 20 seconds then HAD to pass it on - and she timed them!! - then they were supposed to say what was wrong with each picture. I think everyone was afraid to say anything - another reason I thought they had special needs, because they all acted intimidated, but I would be too if I had to work for this woman! I didn't see any of the pictures because I was clear at the other end of the room, but she was repeating (very loudly) whatever the offense was in each picture and it was things like "this lid should be moved over 2 slots so it's directly above the correct pot," "the condiments aren't placed in alphabetical order," and "what the heck is this can of pineapple doing here?" (I don't know where the can of pineapple was, or where it was supposed to be and I don't think the helpers knew either, because none of them got that one right!) Then she said, and I'm not kidding, "I don't think you're dumb, but some of you have worked in 5 star kitchens before and you'd never know it by how this kitchen looks." Now if that's not bad enough, she then told them, while wagging her finger, that if she didn't get a 5 star kitchen because of them, they would all be very unhappy because she would be unhappy.

I had to leave at that point. I mean, come on people!! Lunch lady or not - you don't talk to anyone like that!!

I was gone 10 minutes max. When I got back to the cafeteria another mom had shown up to help with the t-shirt sales. The first thing she said to me was, "Oh my gosh! The lunch lady is a B------east!" (She wanted to say the other 'b word' but was nice enough not to.) She said that she made the helpers raise their hand if they wanted to keep their job. Of course, some of them thought she was just trying to make a point and didn't raise their hands, and then she got in their faces and said, "WHAT? You don't want to keep your job?"

At that point, we were frightened. We both had little kids with us that wanted a drink, and neither one of us dared to go buy a milk from the lunch lady. We did approach one of the helpers, but we were very timid about it and watched for a safe time to enter the 'danger zone.'

I'm sure if I got any closer, I would see that she had a huge mole with hair growing out of it. All I know is I've had my scare for the month. Beware of the lunch lady!!!