il vicino crazies & getting drafted into Man United

spent all day & early evening at the fair eating God knows what, came home & drank some PBR

Time to get the restaurant open, but it seems that whenever I look around, the girls are nowhere to be seen. No giant matter, there are virtually no people and I can handle it. Except that all that ARE coming in seem to be older women with fucking crazy orders that make no sense. [This is IV, but not, and it's not the pseudo Il Vicino I've consistently had my work dreams in, either. More of a coffee shop setting.] The next crazy lady comes in and orders a grilled cheese with some special directions, and then on her drink she wants iced tea, but with "cinnamon and gertrjiopf" in the center, but spaced out so she only tastes it "every 20 or 30 sips."

"I'm sorry, what did you want? Cinnamon and...?"

[Laughs]

"No, I'm sorry, I didn't hear you the first time. What was it again you wanted?"

"Woooooooooooo!"

I lean in and hold an ear forward. "I'm sorry, what?"

She turns around and taps the top of a bottle of tobasco sauce on a thin snack counter mounted on the wall next to her.

I make a note of it on the pad, but explain that I'm not guaranteeing how her drink is going to come out. She seems dismissive and crazy still. And once again where the fuck is everybody? Claire suddenly appears and I grab onto her, tell her that the only people coming in today are crazy old women.

I'm running my butt off here and there trying to prepare this meal; there's nothing prepped and I'm having to go to the house across the street to get the cheese for the sandwich. Damn! The sandnwich I was toasting, upright in a slot toaster, for the last customer is burned. And more than that, I managed somehow to get a banana down in the slot and now it's all cooked through and sloppy. I drag the sandwich out, make another, put it in, come back, not only is it burned, too, but I forgot to take the banana out and now it's even worse. I try to get grip on the slimy thing-- a banana shaped like an ear of corn, but with banana peel, no husk-- and drag it out. I am semi-successful. But this is all taking WAY too long, not that I care when these crazy bitches get their food, frankly. While I'm still at the house across the street [has some resonance with the old house on Morningside, incidentally], in the kitchen, "the team" shows up. Apparently either Man United or the English national team. They're all grumpy and such, getting in my way, wrestling me and each other. I give in and throw up my hands. While some brute is playfully sitting on me, the team camptain (looking like Alan Tudyk) comes around-- there is a room full of them and several guys not on the team, too-- and he's pointing and individuals and saying "draft...draft...draft," and there's no way out. It's a literal press-ganging into this football team. From under my brute, I shout that,

"I'm a foreign national, mate."

Everyone just laughs. I know I'm stuck. How does he know I can play, anyhow? And can I even remotely play in this level of team? What the hell? How is this happening? I give up and start eating one of the ruined sandwiches I was making, all burned grilled cheese & mayo, the cheese in s thick, unmelted slab in the middle. I realize that in the future we should really use grated, even if it's messy. And around comes the captain again, pointing and announcing positions. The guy before me and myself both get Sweeper. I think about protesting that I'll make a MUCH better left defender, but I know that no one cares, I'm just the new American and I'll do what I'm told.