HOT Lunch Room Ladies!

I'm a lunch room lady and very proud of it. I started working at the high school three years ago when one daughter was a sophomore and one was a senior. My idol was Mary Beth with her gregarious attitude, her sense of humor, the way she respected, loved and bonded with the kids. Her "helloooo, how are you?" to each student as they passed through her register line made me want to bring the same type of joy to all the kids.

My job consists of arriving at 7:45. I begin my day by making 24 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on white or wheat bread cut on the diagonal and wrapped in cellophane. Then I proceed to the other sandwhiches--ham, turkey and roast beef on croissants, cibiattas, kaiser and white and wheat bread. This is the best part of the day because my counterpart is on the other side of the stainless steel counter putting together the salad bar. While we work, we talk. Many an issue has been solved over this two hour span. We have talked each other through kid problems, business issues, deaths of our parents, the bad economy, politics, the successes of our kids, but also the disappointments, and the graduation of our kids from the school.

After cutting up the fresh fruit and putting it into containers we roll out our cash register carts. Lunch Mod 1 begins at 10:25. We have three mods where kids can buy (cards or cash) a prepared meal or ala carte. We sell whole fruit, yogurt, protein bars and fun stuff--ice cream and candy!

"Lunch Room Ladies" evoke the vision of women who are blue uniformed clad, hairnetted and a little on the chubbers side. Rest assured none of us fit that profile. We are thin, beautiful and educated. I like to think we look somewhere between this--

(Can you believe the  caption under this was LET ME BE YOUR MYSTERY MEAT. Too funny!)

And this--

(Don't you just LOVE the toothpick hanging out of the side of her mouth? I wish it were a cigarette--haha!)

But my all time favorite depiction of The Lunch Room Lady is Chris Farley's skit done on Saturday Night Live. He dressed up in stereotypical gear and jammed to the song "Lunchlady Land."

Ironically he went to the high school at the school I work--Edgewood in Madison! Does this mean this is what Lunch Room Ladies looked like back in HIS day?

Well here's what we look like now. Eat your heart out Chris Farley!! (Heidi, Linda and me--far right)