Maybe you know, maybe you don’t, but the Irish hate change. Yes, it’s a grand generalization, but you know what I mean: men want their corned beef made the way their mother made it; I don’t like to move my furniture around; I want every holiday to be like the old days. Et cetera. And so it is that I eat the same thing for lunch every day, at least the days that I’m at the bookstore. Soup. I love soup. No matter the weather, don’t care if there’s something new on the menu. Soup, please.
But yesterday there was a snafu in my lunch regimen. Every single person who works in the store’s cafe knows about me and the soup, and the just-so way I need it to be served up: two packets of crackers, one napkin, no bag, please. Why no bag? Because I’m just taking it from the cafe to the break room — why would I need to waste a paper bag? That’s crazy!
Today, however, there was New Guy. Oblivious, he put my soup in a bag, like he would for anyone, and bolted off to the next customer before I had a chance to give the bag back.
You think I’m a nut? I work four days a week, forty-nine weeks a year. That is 196 bags I would have wasted! At least an entire tree, though maybe a small one. On hundred and ninety-six bags I would have carried seventy-five yards, and then dumped in a wastebasket. And I’m just one little soup-slurper! So do the math…
Think twice.
