The Pancake Breakfast

Lately I’ve been on deadline. Actually, I’ve had a lot of deadlines…so I haven’t been doing much other than writing and looking out my office window.

However, I do have yet another installment in my continuing drama as a wrestling parent volunteer. This involves the annual pancake breakfast, of which I was in charge.

I’m a very hard worker, but I’ve never been particularly organized. So, it was with a little bit of trepidation that I accepted this job. It basically involves getting about ten volunteers together, buying a bunch of pancake mix, orange juice, milk, and sausage, then making and serving it all to six wrestling teams after weigh-ins on a Saturday morning.

Now, I’ve helped with this before. Actually, I’ve helped every year my son’s been in high school. Last year’s parent in charge actually made a binder listing everything to do. I just had to do what she said. But still I was nervous.

Last week, in between writing and well, writing…I went to Sam’s Club and bought all the ingredients. I went to a parent meeting and solicited parent volunteers. I stressed over griddles, crock pots, extension cords, and storing five gallons of milk. Luckily, my husband helped with the heavy lifting.

On Friday night, it all began. I had to cook 250 sausage links. It took three hours. I finished at 1am. I had boys over who were running on the treadmill in the basement because they had to make weight for the weigh-ins. No, they did not appreciate the smell.

And, boy, did my house smell! The dogs were barking and begging. Grease was everywhere. I worried about keeping those darn sausages relatively moist until six am the next morning. It was a pain. My husband and I and all the boys were back up at five, loading cars, then going to the high school. You can imagine the next few hours. Setting up griddles and syrup stations, making pancake batter, carting those sausages around.

Finally, at 7:30, we were ready. Our team’s boys got to eat for free. Boy did they eat! The other teams, well, they elected not to pay the $3 for breakfast and brought their own food.

That’s when my pancake breakfast came to a screeching halt.

Yep, that’s right. Imagine 7 volunteers, two large containers filled to the brim with pancakes. Over 200 sausage links (still moist and very edible, I might add!) ready to go. 8 o’clock came. 8:30. 8:45. We only sold another 7 breakfasts. That’s when things got desperate. The emphasis went from making money for the team to getting rid of the food. Parents started eating pancakes. We asked the janitors and referees if they wanted free breakfasts. Only about half did. At 9, we had to clean up. I gave away four gallons of milk. We uh, threw the sausage out.

I ran to Starbucks, got more coffee, ran home and put on orange and black, and went back to watch my son wrestle. He won his first match. Yay! He uh, also threw up. Yep, several of the boys found that the pancake breakfast wasn’t really the best thing to have before wrestling in five matches. It was a pretty nasty thing to watch. The coach shook his head in dismay. I wished I could slink out the back door.

My husband looked at me and shrugged. He told me it wasn’t my fault this breakfast had become, well…The Worst In the Team’s History.

But I know better. There’s a reason I spend most of my days sitting in an office, staring out the window, making stuff up. Things just go a lot better that way!

Shelley