Your working away and look up at the clock. It's lunch time! But you didn't bring any lunch (again), and you don't have a lot of time to run out and get any. Unnnghhh! Soooooo hungry.
Now, any freelancer worth his or her salt knows that a FREE lunch may only be a few steps away. Yes brothers and sisters, I said free. Of course I'm talking about the cold left-overs from meetings which eventually make their way to the kitchen to be picked over by anyone with an appetite. It doesn't happen every day, but when these left-overs show up , it can really save a famished freelancer. All you need to do is make it to the kitchen before the rest of the agency does. If you do, then you'll be able to treat yourself to the "Freelancer Surprise".
I call these left-overs the "Freelancer Surprise" because it's always a surprise what will be left in the kitchen for you to scavenge. Actually, "surprise" might be a bit of an overstatement. 90% of the time these left-overs come in the form of pizza, and not very good pizza either. For whatever reason it seems that agencies have an unfathomable penchant for ordering the shittiest pizza around even when good pizza is readily available. While free, these odious old slices will inevitably leave you with severe acid reflux and a spastic colon.
Sometimes you'll get lucky and find sandwiches. Not the good sandwiches though. Those were eaten over 2 hours ago. The only sandwiches left now are egg salad and prune on rye, or tofu and Tabasco on pumpernickel. Just don't think about how many fingers have poked and prodded at them and you'll be fine. Then there is the salad. Someone always orders it, but no one ever eats it. There always seems to be plenty of salad. And every once in a while... cookies (gasp!). Jackpot my friends!
Who says there is no such thing as a free lunch?
Man, I hear ya! I always thought that my eating habits would be worse at home with free reign of my kitchen and no supervision. Sadly, those free stale cookies get me every time. However, I would like to send out my personal thanks for the giant tub of pretzels that one agency keeps in their kitchen. That really gets me through the afternoon.
ReplyDeleteThe worst is the cookies that LOOK awesomely yummy, but then taste like bargain-basement bagged cookies once you take a bite. Cursed wasted calories!
ReplyDeleteI especially love the picked through salad. Your left with lettuce and a ton of onions. But we can smother it in dressing..or what is most likely olive oil and a splash of vinegar cause the caterer never mixed it when pouring it into the large deli sides container.
ReplyDeletePerhaps that cucumber sandwich with warmed soggy cheese. Yummy.
I had "Freelancer Surprise" for dinner last night and lunch today. I'm changing the image of this post to accurately reflect the price of these "free" meals.
ReplyDelete