The Day of the Burrito Stand
Let’s be realistic, neither you nor I had much faith in Habakkuk opening up a burrito hut. We doubted him from the start, not because we are not willing to believe in him but rather because time and again he has proven an unreliable creator of monetary value. It would be wrong and foolish for us to believe in him when he has amply demonstrated an incapacity to understand market forces and the benefits of capitalism. In conclusion, neither Lauren, Antoinette nor I had shown any appreciation of the seriousness of his quest, nor were we willing to help make it come true, knowing full well that it would flop. So when the notice came in the mail, it was handwritten by Habakkuk in nine languages, Farsi, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, French, Spanish, English, Italian, Russian, and it simply read, “Come to my burrito stand.” That was all, that was all indeed.
That Sunday Antoinette and Lauren got all ready to support their good friend at the opening, they offered to make the guacamole and to fold burritos, neither task which could have been much fun. They got to the quasi park-plaza in a modestly rundown neighborhood, and sure enough, unreal and fantastic there was this white little stand, a wooden frame, obviously not three dimensional, but it gave it the look and feel of a hut without being there. Habakkuk had nicely decorated the frame with Jalapenos and Mexican Hats, so it looked surely as intended of character. Behind the one dimensional wall, were large pots, two were filled to the brim with refried beans, that were certainly smelling deliciously spiced, there were six stacks high of tortillas, obviously store bought, Habakkuk had concluded that there was not that much really to be gained from making them by hand. There were three crates full of avocadoes one could imagine a good days supply of everything, though doubtful that the avocadoes would last the afternoon if sales were brisk.
Lauren slaps her friend in the back, “hey buddy you really did it, you really did it, congratulations.” Antoinette butted in, “how much are we going to charge?” Habakkuk responded with complete confidence, “pass me the cilantro over there please… …we are going to chop tomatoes too, now price, yes, we are going to charge a dollar thirty-five each burrito and fifty cents extra if they have guacamole.” “How much if they don’t want any pork in their burritos?” “There are no burritos without pork and none without beans.” “You’re losing the vegetarians… they would pay close to the price of a meat burrito for just beans, and that’s true profit.” “Nope only have one kind of burrito, we don’t want to complicate things, there is not enough labor at hand to please the picky eaters. We don’t put cheese or sour cream in the burritos either, only salsa.” “Ok that should make for lots of happy customers.” When Lauren interrupted with “ouch I almost cut my entire nail off.” A concerned business owner replied, “careful you don’t want to put any blood in the burritos.”
It was about 1030am, when everything was ready for the grand opening, there was a good stack of about seventy burritos, a hot plate with a covered up pan would be used to heat them, things were clearly looking good. They were ready for business, Antoinette asked about pocket change to cover customers with large bills, Habakkuk responded with his usual customer satisfaction seal, “they have to give us exact payment. $1.35.” Lauren hit Antoinette in the arm with a make fight fist, “hey at least the salsa is free.” Habakkuk put on a Mexican radio station the sun was gorgeously exposing everything.
Their first customer is a man in his late forties, obviously with nothing to do on a beautiful Sunday, was just out walking about, “I love Mexican food, if those are good burritos with lots of carnitas you have won yourselves a regular customer.” The gang went into immediate customer satisfaction mode, first customer, fresh burrito, with lots of beans and beef mix, barely could the burrito be properly sealed, handed to the man, he didn’t want any guacamole, saved himself the money instead, “gotta watch the cash, I am divorced so I support two households, my wife kept the kids, I live alone in those apartments over there, nothing much to do, gotta save the money so the kids can some day go to college, this is a good buy, and the burrito is delicious, you’ll see me next Sunday.” Both Antoinette and Lauren thanked the man, Habakkuk didn’t, “I don’t need customers that are going to tell me all their family problems.” Antoinette and Lauren agreed that the man had been nice and they appreciated how candid he was with them.
The next customer was a huge business success, a grandmother on an electric wheelchair, she drove right up to the stand, “hello young ones, I think you are going to save me a longs day of cooking, I have the grandchildren coming today, they are all big boys, one of them is a football player you know, he is something, the girls love him, his coach says he is a natural,” Habakkuk interrupts, “How many burritos madam.” The little old lady giggles, “madam, madam, why no one has called me that in ages, people stopped doing that in the forties, you must be older than you look sonny.” Antoinette and Lauren join in the giggles, the little lady starts to do some mental calculations, “well there is George that good for nothing son in law of mine, he will for sure eat three, then Michael will eat two, probably all four boys will eat two, and Susan she won’t eat anything she will just pick at it so she can keep that petit figure of hers, and Irma will eat one and so will I, I guess that’s about all of…” Antoinette bails the lady out from having to reach a sum, “14 but you could take 15 just in case someone wants more.” “Yes, 15 is a good amount, besides I am not giving them anything else, not cookies, maybe just Coke, certainly will have to satisfy their insatiable appetite for that. How much are they?” Antoinette, “$20.25 plus tax.” Habakkuk silently pondered for a second in his own mind, “tax, oh I hadn’t thought of that.” The old lady, “ok wrap them up.” That’s went they all noticed that they hadn’t any bags. Lauren leaped to a nearby grocer to secure bags.
The rest of the day went just as well, by 3pm they had sold over 120 burritos, a considerable number. The trio were also very exhausted from having to make last moment arrangements to compensate, surprising for a prophet, for Habakkuk’s lack of planning. The exhaustion led them to decide to shut down early, originally Habakkuk had wanted to stay open till six to hit the early dinner crowd, but they jointly concluded that they should wrap things up, go home and celebrate their success with some wine. As they were packing up, a rather fat black lady cop, “hey you guys look like your closing but I need to eat me one of those delicious burritos, I just talked to the guy at the grocery store and he said they were mighty fine. Habakkuk liked the compliment, he said, “sure will make you one.” “Ill have it with cheese.” Habakkuk replies, “we don’t have cheese.” “oh that’s alright, it isn’t like this fat body of mine needs any more cheese.” She burst out laughing. “I will have sour cream instead.” “sorry we don’t have any sour cream either.” “well what do you have?” “we only sell them with guacamole but we are out of it.” The lady cop felt that these guys were probably being prejudiced or were too lazy to open up the cheese and sour cream for her, she had suffered as a child racist remark after racist remark, she could smell here that she wasn’t worth the trouble of reopening up the cheese and sour cream bins, “hey listen here Mr. do you have a city license to operate here, cause this doesn’t look like a proper establishment, let me see your permit.”
She was obviously throwing her weight around, both Lauren and Antoinette looked at each other knowingly, fully aware of what was unfolding. Habakkuk was a little startled, he really wasn’t into understanding the semantics of city government, properly getting a city permit or getting a tax id were not things of his world, he thought he could just sell burritos, and that only the people touched by the transaction were affected, he didn’t see the relationship between selling burritos and city taxes and city street cleaning and city lights. He didn’t even know that the city was indeed a franchise operating under a license within the county, and the county was really part of a franchise from the state, and that the state too operated with a license from the federal government and even that the federal government existed only because it could defend its territory against other countries and the right to tax its own citizens.
“where is your permit!” Habakkuk looked stunted, he was a man of the cosmic universe, a traveler through eons, now he was up against some local jurisdiction, Lauren interrupted, took out her badge, “I’m a detective working with Captain Ogle, perhaps we can discuss how we can resolve this matter without issue.” The fat lady cop flew into a laughing rage, “ha, ha, from where I am standing you seem to be trying to bribe a fellow officer, and from the looks of your badge detective, you’re outside your jurisdiction, I don’t care who you are, who you work for, your badge don’t matter me, and the only thing I want to see is a permit, I am an honest cop doing an honest job, now where is that permit.” As she finished those last words, she slowly pushed her fingers into Habakkuk’s chest, “where… is… that… permit.”
They finally got out of there, with a ticket for peddling burritos without a permit, they had an order to appear at a hearing, and they were told they had to notify the district’s tax collector of their activities, so that they could take further action against them. Her parting words, “And don’t think I haven’t got the mind or authority to jail your asses now, its just too close to quitting time for me to book you guys.”
Antoinette insisted that depressed Habakkuk come home with them and have some wine anyway, “we have to celebrate we are not in jail Habakkuk, we beat the wrap.” They bought five bottles of wine, and sat in the living room laughing at how hard they had worked to get caught at the end, “I told you we should a had sour cream.”
That Sunday Antoinette and Lauren got all ready to support their good friend at the opening, they offered to make the guacamole and to fold burritos, neither task which could have been much fun. They got to the quasi park-plaza in a modestly rundown neighborhood, and sure enough, unreal and fantastic there was this white little stand, a wooden frame, obviously not three dimensional, but it gave it the look and feel of a hut without being there. Habakkuk had nicely decorated the frame with Jalapenos and Mexican Hats, so it looked surely as intended of character. Behind the one dimensional wall, were large pots, two were filled to the brim with refried beans, that were certainly smelling deliciously spiced, there were six stacks high of tortillas, obviously store bought, Habakkuk had concluded that there was not that much really to be gained from making them by hand. There were three crates full of avocadoes one could imagine a good days supply of everything, though doubtful that the avocadoes would last the afternoon if sales were brisk.
Lauren slaps her friend in the back, “hey buddy you really did it, you really did it, congratulations.” Antoinette butted in, “how much are we going to charge?” Habakkuk responded with complete confidence, “pass me the cilantro over there please… …we are going to chop tomatoes too, now price, yes, we are going to charge a dollar thirty-five each burrito and fifty cents extra if they have guacamole.” “How much if they don’t want any pork in their burritos?” “There are no burritos without pork and none without beans.” “You’re losing the vegetarians… they would pay close to the price of a meat burrito for just beans, and that’s true profit.” “Nope only have one kind of burrito, we don’t want to complicate things, there is not enough labor at hand to please the picky eaters. We don’t put cheese or sour cream in the burritos either, only salsa.” “Ok that should make for lots of happy customers.” When Lauren interrupted with “ouch I almost cut my entire nail off.” A concerned business owner replied, “careful you don’t want to put any blood in the burritos.”
It was about 1030am, when everything was ready for the grand opening, there was a good stack of about seventy burritos, a hot plate with a covered up pan would be used to heat them, things were clearly looking good. They were ready for business, Antoinette asked about pocket change to cover customers with large bills, Habakkuk responded with his usual customer satisfaction seal, “they have to give us exact payment. $1.35.” Lauren hit Antoinette in the arm with a make fight fist, “hey at least the salsa is free.” Habakkuk put on a Mexican radio station the sun was gorgeously exposing everything.
Their first customer is a man in his late forties, obviously with nothing to do on a beautiful Sunday, was just out walking about, “I love Mexican food, if those are good burritos with lots of carnitas you have won yourselves a regular customer.” The gang went into immediate customer satisfaction mode, first customer, fresh burrito, with lots of beans and beef mix, barely could the burrito be properly sealed, handed to the man, he didn’t want any guacamole, saved himself the money instead, “gotta watch the cash, I am divorced so I support two households, my wife kept the kids, I live alone in those apartments over there, nothing much to do, gotta save the money so the kids can some day go to college, this is a good buy, and the burrito is delicious, you’ll see me next Sunday.” Both Antoinette and Lauren thanked the man, Habakkuk didn’t, “I don’t need customers that are going to tell me all their family problems.” Antoinette and Lauren agreed that the man had been nice and they appreciated how candid he was with them.
The next customer was a huge business success, a grandmother on an electric wheelchair, she drove right up to the stand, “hello young ones, I think you are going to save me a longs day of cooking, I have the grandchildren coming today, they are all big boys, one of them is a football player you know, he is something, the girls love him, his coach says he is a natural,” Habakkuk interrupts, “How many burritos madam.” The little old lady giggles, “madam, madam, why no one has called me that in ages, people stopped doing that in the forties, you must be older than you look sonny.” Antoinette and Lauren join in the giggles, the little lady starts to do some mental calculations, “well there is George that good for nothing son in law of mine, he will for sure eat three, then Michael will eat two, probably all four boys will eat two, and Susan she won’t eat anything she will just pick at it so she can keep that petit figure of hers, and Irma will eat one and so will I, I guess that’s about all of…” Antoinette bails the lady out from having to reach a sum, “14 but you could take 15 just in case someone wants more.” “Yes, 15 is a good amount, besides I am not giving them anything else, not cookies, maybe just Coke, certainly will have to satisfy their insatiable appetite for that. How much are they?” Antoinette, “$20.25 plus tax.” Habakkuk silently pondered for a second in his own mind, “tax, oh I hadn’t thought of that.” The old lady, “ok wrap them up.” That’s went they all noticed that they hadn’t any bags. Lauren leaped to a nearby grocer to secure bags.
The rest of the day went just as well, by 3pm they had sold over 120 burritos, a considerable number. The trio were also very exhausted from having to make last moment arrangements to compensate, surprising for a prophet, for Habakkuk’s lack of planning. The exhaustion led them to decide to shut down early, originally Habakkuk had wanted to stay open till six to hit the early dinner crowd, but they jointly concluded that they should wrap things up, go home and celebrate their success with some wine. As they were packing up, a rather fat black lady cop, “hey you guys look like your closing but I need to eat me one of those delicious burritos, I just talked to the guy at the grocery store and he said they were mighty fine. Habakkuk liked the compliment, he said, “sure will make you one.” “Ill have it with cheese.” Habakkuk replies, “we don’t have cheese.” “oh that’s alright, it isn’t like this fat body of mine needs any more cheese.” She burst out laughing. “I will have sour cream instead.” “sorry we don’t have any sour cream either.” “well what do you have?” “we only sell them with guacamole but we are out of it.” The lady cop felt that these guys were probably being prejudiced or were too lazy to open up the cheese and sour cream for her, she had suffered as a child racist remark after racist remark, she could smell here that she wasn’t worth the trouble of reopening up the cheese and sour cream bins, “hey listen here Mr. do you have a city license to operate here, cause this doesn’t look like a proper establishment, let me see your permit.”
She was obviously throwing her weight around, both Lauren and Antoinette looked at each other knowingly, fully aware of what was unfolding. Habakkuk was a little startled, he really wasn’t into understanding the semantics of city government, properly getting a city permit or getting a tax id were not things of his world, he thought he could just sell burritos, and that only the people touched by the transaction were affected, he didn’t see the relationship between selling burritos and city taxes and city street cleaning and city lights. He didn’t even know that the city was indeed a franchise operating under a license within the county, and the county was really part of a franchise from the state, and that the state too operated with a license from the federal government and even that the federal government existed only because it could defend its territory against other countries and the right to tax its own citizens.
“where is your permit!” Habakkuk looked stunted, he was a man of the cosmic universe, a traveler through eons, now he was up against some local jurisdiction, Lauren interrupted, took out her badge, “I’m a detective working with Captain Ogle, perhaps we can discuss how we can resolve this matter without issue.” The fat lady cop flew into a laughing rage, “ha, ha, from where I am standing you seem to be trying to bribe a fellow officer, and from the looks of your badge detective, you’re outside your jurisdiction, I don’t care who you are, who you work for, your badge don’t matter me, and the only thing I want to see is a permit, I am an honest cop doing an honest job, now where is that permit.” As she finished those last words, she slowly pushed her fingers into Habakkuk’s chest, “where… is… that… permit.”
They finally got out of there, with a ticket for peddling burritos without a permit, they had an order to appear at a hearing, and they were told they had to notify the district’s tax collector of their activities, so that they could take further action against them. Her parting words, “And don’t think I haven’t got the mind or authority to jail your asses now, its just too close to quitting time for me to book you guys.”
Antoinette insisted that depressed Habakkuk come home with them and have some wine anyway, “we have to celebrate we are not in jail Habakkuk, we beat the wrap.” They bought five bottles of wine, and sat in the living room laughing at how hard they had worked to get caught at the end, “I told you we should a had sour cream.”
posted by Ricardo Correa at
8/31/2006 05:37:00 PM
