When I was about 13 or 14, I was given the opportunity to work a summer job for family friends at a Shaved Ice Stand (which was actually a vending trailer... not a little table with an umbrella... LOL). It started off as just here and there when they needed me to fill in the first couple of summers at a local festival... but when I was old enough to drive, I was trusted and responsible enough to work all day, every day of the festivals/fairs. I was able to have a co-worker (since the family friends pretty much let me run the business without them)... and so I asked my cousin Meghan to join me(and after Meg went off to college in KY... I asked my other cousin, Alyson). Meghan had a little experience from before... we had asked her a couple of times to help us out during the parade at our local fest. We would literally have lines backed up for HOURS! People waiting to pay $2-$3 for flavored, sugar-packed snow! (But oooh did it taste GOOD!) Anyway... those were some good times! Despite the fact that sometimes we would not sit down for hours.... our hands would be sticky.. or freezing cold... we would be proposed to by scary carnival guys with two teeth ((shudder))... rainy days were OH SO BORING... aaand... sometimes we didn't leave the trailer from 9AM-11PM (except to get food or go to the bathroom).......... The money was good... and we had a lot of fun meeting people and listening to some good music (Jimmy Eat World... totally Classic)!!! I still work shaved ice some... however, now that I've married and moved farther away from the festivals that I used to work... I only fill in now and then. Not to mention the fact that their own kids are getting old enough to work there themselves! (EEEK! I'm old!)
(Yes, those are crayons--we had to bring things to do during the off time!)
See her jeans? Ummm.. yeah... you can't see it in the first picture of me... But I am wearing an equally gigantic amount of denim. What.were.we.thinking? LOL! This fad went on for a couple of years with us... Oh Dear. At least it is a memory! :) Annnd... we had a pretty rad summer job!If you would like to check out more Flashbacks... check out Tia's Blog!
Ahahahahahahahaha!!!!!
ReplyDeleteahhahha!!
ReplyDeleteoh but those were the days!!
My first real job was as the Burger King clown when I was 16 ... yeah, those pictures are most definatly NOT going to make it on a Fri Flashback! I did however own a pair of JNCO jeans (I'm ashamed to admit)
ReplyDeletetotally just read your profile ... where in PA are you at? I'm just outside of Johnstown in Windber :)
ReplyDeleteOh man, I loved shaved ice!! My only job was in childcare, from babysitting to nannying, to daycare, to teaching... now I'm an at home mom and wish I had tried some other kind of non-kid related job! I think making shaved ice would have been great, but I probably would have been too hyped up on food coloring and sugar to work well!
ReplyDeleteYou know what? I hated snow cones. Aren't I weird? I liked the top part with all of the yummy syrup, but as soon as it started to sink to the bottom of the cone, the taste of the ice was too boring... and I had sticky syrup running down my hands. Snow cones just aren't for me. Thats really rad that you worked in one of those stands though! What a fun job. Seriously.
ReplyDeleteAnd wow, yeah I used to wear giant pants like that too, only, mine didn't even belong to me, they belonged to my friend who happened to be the same size as me. And they weren't cute by any means, they were mens, because we were too chubby to fit into ladies sizes. Luckily, I don't have any pictures of me wearing them, so the memory has faded for the most part, haha.
Tia... LOL--I hate snow cones too! YUCK! But this was shaved ice... totally different... it was like packed snow (not little ice chunks) in a bowl and so the flavor would soak in all the way.. not just at the bottom... Mmmmm! I bet you'd like one of those if you tried it. Totally 100% different than a snow cone... :)
ReplyDeleteI used to wear pants like that! And I thought I looked cool hehe. Guess that wasn't very stylish huh?
ReplyDelete