Learning the hard way

When I graduated from college, I was virtually unemployable, having been an English major, something the business world had never heard of, apparently. At last I got a job at a newspaper as a Junior Nobody. I was So low on the totem pole that I got to go to the local deli to get breakfast for everyone.

We started work at 6 a.m.--it was a morning paper-- and at 9:30 the bulldog edition was finished so people could relax. It was then that the staff gave me their breakfast orders. They were also supposed to give me the money to pay for them. Most of them did.

But there were two or three people who said, "I'll pay you later." Later never came. About the fifth time this happened, I was standing in the newsroom counting my money, and I realized I was paying for these guys' breakfast myself, and that I had no money left.

After that, I demanded cash on the barrelhead. Or no breakfast.