New School Year

Hi All,

Wow! Time flies. Its a new school year term. 2010-2011. So far, we have had a great opening. Our counts are down, way down. But we are hoping business will pick up. We opened the school with no problems. No equipment problem and no lunch money problems.

In the past we have had the students order their lunches on a lunch count form in the morning. This year I decided we would not use the forms. The students can come in and take whatever one of the five lunches we offer. They seem to like it. The teachers love it. I never realized how big a deal it was for the students to fill out the lunch count form in the classroom in the morning, but it surely must have been. I told one teacher that I would not be using the form and soon enough everybody knew.

I have been asked many times "How do you know how much food to make now?" All I have to do is look back on my production records from last year and make that amount. I had a lot of food leftover the first week but so far this week, its going well. Not much waste. Now that we have worked a full week, I just look at what we served last week and make about the same amount.

One thing I am not happy about is that we are not allowed to sell ice tea to the teachers and staff this year. I begged and pleaded to no avail. The teachers would come in to buy the ice tea, then pick up another item like a cookie or fruit, soup, chips or whatever. Since I don't have the ice tea, they aren't coming in. I am losing business.

My boss says we can not sell it because of the wellness initiatives. All I know is it sucks that an adult can't have something like an ice tea if they want it.

Other than the ice tea, everything so far is great.

I worked all summer on my book and am very happy with the progress made. It has been edited and I am working on those changes. Once the changes are completed (I think I have six more pages to do), I will write the chapter headings. Last week I got a wonderful story to add to my book from a lunch lady in Delaware. Very exciting.

I am still seeking some stories. I am mainly looking for "good" teacher stories for my Chapter about Lunch Ladies and Teachers. If you have a story about your interactions with a teacher that was good, please send it to me.

I better sign off. I am exhausted. This whole work thing is over-rated!

All is well.