June 8, 2005

I LOVE THIS DAY! I was actually really dreading going to work because I knew that Bobbi Jo and Christina weren't going to be there today and I would have to work alone in the Grille Room. Yikes! So, this morning I went in to start prepping and someone send Edvan in to work with me. Edvan is a 26 year old Brazilian that just started working there a couple of days ago. So, it was me and Edvan running the whole show. It was really cool though because I got to teach him how to do everything. He's been cooking for a long time, but he doesn't know how "we" do things. The Grille Room does a "panini of the day", so I asked Chad what the panini would be. While he was thinking, I mentioned that I made a yummy panini at home. He asked me what was in it and I described the one I made and posted on here the other day. He said, "That sounds great! We have some apples and dill havarti in the walk-in. That's our panini." Whoa. I was so excited. We didn't have very many customers, but 3 of them ordered it and I stood at the window and watched their reactions. I was nervous because all the members are REALLY hard to please. A few minutes after the first customers finished, their waiter came in the kitchen and said, "Liz, they really liked your panini. I didn't even ask them if they liked it or not. They said, 'Hey. Tell Chad that this panini is fabulous.'" I was sooooo happy! Chad was proud.

Other than that, I talked to Edvan about religion a lot today. I am becoming more and more fearless. He is totally going to be LDS someday. Why he isn't already is beyond me. Well, he doesn't know very much yet -- but I will remedy that! He asked me on a date for this weekend and I said I couldn't, but I invited him to come with me to institute tonight. He is a Protestant and has never drank, smoked, done drugs, etc. He even pays 10% tithing to his church. He is incredibly nice and very religious. After work, he asked me if I wanted to go get some ice cream in Canton as we got off early. I felt bad about turning him down before and I wanted to talk about the Church some more, so I went with him. We went to a place called Crescent Ridge Dairy. It's this AWESOME dairy that sells delicious ice cream. It was almost completely packed with local people getting an ice cream on a hot afternoon. Canton's a very quaint, very expensive town. We talked some more about our beliefs (which are very similar) and when he dropped me off at my car, he said, "Thanks for coming. I'm sorry I can't come tonight, but I'll come to church with you and you can come with me." I'm holding that to him.