I hope this is okay to post here. Technically I'm a pizza delivery driver, but I feel like this story displays my BOH energy.

I grew up on a farm in the Midwest. I've had cute little baby animals start out as my "pets" and grow up to be on the dinner table. It's a strange way of life for some. But I always tell people that for me it was strange to move away and buy meat from a grocery store wrapped in plastic and I never even knew its name. All this to say that I'm not very squeamish.

Last night I'm the only female driver on shift with three male drivers. Our GM was the only insider O-C, so I'm catching oven until my delivery is ready. All three guys dispatch on deliveries in pretty quick succession just before me. I grab my stuff and walk out the front door to the parking lot....just to see a dead bird on the sidewalk directly in front of our entrance. Did it die in the last five minutes? Or did one or more of these guys just step over it?

I figure a dead animal directly in front of the entrance to a food establishment is in poor taste. I go back inside, set down my hotbag, grab paper towels and a plastic bag, scoop up the dead bird, and carry it around back to the dumpster. I wash my hands and leave on my delivery. I wonder if any of the guys would have realized that if they had picked it up themselves it absolutely couldn't be dispossessed of in a trash can inside the store. Who knows.

It reminded me of my very first day working for this company, at a different location. I was in the office watching training videos when I see movement out of the corner of my eye. A mouse was climbing up the computer cords. I go tell the GM and she starts apologizing and begging me not to leave. In hindsight that reaction should have been a red flag about that particular franchise. But it wasn't my first time in a kitchen. Mice are attracted to food. I get it. I just wanted to ask for a container of some sort to try to catch it.

I get a disposable tin and a glue trap and go back to the videos. It takes a while, but the mouse pops back up. I'm able to shoo it onto the glue trap. I ask for some olive oil thinking that I could release the mouse from the glue and humanely set it free outside. A young male insider says that wouldn't work. The back door opens up to a large park with wooded walking trails. A live mouse will surely return. He says that he'll take care of it for me.

Well the farm girl in me can't stand to be treated like some prissy girl. I tell him that I understand and I know what to do. I wrap the glue trap in a rag and carry it back to the dumpster. I set it on the ground, take a deep breath, and stomp my boot as hard and as fast as I can. I shake the rag into the dumpster without looking.

I turn to go back inside and see every employee who was on shift gathered at the back door watching me. We had a high school girl working there and she looked horrified! For a second it was like the first day of prison and I had just proved myself.

That high school girl and I ended up moving to a new franchise about a year later. She loved going up to our new coworkers and asking if they've heard the story yet about the time that I curb stomped a mouse on my very first day, lol!