I'm the short-order cook here at the Timeloop Café. My job is to keep the lights on, the automat stocked, and the customers happy.

It's just me and the doozers back here behind the wall of coin-operated windows.

Mostly, my job consists of hearing the buzzer go off, going see what's short on the shelves, then whipping up whatever it is I think folks will appreciate.

The hardest part is knowing that I'll put, say, a nice, hot, open-faced chicken sandwich with green peas and side mash in a cubbyhole, turn around, walk back to the prep table, hear that buzzer, turn around again, and discover that very same plate has turned into spaghetti bolognese, or an iceberg lettuce wedge salad, or 6 nigiri sushi on a geta.

The substitutions are sometimes amusing, but always inconceivable. I've had Western omelettes turn into Lobster Thermidor, gaspacho become Crêpes Suzette, and Chocolate Lava Cake transmogrify into Bahn Mi. Sometimes I swear I can hear the Great Old Ones laughing at me as some perfectly normal PB&J on whole wheat becomes the horror known as balut. (Look it up.)

If only I could find that bottle of scotch I'd been saving for a special occasion... ah well.

Back to the grindstone.