Beware of Carnie Folk
Posted on June 18, 2003
I came across a photo of an ice cream man enjoying one of his products on standardmotion.com and burst out laughing. Not that the photo was that amusing but reminded me a story from high school. This is one of those "you had to be there" stories but I'll try my best to tell it.
Andrew, one of my best friends from High School, lost his job at McDonalds and decided to take a summer job with Dicky-Dee Ice Cream. The dicky-dee guy peddles around a dorky looking ice-cream freezer mounted onto three bicycle wheels and sells ice cream treats around his designated neighbourhood for less than minimum wage. Being the "Dicky-dee guy" is the absolute bottom of the job barrel even in Thunder Bay so a lot of us were surprised that Andrew would take the job. He must have been convinced of all the money he could make when he was
The official summer holiday had just begun and it was Andrew's first day on the job, so first he had to pick up the equipment. The Dicky-Dee office, or were the ice cream and bikes were stored was just the other side of the Intercity shopping mall. He picked up his ride and frozen product then proceeded to bike across town to his designated area of westfort about 8 km away. Keep in mind that these ice cream cart bikes handle like shopping carts and that 8 km probably feels more like 16km. Just across the river from the shopping center biking towards westfort lies the Canadian lakehead exhibition grounds. It was a few days before the fair was to start so the exhibition grounds were full of carnie folk setting up camp. Andrew, thinking he could make an extra couple bucks on the way to his final destination, decided to veer off the sidewalk and take a detour through the fair grounds. One of the carnies spotted this skinny teenager and called over to him, sadly Andrew took the bait. Carnies came out of nowhere, and completely surrounded Andrew and his transportation. Not able to make a getaway on his dicky-dee mobile he gave up and watched as the carnies raided not only half of his ice cream but also swiped most of his money from the cash box.
After the carnie episode he biked all the way to my place and dumped his card on my lawn yelling a string of four letter words. I fell on the grass and almost spilt my gut laughing, "you did What?!" as he reached inside the cart for an ice cream. "Don't you have to pay for that?" "Fuck it! I have to pay for all the goddamn stuff the carnie folk stole anyway!!" he said while laughing and crying at the same time.
That is why the photo I saw of the ice cream man eating his product triggered this story. He ended up getting fired that day and still had to pay for all the stolen ice cream and cash. If you didn't find this story funny or amusing, maybe you just had to be there.
*I took the above photos on Saturday in Omotesando where even constuctions sites are covered in style.
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