Jazz steps are useful

I recently started working at Trio Cafe on Market Square. I make salads.

I know, I know, it sounds simple, but it's the most high-profile job there because when you walk in the front door - BOOM! - you immediately see the salad station and the salad master (I decided that was truly the best title for the position). Everyone else is buzzing around the dining room or back in the kitchen, but I am almost always up front right by the door. I doubt that I actually grasp my place in the restaurant on a day-to-day basis, but I digress...

After learning the ropes of salad-making in my brief training, I learned the standard procedures for cleaning up the salad line. This involves the usual tasks of changing out containers, wiping down the station, and sweeping the floor. It also includes the chore of mopping... kind of. You see, I wasn't instructed to use a mop and bucket. No, no, no. This is much simpler and far less of a mess. You take a regular towel that you'd use for wiping things up and a spray bottle of cleaner. Then you squirt the floor, throw the towel onto it, and move the towel all around until the cleaner is mopped up and the floor is clean. Kind of cute, really. And a little awkward, especially to get underneath shelves and in cubbyholes. But that's what I did.

Until I realized that I could simplify the process by dancing. Yes! I don't know what this move is called, but I know that it's fun. Morgan suggests that it could be called a swim sweep or a glide. Another possible name is "dolphin." At any rate, I remember watching Bobby White do this move many moons ago in Atlanta, and the first time I saw it, I knew I had to learn it. It has the effect of an illusion. You put 100% of your weight on one foot and, shifting your weight between the heel and ball of that foot, you inch your way in the direction of your other heretofore motionless foot. With said motionless foot, you make a circular motion, like you're sweeping the floor. It looks very cool, very smooth, because of course you're barely taking your mobile foot off the ground and keeping it at a very low profile so the attention is drawn to the sweeping foot. I love it, and it's PERFECT for cleaning the floor at my salad station. It's also pretty challenging and it looks far less awkward than randomly poking my foot all over the floor. Boo ya!