First Jobs and St. Louis Park Rituals

From their “Park Bench Perspective,” Carlos and Mike Hammer reminisce about growing up in St. Louis Park and early work experiences, starting with a childhood paper route and frustrations with school fundraisers, including a story about Melissa McCarthy opting to write a check rather than sell magazines. They compare fundraisers like paper drives and Girl Scout cookies and joke about shrinkflation. The conversation shifts to first jobs: Hammer dishwashing at the Ambassador Motor Hotel (union breaks, heavy pots and pans) and briefly working at Jolly Troll before quitting due to a creepy manager; Carlos describes working at TGI Fridays as a teen, cutting his thumb and receiving a disability payout, then being fired over an earring, and quitting Plums after 17 straight days. They mention other jobs (Shakey’s, Snyder Drug, Tom Thumb, Domino’s) and discuss restaurant theft, service, and management lessons. Carlos announces a new podcast with Joe Reilly, “Forgotten Television,” debuting with The White Shadow, teases another podcast with Hammer, and they plan “Jobs Part Two,” while plugging Hammer’s handyman/construction work and Carlos’s writing project “The Ghost of Lake Osseo.”

00:00 Park Bench Intro
00:31 First Money Jobs
01:03 Fundraiser Rants
04:03 Girl Scout Shrinkflation
05:24 First Real Restaurant Jobs
09:04 TGI Fridays Thumb Story
11:55 More Teen Jobs List
13:12 Dominos Before GPS
15:26 Restaurant Theft Wisdom
20:26 New Podcasts Announcement
21:29 Jobs Part Two Tease
24:11 Wrap Up and Contact

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:18

How are you doing today, Mike Hammer? Carlos, I am doing wonderful. How about yourself? I'm doing really well. It's a beautiful day here out on the park bench. It's a nice bench. It's a good perspective and a nice view. No, I wanted to talk about one of the things that is a ritual of growing up and growing up in St. Louis Park. The various places you and I worked when we were youths. Youths. I think my very, very first quote-unquote job was a joint paper out with you when we were 10 or 11 years old. We got Kenny involved.

SPEAKER_04 0:54

I think that would be the first time the money was ours. Nobody else pimping you out. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:03

I got money and remember the send the cute kid up to the door with candy to try to sell it so that we can raise money. I hated that as a parent.

SPEAKER_04 1:11

I went, how much is how much is the average kid getting this fundraiser? I I won't make my kid before.

SPEAKER_03 1:16

Hey, I've got a celebrity adjacent, super adjacent story.

SPEAKER_04 1:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:21

My friend that I worked with, Carol. Carol.

SPEAKER_04 1:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:24

She spent a few years in Los Angeles. And the school where her kids attended, shout out Carol, if you're still listening in Eden Prairie. Her kids went to a school with Melissa McCarthy's kids. And Carol's husband is working the booth and their fundraising thing was selling magazines. And Melissa McCarthy goes, please just tell me the size of the check you want me to write.

SPEAKER_04 1:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:46

Because I am not going to sell magazines. My child's not going to sell magazines. And the thing is, I need to make it very clear. The story was not Melissa McCarthy being a bitch about it, but the same thing I would say if writing a check could solve the problem.

SPEAKER_04 2:01

I if your kid runs with it, yeah, great. If not, just pay the 30, 40, 60, 80, 100 more. Yeah. And don't have your kid be a door-to-door salesman. It's not dangerous out there, but usually we did it together as kids. You didn't have parents going. Now you sit there and I don't. That never really didn't the office job. You see the box of candy and you're like, oh Christ, now I have to buy candy from them. Yeah. You know what? How about this? Here's five bucks, and I've done that a lot of times, even with Girl Scout cookies. I got enough cookies. Here's five bucks. Go give it to someone. I don't do something else with it.

SPEAKER_03 2:35

I have to tell you, I am the softest touch on the planet when it comes to buying kids stuff, and I don't think you ever once asked me to buy anything from your kids' fundraisers ever. It's just, it's it's it's I honestly honestly, it's worse straight up. I don't think you ever asked me once. You know what we did good that was interesting when we were young?

SPEAKER_04 2:54

We talked about it uh last week or whatever. Paper drives. And then handing out phone books. Yeah back when there was phone books, there's not phone books now. That was better suited because the kids gotta walk up there and they do the guilt thing. Uh give me the money. You don't like candy? You don't like kids. Oh, and people talk about it. The girl scots are great. Yeah, but every time you walk into a store sometimes, but it sees them, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:23

You gotta look the other way sometime because you know, my club, it's the St. Anthony swim team. Do you want me to bag your groceries? I'm like, no. I'm not gonna how much what's it gonna set me?

SPEAKER_04 3:37

How much more?

SPEAKER_03 3:38

Oh, it's just a donation. Yeah, but I'm not gonna be the you know. Well, that's how they started the pot stores. I'm not gonna be the Richard that has them bagged the groceries and walks past them with the walk of shame.

SPEAKER_04 3:48

The donations, that's how they started the pot stores here. We can't legally sell it, but people donate. And it was like, well, I don't know, I could ask somebody that's in an earshot, how that like that went on for about a couple years. Like, how do you get all it's not they don't sell it, it's just a donation.

SPEAKER_03 4:02

It's a donation, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 4:03

But so that that because you get a box of thin mints, you can crush them in a in an hour, and then you're like, oh Christ.

SPEAKER_03 4:11

I now this is probably true. But there's that theory of shrinkflation, but it feels like you get less ounces of cookies per package. Am I wrong? Is it is if I just my fat ass just wants more cookies, or do you think we're getting less ounces?

SPEAKER_04 4:28

I believe, even though we're in the world of bigger plates, yeah, because there's bigger bills or bigger prices for the food. I want to say somewhere along the line, someone talks about it.

SPEAKER_03 4:39

Like they deleted a couple of rows or something.

SPEAKER_04 4:41

Not rows, they just made them shorter, and I believe you're right, and I think it's it's it's still probably we'll have our crack research staff, Jamie.

SPEAKER_03 4:48

Get on that.

SPEAKER_04 4:49

Get on that. We want answers before this show's over.

SPEAKER_03 4:52

That's unlikely. That's unlikely. So, first Jamie doesn't exist. He works for Joe Rogan. He doesn't work for us, sadly.

SPEAKER_04 5:01

Anyways, did you what was you just funny thing about I'm not gonna bring up the joke, but the Kevin Hart roast?

SPEAKER_03 5:07

Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_04 5:09

It was the girl talking about who's something with Joe Rogan and his test. Never mind.

SPEAKER_03 5:16

But I actually Chelsea Handler had the joke of the night. I'm not going to say it because yeah. Okay, Mike Hammer. We've talked about selling stuff for various sports teams. We've talked about delivering newspapers. What was your first job?

SPEAKER_04 5:30

My first job that I remember, not sure exactly how the firing order went, but it was either I think it was the ambassador, hotel, coach, and restaurant, or Jolly Troll. Jolly Troll only lasted two or three days because if anybody worked there, the manager was very friendly. Does not need to be around young people, especially young boys.

SPEAKER_03 6:06

He's weird and nothing happened, but he was just the induced, the the creepy, the creepiness factor was pretty high.

SPEAKER_04 6:12

I told my mom after she picked me up because these were all jobs before I could drive. I said, Mom, do not ever bring me back again. And this was yeah, 30, because we had literally banquets and stuff, then I never could look at it the same. But that was the but the first sustained one I remember was the ambassador.

SPEAKER_03 6:32

Okay. And what were you doing at the ambassador? Now you can Kenny worked there with you, right? Kenny got a job there after me.

SPEAKER_04 6:38

I got a job there. I know it was dishwashers. Okay. We were dishwashing in pots and pans. And I played sports, so I always got there after that. So I always got there at 5:30 or 6. And the person that got there earliest always got what they called the cafe, the Camino Cafe dishwasher. And that cafe closed at 6 or 7, and that dishwasher was out early.

SPEAKER_03 7:05

Oh, you gotta be there.

SPEAKER_04 7:07

Jeff Anderson worked there, not the Jeff Anderson older than us, and a couple other people I remember older, and they get there. But because I played sports, I always got there five, three, six, the last one there, and the last one got pots and pans. And this was a room about 15 feet by 15 feet, four large sink bins. Well, one unit, but there was four different tubs in there, big. And this was a supper club, so they had, you know, from Fridays, the big cast iron soups, tokenos, whatever. Massive, massive, big, and I would get there, and I half the time I could not see the sink because there was so many things, and it took me the first 45 minutes just to pull all the stuff out of the sink and sort it, and then clean dishes for about five hours just doing pots and pans. But my manager had to come in because I was union, you were union, and I was required to take a lunch or dinner, whatever break. So I would have to go sit down there with the older cooks that would just freaking hassle me. And I'm like, I don't want to eat, and now I'm getting in hassled by you weirdos, but it was interesting. That was I get home about 11. That was this is well before child labor laws come in. Oh, yeah. I mean I was yeah, I guess I rode my bike there, I was well before 16.

SPEAKER_03 8:38

Yeah, I was 15. I started at TGA Fridays. I remember that. That was big. I was like, wow, you had a fancy restaurant. That was a bit. It was actually. Do you remember a guy? I don't know. I must have had him in a class because I don't remember him, and I don't remember him. Well, I don't remember him well, but for some reason he got me to apply for this job, Kenny DeForest. Yes. And he was two years older than us, and I said to Michelle's great. And yeah, I got a job there at the time. It was during the Marielle boat lift. Castro let out some folks from Cuba that maybe were some of the less desirable folks from Cuba, from kind of sanitariums and prisons and stuff. But if you need to know what happened historically, Pacino Scarface. And you'll know it. But they had a ton of Cubans dishwashers and they couldn't speak Spanish. So I show up, I'm 14, I have not turned 15 yet, and they hire me on the spot. I'm a prep cook and I'm talking to dishwashers and I'm telling them their stuff. And it was awesome. And then I hadn't turned 16 yet. I cut the end off my thumb. I remember that. Big scandal. And it was like kind of my boss, Joe Coz, Joe, Joe, amazing guy. His wife was a nurse at Methodist. He went on to be the general manager all of TGI Fridays nationally. But Joe's a good dude. Joe's, how old are you? And I'm like, don't ever tell anybody that I know that.

unknown 10:03

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:03

I'm like, okay. And then I didn't know nothing. I had some time off work. I got a check, and then I got like a $1,700 check. Because apparently I was permanently partially disabled in my thumb, and you can barely tell, but there's a little thumb missing.

SPEAKER_04 10:17

Well, it could be a thumb or a thumb or a hand model with that.

SPEAKER_03 10:21

I'm telling you, $1,600 at 16 is kind of awesome. It's kind of awesome. Big money. So, but yeah, I worked there four to midnight. Four to midnight from my freshman year until I got fired my senior year. You were part of that of why I got fired.

SPEAKER_04 10:41

Where did we go?

SPEAKER_03 10:42

We were at a party, and the older brother of one of our classmates uh pierced my ear. I do not know where this party was, but I knew that we were like in a hallway or like a staircase where my ear was pierced. I was feeling no pain at the time, so I didn't notice it. And all I knew was that you needed to spin it around and not take it out for X number of months. So I show up at work and they're like, you gotta get take that out. That's not allowed. And I'm like, why? Well, because it looks trashy. I'm like, but the public doesn't see me. I'm in the back. No, it's against the rules. I'm like, Sally has them on all the time. Well, Sally's a girl. I'm like, so you're discriminating me. That's the rule, Carlos. Fire. Boom. So then I worked at one of the former cooks there had left to open a brand new restaurant that is still exists in St. Paul called Plum's Saloon and Dining Hall.

SPEAKER_04 11:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:32

So that was my second job. I lasted all of 17 days. McQuen Quinlan's or McQuinan and all of it, but yeah. I saw some things that we can talk about later that are maybe less than legal while I was there, but they did not really want to hire a lot of people, so they had me working like seven days a week when they're paying me cash and overtime stuff, and 17 days in a row. I'm like, I can't. I quit. I walked out.

SPEAKER_04 11:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:55

So where did you go after the ambassador?

SPEAKER_04 11:58

Oh god, I don't know. I spent a lot of time. You had a lot.

SPEAKER_03 12:00

I mean, I let me just let me say the ones I know. Shaky's Pizza. Yeah. Snyder Drug. Yep. Tom Thumb. Yep. K Gas? Yep. Which ones am I missing? I did Embers. Embers? I was at Embers.

SPEAKER_04 12:16

I did a few of the Embers after after Plums. I was at Embers. Yeah, I did a few of the weekend overnight shifts, and I just couldn't stop falling asleep in the booth, so I'm like, I can't do this. What were you doing? Were you cooking? Bussing and dishing. And this was before driver's license. I know I'm gonna forget a few because I worked at Napa for a brief bit. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 12:37

That was back in our right by the post office. Yep. Tom Thumb was fun. Tom Thumb. Oh my the it not because of you, but it's amazing that stayed in business. That's all I can say. Yeah, oh that was interesting.

SPEAKER_04 12:52

And a lot of my jobs were based on places that would accommodate my sports schedule. Yeah. And and that was big because I wasn't gonna not do it, but I remember as I got a little older, high school. Remember Snyder'cause you'd pick me up a lot after work and in exchange for stuff, but that didn't sound right. Never mind. The the remember working at out of high school, Domino's, because they would go around my sports schedule there. I had a great manager and he moved around. Well, I remember working at the one in Minnetonka. Marty worked there. That was interesting. I think back of that, we didn't have phones to get to the address. Yeah. There was a big map. Anybody worked there? There's a big map on the way out the back door to get to your car. And we didn't have to put little fake sirens on our car or anything. We just got to go.

SPEAKER_03 13:48

Oh, but that was when they were guaranteeing the half hour, too, wasn't it? It was.

SPEAKER_04 13:52

And we would you'd look at the map and you'd go, and you'd go. And that was your you got in your car, you knew where to drive, you didn't have your phone, no GPS, no nothing, no Hudson books. I mean some people put some in there just when they're really stuck, but you just and usually the dominoes had a three to five mile radius.

SPEAKER_00 14:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:11

So you weren't going that far. But we didn't have phones to call in. You couldn't call into the headquarters. Say, I'm lost. You're lost. You go back. And then sometimes, and sometimes you'd get two orders because it didn't really do three unless you were good.

SPEAKER_03 14:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:28

And you know exactly and usually three and a half hours.

SPEAKER_03 14:31

That's challenging.

SPEAKER_04 14:33

Usually it's repeat customers where you know exactly, oh, it's for Bill, Kay, and Sue, and whatever. But that was fun because you got to do both, cook and drive.

SPEAKER_03 14:46

And now did you ever make yourself a super custom pizza?

SPEAKER_04 14:51

Wait, when we were hungry, there wouldn't be really said we cooked, but one of the cooks.

SPEAKER_03 14:58

What if you make a one by mistake?

SPEAKER_04 14:59

Are you let it go a little bit too far past done? And that was the wink. Oops, everybody gets a piece of pizza, even the manager being on it. I'm not this one's too done. I guess we'll just have to eat it and make another one. Who was the other one for? I don't remember. But yeah, people, the restaurants that don't feed, especially pizza restaurants that don't feed their employees.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:22

Considering the cost of it, you're like, it's yeah, it's yeah, exactly. Exactly. That's I remember TGI Fridays used to do annual security interviews where you weren't hooked up to a machine, but they would take you into a room and a guy would say, So, is anybody stealing anything? This and that, and he goes, I don't know. Maybe grab a fry while you walk by the fry bench, this and that. When what is like people stealing steaks out the back?

SPEAKER_02 15:49

I'm like, I said a French fry, dude. Yeah, no one's stealing anything.

unknown 15:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:54

Dude, come on now.

SPEAKER_04 15:56

Yeah, that was big before video cameras, but yes, a lot of restaurant downfall is is it's shrinkage. All of a sudden, a prime rib disappears. Yeah. That's a I know when I had the restaurant and we were we had prime rib night, and you're like, we cut them three-quarters of an inch, and they're cutting them an inch and a quarter, and you're like, let's do some math here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:18

After I'm supposed to get 40 pieces out of this or 20. I don't know what you were in the hospitality business, but man, that's the hardest business. Because like restaurants, it's like going, okay, your inventory, you have to throw it away if it goes bad. You you can't, you know it's not like Chuck, who has a storage full of some Halloween shit he might have bought 10 years ago and he can still put it in a store now. Adult stuff costumes, you know, and then for the liquor part, you got liquor. Yeah, don't go back, and you get liquor, but it has a tendency to walk away and money and cash. I guess now cash is less prevalent, but cash is still so it's the wisdom from my camera. Okay, so I hope you're careful about what you say because I listen to what you say and then I keep them as rules in my head. But yeah, you you told me as a restaurant owner, you always have to assume that your employees are stealing from you. You just need to rely on employees that know to keep it to a minimum.

SPEAKER_04 17:13

You're going to hard part is the hard to accuse them to do this. If you're an owner and you work enough, you know what your Tuesdays are. And if all of a sudden there's a dip on Tuesdays for three, four weeks. I I try to say to the employees, hey, I I get it. If you need 20, 40, 100 bucks, just ask to borrow it, and there's a good chance I'll forget. Yeah. But as soon as you take it, that's different.

SPEAKER_03 17:43

That's that totally changes.

SPEAKER_04 17:45

You feel like you deserve it. You you feel entitled to it. Now it's easier and easier to keep doing it. And I always said there's more than there's more than just stealing cash out of the till.

SPEAKER_03 17:59

There's overpouring, there's not charging for drinks. There's a how much money you get, three fives and five ones back.

SPEAKER_04 18:07

No, there's not many people do that, but sometimes you'll do some of the things because you know it's a big tipper, but usually the big tippers don't want you to give them a deal, they're gonna do it. But there's customer service that's stealing what you don't you're stealing from your fellow employees, yeah, and everybody what you don't give them good service, yeah, so they don't come back, so therefore the crowds aren't as big.

SPEAKER_03 18:29

Well, and that's the thing is you don't want to run a situation where your bartenders aren't empowered to know, hey, this client deserves a little something because they're keeping them. The thing is, I would imagine, like a lot of things in sales and getting people to you know volume to spend money at your bars. No, but what I was gonna say is there's a little bit of flattery, there's a little bit of ego, you know what I mean? And for some customers, getting that little extra, this is my place, this is my place, this is my place, huh? And then and you that's not lying. You know what I mean? It's not lying, but it is it's it's what did what did Del Carnegie say? What's the sweetest sounding word in the world? A person's own name of somebody else's name. So he say norm.

SPEAKER_04 19:14

There's two things, yeah. Taking care of the ones that take care of you, and it's volume, or it's whatever, and it's also the owner that wants to sit in the best booth in his restaurant, and you're like, Yeah, you you wait, you own a restaurant, you own a place that cooks and serves food that's been doing it for thousands? Yeah, you're not that good. You're an owner restaurant. Anyone that thinks they're the best bar restaurant owner, there's a lot of you.

SPEAKER_03 19:41

Get over it, but do your job. Oh my god, businesses that let their employees park in the prime parking spots? Are you kidding me?

SPEAKER_04 19:49

Yeah, but the the other one was I say this with the work ethic of a lot of people. Don't tell everybody how much you work, let them notice.

SPEAKER_03 19:59

Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 19:59

Because it feels a lot better to you when you get noticed at yeah, and somebody that's telling you how much they really want sympathy. Well, I don't want sympathy, then why'd you tell me? I don't care. If you work a lot, I'll notice it. And when I worked in the they're like, God, you're here all the time. And I'm like, Yeah, that's because I own it, but you're here a lot too. You know, I can't. You're here a lot too to notice it.

SPEAKER_03 20:20

It's one of the ultimate rules for screenwriting is don't tell show. Yeah, show it happening. So my camera, I've been up to something. What have you been up to? Uh, I have been working on another podcast. Okay. With our friend Joe Riley. Big Joe Riley. Big Joe, a new Classic Solid.

SPEAKER_04 20:43

Class Act.

SPEAKER_03 20:45

Joe is a top-notch human being. Met Joe in youth sports and in junior high. Uh super great guy. But he and I have launched a podcast that will premiere this Tuesday, which is tomorrow, called Forgotten Television. And we're starting with one of our favorite shows, The White Shadow. That was fun. If you remember The White Shadow. So, Joe and I are gonna be working on that podcast, releasing it Tuesday. We'll let everybody know how to watch it. And then, as a bit of a sneak preview, you and I are working on a bit of a new podcast that we're gonna start messing with and recording today. But stay tuned, folks. I think you might find that one very helpful in your day-to-day life. Yeah. Are we done? Uh, do you have anything you want to add?

SPEAKER_04 21:29

I was gonna say, then we have to get to later because we basically just talked about jobs up to about 18 or 19.

SPEAKER_03 21:36

Well, I meant St. Louis Park jobs because at that point I left St. Louis Park.

SPEAKER_04 21:39

I know I had some other jobs, I just can't remember.

SPEAKER_03 21:41

All right, we'll do we'll we'll do a jobs part two. How does that sound?

SPEAKER_04 21:45

Yeah, but I gotta try to think of the other jobs I had. Had a lot, had a lot of those Sunday afternoon. Things are going good. It's summertime. I don't want to go into work. Yeah, and I tended to not give the grand.

SPEAKER_03 22:00

I'm a die excuse. I just got like our dear friend who used it. And then his mom frequented the store. They said, Oh, Nano, I'm so sorry about your mom.

SPEAKER_04 22:11

I tended to not use that. I just tended to say, I'm not gonna make it a lot. I just I'm not coming in. You could get fired, so it's up to you.

SPEAKER_03 22:19

I remember working. I remember working a TGI Friday shift, and I now remember that I got Kenny a job there. So I was working TGI Fridays. It's New Year's Eve. Two of my buddies are working with me, Mark Thompson and Kenny Benning. Well, Mark and Kenny say, screw this, let's go to a New Year's Eve party. We're out of here, Carlos. And I'm like, yeah, I'm not gonna leave because I got a car and a girlfriend and I pay bills, and yeah, no, I'm not leaving. And I remember my manager, Joe Coss, Carlos, you're not gonna walk out and eat like now. Because you stay the night, I'll give you a dinner for two and a free bottle of champagne. I'm like, okay. Sure. I was gonna stay anyways, but okay. Let me think about that. Okay, I want two dinners. Oh. And I don't blame once again. I don't say that to blame Kenny or Mark or anybody else because we were dumbasses at that age. But I learned the lesson of just be careful about vouching for friends.

SPEAKER_04 23:19

Yeah, and they're not trying to make tarnish your word.

SPEAKER_03 23:22

The thing is, no, and particularly not at that age. When you're that age, you're like squirrel. No, no, but here's the reality people are going to act in their own best and self-interest. Yeah. And there are friendships that exist where I'm certain that you would never do anything that was against my interest just for the sake of it. Yeah. But there might be a situation, like if you can save Carlos or Georgia, Carlos, it was a nice run. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? So once again, that was not meant as a judgment on them. But I think that we should come back to a jobs part two. Unless you want me to pause and work on work on that with you.

SPEAKER_04 24:07

It was jobs St. Louis Park, other things. Certainly. That's good. It's traffic's getting a lot busy here on the bench. You've been working a lot. How can folks get a hold of you? If they need some work done, uh, we do we fix stuff, we build stuff, we have a little handyman slash construction type thing.

SPEAKER_03 24:25

And I know you've been busy. The industry is busy, so folks got something they gotta get done. Reach out to Hammer. We do stuff, yeah. All right, and and and you're uh writing and you're stuck. Writing, I'm still working. I'm hoping to have the ghost of Lake Osaka. I said, by the end of May that I've got less than two weeks, so I'm working on it. Well, that's cool.

SPEAKER_01 24:43

I think, as we say, Hammer and Carlos out watching all the world go by now, underneath the hazy sky now. Got my ticket for the long ride. Yeah, from my parkbench perspective. I got that wide eye view online. From my park bench perspective, open me to win the park.