#54 Eat a croqueta

This was the scene of CroquetaFest 2010.

I did not start it. I swear.

I enter the bakery section at the Publix grocery in South Miami and am perusing the pastries. (Much to my diet's chagrin.) Suddenly I hear a guy in Spanish say: "Qué estás haciendo?"

I turn around and I see a man in a green Publix uniform leaning against this glass case and dumping as many croquetas as he can into a plastic Publix bag. A platter of freebies had just been set out. (It was an hour to close.)

"Te están mirando," another employee tells his chubby coworker, nervously snatching the croquetas. "Las cámeras," he added.

I thought it was funny, and sad at the same time. The guy seemed very excited about the croquetas. (Hey, I love free food, too.) But he was almost too excited. I thought maybe he was hungry. Maybe they should just give the leftover croquetas at the end of the day to employees every day.

When the employees left, I had a couple of croquetas myself. Again, to my diet's chagrin. They are totally fried.