(snipped in the middle by me, indicated by the ellipsis)
One of my “favorite” things when I cooked in a fast food place was the guy who would come in with a list, and was apparently ordering a meal for his entire block:
“I need 15 double cheeseburgers, one with no lettuce, one with no tomatoes, two with no cheese, one with no catsup, one with mustard instead of catsup, three with no mayo, four with bacon, but one of those just wants bacon and cheese and nothing else on it, one with no mayo, and one normal. I also need five large orders of fries and ten small orders of fries, with no salt on one of the larges and three of the smalls. Nine large Pepsis, a medium Pepsi, an extra-large Diet Pepsi, one small orange, one small Dr. Pepper, one small root beer, and one small 7-Up. To go.”
So we’d make all those items, hopefully with no mistakes, and then since the burgers were all the same item but with special requests, we’d have to break out the Sharpie and hand-label each and every wrapper. While the next customers in line were all wondering what the hell was taking so long.
ETA: Oh yeah, and this wasn’t a chain place, it was a locally-owned independent burger joint. So the grill was small, and the buns were toasted on the grill, not in a separate bun toaster. So since 30 hamburger patties were going to pretty much take up the entire grill, we’d have to first toast the fifteen buns (again, taking up the entire grill), then set them aside and put the 30 patties on the grill to cook, dress the buns while the patties were cooking, trying to keep all the special orders straight, making sure the patties didn’t burn while the buns were being dressed… all this with just one cook on duty.