My first day of work at a 3D software company and we canoe/ferry over to Toronto Centre Island for a department BBQ. I learned the secret of making cohesive hamburgers that are less likley to fall apart - add eggs and oatmeal to the ground meat mix, as oatmeal acts like a sticky glue when cooked, according to Ian the resident BBQ chef and today’s organizer. Never tried adding oatmeal or eggs before, but all of this will be good reference info if I ever need to organize a similar BBQ trip myself.

I did actually start the day quite normally, with a company tour to meet other relevant departments, getting the tax forms from HR, being shown the new but slow, beta-status content management system I will be using in the next couple of weeks, and even attended my first meeting. But then from about noon onwards we took the taxi out to the waterfront for our department team-building “day”, which was the canoe/ferry trip over to Centre Island for the BBQ for the rest of the afternoon.

We never actually got to official team-building activities involving some fancy baton. The ferry trip took at least a twenty-minute wait, and it seemed to take an hour getting canoes for those who took the canoe routes, then there was preparation of the site like hauling over two park benches to our park grill, pre-burning the grill, so it wasn’t until at least 2:15 that we finally brought out the nine hamburgers wrapped in foil with paper seperators in our cooler box to place on the grill. That was followed by the three veggie burgers before we started eating the meat hamburgers that were ready. There were two bags of twelve bread/hamburger buns each, minus one which was pecked away by an agressive seagull who punctured a huge hole in the bag while we weren’t looking.

We also took out the paper plates for the large, deep aluminum tray of salad. When the remaining hamburgers were ready we put them aside and brought out the ten or so chicken breast shishkabobs and three tofu ones to put on the BBQ grill, so those were eaten a bit later.

Apparently the shishkabob sticks should have been soaked in water to prevent them from charring and darkening when placed on the grill but Ian didn’t have time.

In addition to all of this food, Ian also distributed small individual brown bag snack kits beforehand at the start of the trip, each containing a bag of junk food, a juice drink, an apple and an orange, so all of this was more than adequate for our group of about eleven people.

By the time we finished eating it was already about 4pm and time to go.

Apparently there is a company-wide BBQ on the above-street porch on this week, but I’m not sure if I can handle another BBQ, as I always get so thirsty afterwards. Today at least, was a great first day at work. As my new colleagues say, tomorrow I will actually have to work!

Photo: Nine delicious meat burgers with garlic, basil, oregano, oatmeal and egg mixed into the meat by Ian