The Many Woes of Dunkin Dave

 

I met Dunkin Dave at Club Body Tech in the Duval Square center perhaps twenty years ago. We would often speak to each other during our early morning workouts. He was a very personable guy, very  outgoing, and super friendly to everybody. He almost always had a smile on his face and certainly all conversations started out on a high note. 

He told me he owned the Dunkin Donuts franchise in Key West. The principal store was at the Overseas Market in the same building that now houses DOMINO'S PIZZA. I recall there was a second Dunkin Donuts at 502 Southard Street - just a couple hundred feet from my office. You remember the saying "You can't eat just one?" It's true when it comes to Dunkin Donuts.

I said our conversations would start out on a high note, but they often regressed. Dave shared his three tales of woe with me. He was proud to own a waterfront condominium which looked directly out too the Atlantic Ocean. He loved the view but he was terribly annoyed at hearing the upstairs neighbor walk across the floor and each time the neighbor flushed the toilet. He said he could hear water flowing through the pipes. There was nothing he could do. Except leave.

Dave complained about that the Key West fire department would call him each time the department went to a fire. They expected Dave to deliver a two or three big boxes of donuts to the firemen. Not one time. All the time.

 While I was a creature of habit as to my arrival time at the gym, Dave was not. He might not show up at the gym for a couple of weeks. We discussed his absence. He said he got up very early each morning to go to the store and start making donuts. He said he could not depend on his employees to show up. That is a proverbial problem of every business owner here. The road to Key West is paved with good intentions. It is easy to get a good paying job here. The problem is getting people to show up for work every day. I understood his pain.

And one day Dunkin Dave did not show up. He left town.