My New Job

You should know that I've been busy on account of it's break, and during break you must do things like get your ipod fixed, buy cereal, watch 10 episodes of 24 waiting for you on Tivo, and get sick.

Why I got sick is an interesting story. Whenever I come home there is always the pressure to make money. My mom is always reminding me to make money with helpful reminders like "get a job" and "If you don't get a job then I will stop buying you tappiocca pudding" which she says, or spells in magnetic poetry on, you guessed it, the fridge (containing the tappiocca pudding).

So, we look in the phone book for what place would possibly hire a 19 year old with no skills who is available for about 4 days. There is one job typing and one job doing manual labor for a company called Labor Ready. Now, one thing I've learned in your life is that you have to play to your strength's so my first choice was obviously the labor. Manual labor appealed to my main strength: my strength! If there was an application I WOULD HAVE WRITEN THIS.

But there wasn't an application. When I arrived at the "office" which was really a large empty room: half carpeted but fully depressing, I found a morbidly obese women listening to "If you don't know me by now" and eating Taco Bell. The song was appropriate, because in an instant I knew more about her than I would ever have cared to.

She told me I had to fill out a 73 question survey to see if I qualified for the job. The survey was a laugh riot! Here's an example of some of the questions:

1. When was the last time you smoked Weed?
a) today
b) within a month
c) never

2. When was the last time you were in a fist fight?
a) today
b) within a month
c) never

3.When was the last time you did angel dust
etc...

The questions rotated between drugs and fist fights, and I was doing well until this bizzare question:

16. If you got in a fist fight right now, would you win?
a) yes
b) maybe
c) probably not
d) no

Answering yes would suggest strength and perseverance. Also, if it was a fight over safety, for example, my boss is instructing my men to transport hazardous waste in their bare hands and I go "not on my watch" and then he starts fighting me, it would probably be good if I could win the fight. But I put no. I was just trying to be honest.

They called my house at 8 am the next morning with my first assignment. I was going to be moving boxes into storage. I got to the work site and I met my disgruntled Eastern European boss named Emil. Emil was the kind of guy, that when I meet people like him I wonder what it's like to have no joy in your life. Emil's favorite word, I think, was "idiot", and his favorite sentence was "don't put that there you idiot".

I was not too much help moving as it turns out, because I'm actually not strong, but my coworker got the job done. I felt bad when he shouldered the brunt of a 300 pound granite table top from a moving van, but not bad enough to not accept the exact same pay as him.

When we were done unloading the boxes I figured the job was over, but Emil had one more task in mind. We were to help him fold his filthy, infested moving blankets and put them back in the van. These blankets were like nothing I'd ever dealt with, invoking sneezes galore and a near vomit experience, discretely supressed but foul tasting nonetheless. Speaking of taste, my taste test of a white powder upon one of the blankets was inconclusive with regards to anthrax, but I remain highly suspicious.

At the end of our work shift (9 am-2pm) Emil was to fill out my workslip. Under hours worked he wrote 5, whispering kindly, "the extra hour is your tip". I didn't have the energy to teach emil the concept of arithmetic then and there, so I got into my car and drove to hq. There, I received 33 dollars in cash at hq and headed home.

The next morning I woke up with an aching sore throat and a runny nose (please note: two symptoms of anthrax). I used the money to pay back my mom, because I owed her 30 dollars from the night before. All in all, an awesome experience and I would definitely do it again. Thanks Labor Ready for making my dream come true!