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| I kept telling myself I'd update when something interesting happened at
work. Here's something interesting: I'm fired! Not really,
just not given any hours. When my boss Brian first got the
contract, it was for 5 days a week at 20 dollars an hour, so long as he
brought on a second person to work the store with him (me). So he
hired me and within a week the owner of the store downed it to 4 days a
week at 15 dollars an hour, which means if I'm working the store at the
same time he's only making 6 dollars an hour, so my hours got cut to 10
a week. Then, the owner decided to cut the hours down to 3 days a
week. Shit rolls downhill, I'm laying at the bottom, I get fired
on my day off. It was like one of those comedy movies where you
see like "Newline Cinemas presents:" and then there's a shot of a guy
laying in bed asleep with daylight coming through the window, and then
the phone starts rining and the screen cuts to text again. "A
david lynch Film" and then back to the guy. "unnnh..Hello?"
"YOU'RE FIRED *slam*. *dialtone*" "....Okay....". "Produced
by: Jerry Bruckheimer" *beep* turns phone off, goes back to
sleep. There was a lot more "I'm sorry i have to do this to you"
and "I still really want you to work for me when i find something else"
in my conversation, but the backbone of the plot remains the
same. I caught an open and shut case teenage shoplifter with
priors and a couple who knew one of the cashiers who may be helping
people steal the sunday before. Owasome.
So I was unemployed from last thursday until today when I
woke up at the crack of noon thirty and checked my email, where a brief
message with a phone number had been left in responce to a job inquiry
about an ad on craigslist. I called the number and had a brief
discussion with the guy and he gave me an interview for 2:30 that
afternoon. A quick shower, shave, brush of the teeth got me
started on my way, and I rescued my nice pants and polo shirt out of
the laundry hamper (smelled ok to me...) and took off towards south
Seattle. the I-5 onramp is 3 blocks from my house (2 up one
over), it took 8 minutes to on the interstate. The place was
behind another buisness in the warehouse district near Qwest and Safeco
Field. There were real estate signs everywhere (more or less what
they do there) and I walked into the front office to start my 5 minute
interview/introduction to all the employees. Then I was told to
give it a try thursday at 7:30AM and start working Saturday. If I
decide driving around seattle in a company car and putting signs in
front of houses for 10 dollars an hour is for me then I'll be working
Saturdays and Tuesdays, for "as long as it takes". How long is
that? "10,12 hour days sometimes." Score.
Getting a job on my birthday was awesome, as was my night
out with the roommates. We tried to go to hooters but the parking
lot was absolutely packed and I was too hungry to wait so we went to
Ivars on the waterfront. Fun thing about Ivars is the majority of
the eating area is outdoors and they encourage people to feed the
seagulls. One woman went over to try to feed one a fry
immediately after getting her foor (instead of throwing it from her
seat) and got mobbed by 5 others that were hiding on the roof, causing
her to scream and run, causing us to laugh. Then one stood on the
railing nearest our table and just stared at us until I got creeped out
and threw ice at it. It was unsettling enough to make us
leave. Then off to gameworks, all you can play for 3 hours for 25
bucks, good times, couldn't win at ANY of the racing games against
scott and klepto  . I did work scott's bags in virtual baseball
and beat the fishing simulation however. They picked up the tab
for both, so that was a pretty sweet present. I also got an
expensive, sharp chefs knife and Shaun of the dead on DVD from my
parents, and a little extra spending money from my grandpa. And I
bough a WACOM Intuos2 graphics tablet with some money I had left over
in my paypal account for about 20% of what they cost new for
myself. All in all good birthday. The only bad part is the
homework, because I can't technically count the noise my neighbors are
making having sex right now since it's the 20th. I hope he
wrapped it up.
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| The 3:30 AM to 3:30 PM hours working for UPS weren't really doing it
for me so I secured and aced an interview for a Rent-a-cop agency this
afternoon. Pending my watching a FOUR HOUR Washington State
Security Officer Pre-Assignment Training video and some government
paperwork/fingerprinting/FBI background check (not joking) I'll start
training in takedowns and handcuffing, maybe by the end of the
weekend. I think this is common knowledge, but if you're going to
plan an interview in the Seattle area somewhere public, don't choose
"Starbucks" as your locale unless you can give specific address,
directions, and landmarks. I was supposed to meet my employer at
the starbucks next to the babies-R-us but instead ended up 2 blocks
away at the Starbucks near the office depot and Barnes and Noble.
He met me there and we had a really casual,
enjoyable interview. He pretty much laid down his buisness plan,
which entails getting private contracts from retail stores where we
would work as plainclothes detectives and detain people upon leaving
the store with merchandise. In the future he also hoped to do
guard work for apartment complexes and neighborhood, which is "the
easiest goddamn job in the world. Just cruise around in your own
car with a flashlight all night." He's starting this buisness
from the ground up after 7 years of working for big time private loss
prevention companies and getting fed up with them. That raised
some red flags but he already has contracts, so there's arleady work to
be done. He also made a large point of saying that nine
dollars an hour wasn't nearly enough and that he was going to pay me
more ASAP and help me move up in the loss prevention world however he
could. Good dude all around.
I'm going to leave the rest of this up to Q&A as
best I can, as I'm sure people can take only so many detailed interview
breakdowns. Yes, I get a badge, and handcuffs, no, no gun or
nighstick or flashlight whos batteries may or may not work.
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| Before going to my interview today I made a lot of predictions based on
things I heard/researched before hand. I had heard that job
placement companies like the one I was going to liked to tell you how
great your interview was and that they were sure you would get hired
before the REAL people in charge decided that you weren't up to
snuff. I also expected it to be casual, as general laborers
aren't the suit and tie type. Third, I looked at craigslist one
last time to see if I could get any more information about what I was
getting into before the interview and found the exact same ad except
the line "PT/FT JOBS AVAILABLE" was replaced by "SAT/SUN 3:30AM-3:30PM
24 HOURS A WEEK" which made me assume that this was the position I was
trying for if I wasn't interested in full time.
Therefore, in preperation, I printed a simple resume with
no cover letter and wore a smart polo shirt and slacks; something to
put me above the rest without looking like I was over
compensating/desperate/a tool. I talked to myself all day and
made scott stand there while I went over the answers to "What do you
feel you bring to the company?" and ugh "Where do you see
yourself in 5 years?" and double ugh "What's your greatest
fault?" I showered, shaved twice, brushed my teeth twice, made
sure to drink plenty of fluids and bring mints, and brought my shirt
along with me so it would be as dry and wrinkle free as possible when I
got to the placement center.
I interviewed myself the entire way there and
practiced highlighting points of my experience and personality not
expressed on the application or resume. When I got there,
everything I had predicted was more or less correct. There were
at least 3 other people in the lobby at all times, filling out various
forms of lengthy paper work and 3 overweight women sitting behind desks
talking about soap operas and how they can't figure out how to work the
printer like overweight women with deskjobs do (in my
experience). As I walked in they asked if they could help me and
I told them my name and I was there for an interview and the woman who
helped me couldn't have cared less what my name was and handed me the
SIX PAGE application form that I spent the next 15-20 minutes filling
out. A large, middle aged, gristly guy in shorts and a long
sleeve t-shirt next to me waited until their backs were turned and
grumbled at me "So much damned paperwork..." and I laughed and agreed
with him and kept writing my application novel. I was glad I
spent a bit of time in the waiting room because I was able to observe
the fact that interviews only lasted about 5 minutes and everyone was
told that they "fit the profile" or some nonsense and given tax and
background check paperwork to fill out (another 7 pages).
Eventually I finished and stood up and Maranda my interview lady took
it from me and comandeered the interview room where we went and sat for
the "interview".
The interview was probably 6 questions long, and many of
them weren't questions. Since I knew that she wasn't going to be
able to make very many oppertunities for me to highlight my strenuous
work background or forklift experience I made sure to extrapolate as
much as possible whenever I could. The only thing that wasn't her
just asking about something that could be read directly from either
piece of paper she held in her hand was "Why are you going to school,
what's your dream job of the future" and I stupidly said my real dream
job of owning my own repair shop (because I didn't realize that the
"interview" was so crappy it was just asking about things on the
application, I thought we were just warming up for the first few
questions) instead of saying "Working for a company that acknowledges
my hard work and dedication and allows me to advance my career
accordingly." Three or four questions later it was over and I was
told that I fit the profile and then some, and we set up an orientation
time on the spot and I filled out all sorts of legal mumbo jumbo like I
mentioned earlier, then thanked her and left.
The employer is UPS in a warehouse where they handle
all of and only Target merchandise. My job would be to unload
trucks, check in all the merchandise, and sort it 3:30AM to 3:30PM
SAT/SUN. 9.75 an hour, 35 minute drive from my house. It
has innumerous pros and cons in my mind, and I still haven't decided if
I'll take it given that I do get it. I feel like I made a pretty
remarkable impression when compared to the other applicants, and the
interviewer seemed quite impressed. Up until next tuesday's
orientation, however, I'll be scouring craigslist and shooting off
resumes like bullets in a john woo movie. So far I've applied to
be a math tutor, a delivery driver, and a plain clothes loss prevention
detective (AKA rentacop). If you really read this far, put
something that's neither "congrats" or "good luck" in the comment box,
possibly a short story in 30 words or less. Thanks for your time.
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I'm going to try to save you 9 dollars by saying the new Star Wars
movie was abysmal. It didn't make any sense. The beauty of
the Star Wars universe is this idea of good vs. evil, the eternal
struggle, the force vs. the dark side. Anakin just decided in one
scene to go to the dark side and stop doing anything for the light
side, just kill whoever he was told to. That's not a struggle,
that's just stupid. Also, R2D2 doesn't have any handlike
appendages, nor the ability nor cunning to actually thwart any
attackers. I'm not a big StarWars fan, but I appreciate art, and
George Lucas is destroying his own. It's like making movies of
yourself pooping on your kids and selling it for profit. Hey,
they're you're kids, you can do whatever you want. Nobody can
tell you how to raise them.
To end this on a positive note; I have a job interview
wednesday. I was just screwing around clicking on things in
craigslist and ended up filling out an application with enough right
answers to get an interview at a placement center for a forklift
position. I don't have high hopes or expectations, and i don't
really need the job, so I'm more or less in this for the experience,
and maybe I'll get lucky and not have to eat the costco size brick of
ramen on my kitchen table.
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| Today I went to the Dance Major's Concert and thuroughly enjoyed
myself. It started out a little spotty and akward, as with any
new artform, but after I got into it I really enjoyed it.
My favorite piece was a performance piece, not "interpretive dance" but
not what somebdoy would do if you said "hey wanna dance?" It made
me pretty glad I dreamed about fighting off bandits with my six shooter
on a train last night, because I'm going to be having nightmares about
it for a while. The performance was done by two girls in what
looked like discarded wedding dresses with their hands bound
together. The entire time their movements were very unnatural and
unnerving; a jerky type of motion that just wasn't quite right and
askew enough to give you chills. And periodically throughout the
performance one of the girls would twist and contort her face into a
silent desperate scream, then return her face back to emotionless
stone. The soundtrack was mostly the sound two tones make when
just barely out of phase, the repetative, dreadful pulsing noise.
Over that was the sounds of rats, then the sounds of screaming
children, then some sort of backwards talk, with a bassline of a
heartbeat to boot. Near the end of the dance, one of the girls
contorted herself through what looked like a very painful death, and
then lay motionless on the floor as the music stopped and the other
girl continued dancing. The other girl then stopped, turned in
the direction of the other girl, and contorted her face into the same
silent tortured scream. Then, very slowly, a paper ball that
looked as though it could barely fit inside of her mouth slowly fell
out of her mouth and plopped on the ground. Fade to black.
Fuck me it was scary but almost made the performance twice as worth
going to, as if tara's performance couldn't do that on its own.
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