Jobs I've Had: The Good and The Bad

[carl1951]

Your experiences at jobs you have held.
They be good, very good, bad, very bad or downright awful.
The best or the worst.
The longest or the shortest.
The wanted or unwanted.

[dogma]

where do i begin?

> i had to clean my dad's dr's offices on weekends for 3 yrs, ,it took about 4 hrs,, had to scrub scrub scrub,, the floor trim strips,, etc ( thru highschool )
>worked as a "candy stripper " in a home for crippled kids ( age 16 )
> babysitting at 50cents an hr

> worked in a hobby shop
>worked at a hoagie shop
> worked at a veterinarians thru two last yrs in highschool
> worked as a waitress at a perkins,, for about 27 cent/ hr ( they took out w/holdings from the $2.00 min wage,, and then you got your tips,
a payck was less than $18.00 a week ( it was the only 24/7 for miles in the mid '70's,, all the drunks came in ,alot were disgusting
BUT: also got to know alot of the pittsburgh steelers,, what a great group of guys ;D

worked for veterinarians a total of 12 yrs,, in pittsburgh,,stuart, florida,, grove city PA,, ( after i went to college to be a veterinary technician )
> worked for protologists for 3 yrs,, what an experience that was,, what a bunch of assholes,, jeez
> worked as a physical therapist aide in a hospital 1 1/2 yrs
> worked as a pharmacy tech for 2 yrs ( was held hostage by pharmacist that had a mental breakdown ,, locked all the doors and wouldn't let me out,, it was terrible,, he was threatening to bash the owner's head in w/ a baseball bat,, and verbally assaulted me for hrs )

> worked as a "house parent" in a group home of severely retarded adults,, there were 6 of them,, only two could speak minimally,, i was there from 3pm mon till 11 pm wed,, couldn't even go to the minimart across the street,, there was no other person/ assistant there,, and there were bats in the house ( old house ) ,,, needless to say, ,job lasted less than 9 months,, some people are just not cut out for a job like that,, i was definately one of those

>owned a rabbitry ( yup,, owned rabbits,, and bred them,, had 125 breeder females,, and about 100 babies a week born ) alot of poop to scoop,, fur shur

then,, for the last 17 yrs,, am a respiratory therapist,,
and i also own a boarding kennel

whew,, that 's alot packed into 35 yrs of employment,, don't ya think?
am i possibly really that old?

>

[shmeep]

What a fun idea for a thread! Thanks and Karma, Carl.

Let's see...I babysat from the time I was almost twelve until I was sixteen. I usually enjoyed that, but some jobs were better than others.

At sixteen I got a job at Sears Portrait Studio and I stayed there for the next six years. I worked in three different studios and was the manager of two of them. What a hellish job! The actual photography was fun and I was pretty good at it, but dealing with maintaining a high sales average ("Would you like all nine or would six be enough?" Blech!) and balancing the books and trying to turn some unpromising employees into good photographers was all very stressful, especially since there were no appointments at the time and people tended to wait for several hours to get their babies photographed. I still have nightmares about working there.

Next I got a job at O'Connor Photography, a real portrait studio. For the next several years, I did senior portraits and proms (I can't even tell you how many proms I've attended) and I never had to sell anything. It was nice to work for people who believed the best way to sell portraits was to make them good enough to tempt people to buy them. Once I photographed the students and professors at Pepperdine Law and one of the professors was Ben Stein. That was really fun! My friend Jill worked at both photography places with me and she was assigned to photograph all the firemen in LA County. I think she enjoyed that.

I went to school so I could become an interpreter (my favorite job, by far!) and I ended up interpreting at a high school during the school year, but then doing senior portraits--at that same high school!--during the summer. The kids were always astounded when they entered my studio and found that the interpreter from Mr. York's fourth period history class was taking their portraits. That was a lot of fun. I always hired a high school kid I liked to be my assistant. Usually it was one of the Deaf kids so they were able to get some real work experience. We had a blast.

At one point while I was in school, I was a professional roommate. A friend of mine and I moved into a condo with a developmentally disabled girl and we were paid to take care of her. It was very unpleasant because the parents were evil and the girl required a lot more care than we were told upfront. She wet the bed--and her pants--often. She couldn't go to the bathroom herself. Or brush her teeth. Or bathe. Or talk. And her parents had specifically said in the advertisement that it was not a caregiver's job. It lasted an entire year and that was quite enough for me. Even though we only had her from 8PM to 8AM on weekdays, that was plenty. At least we got to keep the condo after the parents moved the girl out. I lived there with a progression of other roommates until I was married three years later.

Other in-between jobs? Hostess at Chilis. I was fired. I worked at a men's clothing store for about two weeks but hated it. I spent one day as the nanny for Gwendolyn--child of some soap star whose name I have long since blotted from my memory. I wasn't going to subject myself to THAT for any amount of money. Oh, and I occasionally worked at Visual Addiction--a comic book store owned by a good friend of mine. That was fun, but I never did develop an appreciation for comic books. I was quite useless when one customer tried to engage me in a debate about which was superior--Marvel or DC? I got hit on by some very odd people there, but I also got to sell comic books to Neil Patrick Harris and Stephen Root, so that was interesting.

Since moving to DC two years ago, I have been working for an interpreting agency that has me on call at the Bureau of Labor Statistics. I enjoy it quite a lot. I get a lot of down time, but when I work, the work is challenging and keeps my skills honed so I'm never bored.

[housemouse]

Right out of high school I worked as a maid in a sleazy motel. You know, the kind people rent for a couple hours. I remember during training I learned to scrub the bathtub with the toilet brush. We didn't bother changing the sheets or the towels, just fluffed them up for the next guest. One day the girl who was training me had to leave early because her uncle had been arrested for murder. I quit after about two weeks.

I have also worked in a donut shop, a hotel gift shop (different hotel), Carl's Jr., an escrow office, oh, and I taught pre-school for a couple of months.

The shortest time I held a job was my hour of telemarketing.

My last paying gig was as a financial analyst/budget manager for a major financial institution - which no longer exists. But I feel obliged to say that the job I have now is my favorite. I wouldn't trade my overworked, underpaid position for anything in the world.

[shmeep]

housemouse said:

Right out of high school I worked as a maid in a sleazy motel. You know, the kind people rent for a couple hours. I remember during training I learned to scrub the bathtub with the toilet brush. We didn't bother changing the sheets or the towels, just fluffed them up for the next guest. One day the girl who was training me had to leave early because her uncle had been arrested for murder. I quit after about two weeks.

I found this hilarious--and unspeakably disturbing. At the same time. Wow. I'd hate to shine a black light around in that motel! Gross!

And this has nothing to do with anything, but one time my sister-and-law, Kathy, and I decided it would be fun to try to work for an airline because they were having a mass job interview at LAX. We went for the interview, but most of it was just a skills assessment a monkey could do. When that was over, we waited in line and had a quick interview with some head honcho or other. All I remember from that event was that when Kathy sat for her little interview, the guy asked her why he should hire her and she said, with a straight face, "Because I don't knit." We giggled over that on the way home and never expected to hear from them. We were both offered jobs, but decided we didn't want to work for an airline after all.

[inuvik]

My worst job would probably be working as a dishwasher, in the summer, without air conditioning. Talk about a sauna! The good thing about that job was it made me realize the importance of an education. So I got one.

I also worked north of the Arctic Circle for a year. The best thing about that was it gave me the opportunity to be up there. I've been dog mushing, wading in the Arctic Ocean, and had Christmas in the North. Wow.

[shmeep]

One job I thought was fun was being a script reader for The Los Angeles Independent Film Festival. I just picked up a stack of screenplays every week or so and got paid for each one I rated. I liked it because it gave me hope. Almost everything I read was utter and complete garbage so I thought that meant I had a better chance of making it as a writer, since most of the people who thought they could write really couldn't. I never had the urge to write a screenplay, but that was a very interesting sampling. I also read scripts when I briefly worked as a receptionist at HSX. Hollywood Stock Exchange. Weird little company. It's part website, part production company. I never did fully understand what they did. All I know is that my friend Leanna produced a few films out of there and she hired me on for a while. It was hard not to giggle when I answered the phone because someone pointed out that when we said, "HSX," it sounded like we were saying "age of sex" and I was always worried I would say the wrong one. I have no idea if HSX is still making movies, but the website is going strong. hsx.com/ I think it's some kind of stock exchange game involving actors instead of companies. I've heard it's fun, but I never had the urge to play.

Several of the very bad scripts I read and rejected were eventually made into movies. This cracks me up. One script I LOVED called "Haiku Tunnel" was made and I eventually saw it on HBO a couple of years ago and thought watching it wasn't as entertaining as reading it had been. The writer made the huge mistake of starring in it himself and he wasn't all that appealing. With a different person in that role, it could have been quite good.

[housemouse]

I've had a couple of interesting job interviews. There was the time the older gentleman interviewing me asked what kind of birth control I was using. I told him the rhythm method. I didn't get the job.

Once I went for an interview at a building on the Sony lot. I got to the building, got on the elevator, and went up to the third floor. When the elevator doors opened, directly in front of me was a cabinet filled with Academy Awards. I almost fainted. I tried to glance at as many as I could I don't remember what most of the were for, but one was Elia Kazan's Oscar for On the Waterfront.

[doobrah]

admin said:

Several of the very bad scripts I read and rejected were eventually made into movies. This cracks me up. One script I LOVED called "Haiku Tunnel" was made and I eventually saw it on HBO a couple of years ago and thought watching it wasn't as entertaining as reading it had been. The writer made the huge mistake of starring in it himself and he wasn't all that appealing. With a different person in that role, it could have been quite good.

I saw Haiku Tunnel. The actor/writer was very bad in the role. I kept thinking something would happen, and I just couldn't sympathize with the character. It had potential, but turned out to be a waste of two hours.

[Eyphur]

Well I've only had two jobs and both were pretty fun.

I got my first job in my college's library when I was a sophomore. My best friend told me they were hireing so I went over there and talked to the guy in charge of student workers and was hired on the spot. I worked there 2.5 years until I graduated. I mostly worked circulation (where people check out books, but also frequently ask for directions to the restrooms) but I also shelved books from time to time, shelf read (checking to make sure the books are in the right order) which was boring and allways gavbe me a headache, I worked in the archives one summer and it was lots of fun looking through old scrapbooks that I was photocopying onto acid free paper for preservation purposes ( made 350 copies in 4 hours once, I had to make sure the copies came out clearly, so lots of them would go in the garbage.) And my best friend worked in the library too, so it was fun to have her to hang around with.

My other job was playing in the school pep band. I played for 2 football seasons and 1 basketball season. It was an excellent paying job. For football I got $25 a game (about $8 and hour) to sit in the stands and play piccolo durring time outs and halftime and whatnot. IT was basically the same thing I used to do in marching band except no marching, no stupid shacko hat and I got paid . Basketball paid $250 for the whole season and I got to go the the conference tournament which was basically a free trip ( Ihad to pay for food, but the athletic department picked up our hotel costs). That was a lot of fun.

And now summer is comming so I'm probably due for a crappy job soon.

[carl1951]

My worst:
I was hired to work at a cold storage place in the middle of one of the hottest summers. I got there wearing a t-shirt. Was told jackets, glove, and boots would be provided. The gloves were; the jacket..no. The cold storage was kept at about 40 below. The temp outside was about 110. Between going outside to keep from freezing to death and going back in to work lasted about 4 hours. I went to lunch to thaw and never went back.

The unwanted: Was when I went through three (count'em 3) people to interview for a dishwasher job. Waited three weeks to hear if I was hired. I was. The day I was suppose to start, the restaurant burned down. It was the Paradise Cafe. Who could forget that one.

The Awful: US Marine Corps. Sunny San Diego (nice place to visit)

The Best: Being a Hypnotherapist and Past-Life Regressionist.


The Good: Telemarketer. It 's "Good" to harrass people at dinnertime, bedtime, favorite tv time, and anytime between 9 am and 9 pm. Life was good at the time. Why? Because, I was the harrasser not the harrassee. Did that for about 10 years off and on.

The Cheap: Tow truck driver, gas attendant and tire repair, all rolled-into-one, for a taxi company. One of the benefits was cheap gas and oil. The kick was I needed a taxi driver permit, not to drive taxi, but to pick up the abandoned ones when the drivers quit in the middle of a fare. Those were the best, especially if a passenger was left. Had to call another cab so the fare could get to their destination. I couldn't haul passengers, because I was "shop" personnel. That was company policy. Couldn't make the extra money "driving" the taxi.

Later, Carl

[carl1951]

I wanted to forget this one.

This one has no classification:

I was a clown for a Jack In The Box in Norfolk VA. (How low can you go?)

[greenbeing]

carl1951 said:

The kick was I needed a taxi driver permit, not to drive taxi, but to pick up the abandoned ones when the drivers quit in the middle of a fare. Those were the best, especially if a passenger was left. Had to call another cab so the fare could get to their destination.

I am so very intrigued! I smell a story. Can someone please explain, as this seems to have been a recurring problem, just what's up with the taxi drivers quitting in mid-fare? This is so entertaining! I'd never thought they could just up and abandon people!

Explanations?

--GB

[anna]

housemouse said:

Right out of high school I worked as a maid in a sleazy motel. You know, the kind people rent for a couple hours. . . .
I have also worked in a donut shop

My college roommate worked one summer at one of those motels. As I recall, what she hated most was the drunks who had . . . uh . . . continence problems.

I also worked at a donut shop - Dunkin' Donuts. I worked there off and on during college. During one stretch when I had run out of money, I took a leave from school and worked the 11pm-7am shift six nights a week for six months. On the seventh night, I just stayed up. It wasn't worth getting off schedule. I actually didn't dislike it, but I also didn't doubt that going back to school was the right thing to do.

[shmeep]

I must say...I didn't see this one coming at all:

carl1951 said:

The Best: Being a Hypnotherapist and Past-Life Regressionist.

Seems like you sort of branched out, huh?