Tag: jobs

Jorbs

I went looking for my dough job last week, and didn’t find any real prospects, though I did find one shop that may train me when business dies down in mid-January. It’s possible that there were other shops that would have hired or trained me, but those weren’t the places I would like to learn from. If I wasn’t able to easily talk to the owner/manager/chef, I quickly lost interest. I want to learn how to make pizza from someone who gives a crap.

Meanwhile, on Craigslist, I had been firing off my resumes to anything that looked interesting/not too soul sucking. I got a call back this Monday from a company that demonstrates products for (I’m assuming) the holiday shopping orgy. So if all goes well this weekend, I’ll be getting paid to play with toy helicopters in public. I really feel bad for people with real jobs.

No Sense in Census

Census job is looking pretty good. I’m officially in now, which wasn’t the case up until Thursday. I’m pretty sure this is the job I was born for, and I’m sad that it only comes along every ten years. I need to find out how to get involved in the stuff they do in the meantime (which apparently there is a lot of).

Also, it seems less likely than they made it seem that it will go over into the summer, so I may get to do Manhattan this summer after all. It’s the best of all worlds.

Developments

So. I just got a job offer from the Census. Interestingly enough, it’s the third one I’ve gotten since I’ve applied. Each successive offer has been for a better paying and more desirable position. The first was a clerical job, located in an office that was just too far away. The second job was the one I was gunning for, but my return trip to get the bus was a dealbreaker for them. This third job is close to home, and starts after I’m back with the bus. Marvelous!

However, it presents an interesting predicament. This job may very well last the entire summer, conflicting with my plans to live in NYC. If push comes to shove, this job will win. I can’t scoff at this money, since it will put me much closer (probably a year ahead of schedule) to getting my own place and unplugging. I am going to do New York at some point…it just may not be this summer. :(

Job Hunting

I left my last job about two weeks ago, right before the snowboard trip. I liked that job, but it was too far away. Far too far. I started looking for a job again, and it’s a very odd process. I’d imagine it’s more odd for someone like me who has no specific trade or skill. There is really nothing out of bounds. And I might have found a new one, that I can do from home. Which is a good thing, because that powerball ticket I bought the other day was bunk.

A Guide to Good Jobs

This is a bit of an update to the man-job theory I wrote over two years ago.

One point of clarification: while the jobs titles listed below may not be the official title of the job (garbageman being ‘civil sanitation specialist’ and the like) if a job can be referred to by a -man name and understood as such, it qualifies.

-man jobs are still at the top of the list of good jobs. -man jobs are nearly always jobs that don’t involve sitting behind a desk, are always interesting, and not very difficult. -man jobs pay well – not enough to live extravagantly, but enough to live well on. -man jobs usually have easily met prerequisites, most training occurs within the job.

-man jobs:
Fireman, Delivery Man, Mail Man, Spokesman, Policeman, Garbage Man, Milk Man, Salesman

-smith jobs are also very good jobs, and while they rank above -man jobs in awesomeness, they rank below -man jobs in everything else. -smith jobs don’t pay any better than -man jobs, but require more training (apprenticeship), and more skill. Make no mistake, -smith jobs are very good jobs, but because of the increased emphasis on training and skill, ranks below -man jobs.

-smith jobs:
Blacksmith, Goldsmith, Silversmith, Locksmith

-er jobs are far more common than either -smith or -man jobs. -er jobs are like -man jobs in spirit, but it isn’t as smooth sailing as a -man job. There is some undesirable aspect that sets it apart from -man or -smith jobs. These jobs embody the -man job spirit, and are a good first step in the direction of a good job. Note: -er jobs are still better than jobs that do not fall into any of these categories.

-er jobs:
Painter, Shopkeeper, Barber, Teacher, Auctioneer, Dog Walker,

I plan on updating this list with jobs in all three categories as they come up. Comment if you have any to add.

I knew a girl in Marysville who could walk the ridgepole of a roof.

Plane Crash by moe.
[audio:http://www.archive.org/download/moe2006-02-28.flac16/moe2006-02-28d4t04_64kb.mp3]

So yesterday I found myself in an odd position. I had to paint the side of the roof (a 10″ or so wide board that runs the length of the roof) of the house I’m working on. The problem that was posed was that since this board and the rest of the roof jutted out about two feet from the side of the house, reaching it was difficult and awkward on a ladder.

I did try the ladder with a brush attached to a pole, but that didn’t get the board covered completely. The top of the board, right next to the shingles, didn’t get the paint it needed. We tossed around a couple other ideas, and ultimately decided I’d just hang over the edge of the roof to paint them.

I’m scared of heights. In middle school, the IDEAS program went to this overnight camp somewhere in the backwoods of CT. The idea was to get us to challenge ourselves in not-very-subtle ways. There were different stations where the goal would be teamwork, or communication, or any other theme they could come up with. One was the Giant’s Ladder. This was a large ‘rope ladder’ made up of logs and steel cable. It was about 5 stories high. Each person climbing was hooked up to a climbing(repelling?) harness to make sure they’d be safe. The rungs were about shoulder height (I don’t remember how tall I was then, but it was shoulder height). I remember I partnered up with a kid who I had never met before that day, but we got along well. We talked it over, and figured that we could just vault ourselves individually up to the next rung, but quickly discovered that they were too far apart for that to work. So we cooperated (you win, program), and got ourselves halfway up, then we took a break. The method we used to get up each rung was pretty straight forward: one person (usually me) would steady themselves by holding the rung above, and balancing on the rung below. Then I would extend one leg so my partner could use my knee as a step. Once he was up, he would reach down, and pull me up. This worked extremely well, but there was one problem. Whenever I was pulled up, in order to get my grip, I’d need to be on my belly. That meant I was looking straight down. So at that halfway point, I started to get freaked out. Each time I looked down it got worse, until with about a quarter of the way left, I had to stop. The councilors and my classmates tried to urge me on, in a bunch of different ways. They saw this as another challenge for me to overcome. I never made it to the top (take that, program!), but I took a picture of everyone on the ground from that spot.

So yesterday when I was hanging over the edge of the roof, I was a bit freaked out at first. It is a two story house with an attic, so at the highest point it reaches about three stories. Painting those spots, you have no choice but to look straight down. I tried to distract myself by keeping an eye on what I was painting. That half worked.

Painting from the roof was much much faster than with the ladder, and it was actually less freaky than being at the same height on a ladder. Its nice to have something (mostly) solid under your feet. I liked this because it took me out of my element, which is something I don’t do often. I like my element. Its comfy and familiar.

I had to go up again today to touch up a few spots that didn’t come out so well. It was easier today. I’m going to go on a tangent now. Today, the roof was far hotter than it was yesterday. And yesterday, it was hot. Yesterday, I poured water on the shingles to cool them off, and it steamed. In ten minutes it was dry again. So today, I went up there without any water, and I think I actually burned my hand. How absurd. Why would you make a roof black? It makes it harder to cool a house with air conditioning (using more power).
Also, in case you’re wondering what a ridgepole is, it is ‘a horizontal beam at the ridge of a roof to which the rafters are attached.’ I walked the ridgepole.
Continue reading “I knew a girl in Marysville who could walk the ridgepole of a roof.”

Employment

So I started my new job today.
I call people and ask them surveys they don’t want to complete.
Not quite a telemarketer, because I don’t actually sell anything. In fact, all I do is take from you.
I’m totally teletaking.
Unsurprisingly, this job is easy as hell. Almost as unsurprising, it is boring as hell.
I can’t complain though, it pays well, and requires little to no thought on my part.
But I can’t help but think that I would much rather be in many other jobs.
Jobs which I can’t do because they conflict with school. Like baking. Or painting.
What I like about those jobs is that at the end of the day
you have something that you can point to and say “That’s what I did today!”
Today I called literally hundreds of people. Two completed the survey.
That’s what I did today.
I’m not disappointed in this, as I have absolutely nothing invested in this survey.
In fact, people not answering makes my job easier. It also makes it more dull.
I couldn’t think of any little game to play with myself and the folks I was calling
because for the most part, they weren’t actually there.
In truth, I may have spoken to 40 people today, and that is on the high side.
Most numbers I called were answering machines or numbers that don’t exist.
(Thanks, autodialer!)
So for four hours today, this was the only song that came to mind. Appropriate.