March 2006 Archives
March 28, 2006
Fortune
I just found, among piles of paper on my desk, a little slip of paper that I thought was the fortune from a fortune cookie. I unfolded it and read the message:
Your food is Prepared to Order PLEASE PRESENT THIS STUB WHEN YOUR NUMBER IS CALLED 010
What a crappy fortune.
Posted by Stan on March 28, 2006 9:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | Random Musings
March 19, 2006
Tully’s Closed
During the summer of 2004, I spent the bulk of my days and nights working at a branch of Tully’s Coffee, located at 99 Yesler Way in downtown Seattle, across the street from Pioneer Square. On the exact corner on which I worked, at 1st Avenue and Yesler Way, a huge saw mill owned by Henry Yesler once sat. Yesler Way consisted of skids, going all the way up the steep hill. At the top, loggers would chop the trees and send them down to the mill at the bottom of the hill by way of these skids. The mill-loaded neighborhood in this early version of Seattle was a filthy cesspool, and it was on the corner of 1st Avenue and Yesler Way that a reporter from Chicago stood, surveyed the disgusting sight of this new city, and coined the phrase “skid row.”
In the intervening 120 years, little had changed. It had become a tourist trap (two blocks away is the Kingdome and Seahawks Stadium, and across the square is the hugely successful Underground Tour), which is important because it spurred the profitability of the shop in which I worked for a long while. The original manager was apparently some sort of service-industry genius, because he took a brand new shop in a place where there are at least five others within short walking distance (and a dozen within slightly longer walking distance) and made it one of the most successful in the entire company. Unfortunately, when he left, so went the success. I don’t know for sure, but from the stories I’ve heard about the previous manager running the store into the ground, it seems like he had a “service last” mentality, which drove away both the regulars and the tourists.
I was hired by an interim manager, brought in to try and whip the shop into shape before moving on to run his own branch permanently. There was a lot of office-politics turmoil that led to this, and in a way led to my hiring. The interim manager worked at a store in a nearby mall. They brought him to 1st and Yesler because he had been training to manage a store for awhile, and they wanted to oust the actual manager, so they said, “Give us a month to pink-slip him, and in the meantime you can get your feet wet and 1st and Yesler, then take over Westlake.” In that month, they also gave the manager who would take over a crash-course in managerial skills. In that month, they also hired me.
I got along pretty well with the interim manager. He was also a writer, also a huge Woody Allen fan, also couldn’t decide if Manhattan or Hannah and Her Sisters was his best film — we were two peas in a pod, and I’m certain if he hadn’t noticed I was a film student and started talking movies with me, I never would have gotten the job. At the same time, if the previous manager or new manager had been there when I applied, I don’t think I would have been hired. It’s all about timing.
The problem, when the interim manager took over, is that he was both too nice and too gullible. I don’t really know what went on after I left, but while I was there, he managed to find himself under the tenuous claws of two different, subordinate employees, and as a result he largely ignored the rest of us. One of them was a guy I worked with a lot, and he ended up getting fired because he made a long series of stupid mistakes. I think the biggest was closing up the store one time without setting the alarm. Nothing happened, but that’s still frowned on by the company. The other was a fairly attractive girl who made an inordinate amount in tips by flirting with the customers (like hardcore; I wouldn’t be surprised if some guys got phone numbers), and she managed to get a stranglehold over the new manager in much the same way. She was angling for his job, and he knew it, but he didn’t seem to be able to resist the powers of her charm.
Then there was the turnover problem. When the one guy got fired, that started a disappointing revolving door. I was the next to give my notice, and I knew the timing was terrible but I had to get back to school (I was willing to delay going back a semester, but nobody on the planet but me and my co-workers seemed to think that was a good idea). I found out through the grapevine (a.k.a., the flagship store, where I had befriended far too many employees) that the shuffling they were doing in order to accommodate my quitting was ridiculous. And the fact was, they just didn’t have enough people. With me and the other guy gone, they had a total of three employees. They hired a fourth just before I left, and transferred somebody else, but neither of them were permanent. I could see in the new girl’s eyes that she was a short-timer (and I was right, I found out), and the girl who had transferred knew it would only be until they hired more people.
I kind of lost track of my Tully’s friends after that, but I’m guessing the downward spiral continued. Maybe somebody made a power play that got out of hand, but here’s the fact: my sister just called me up and said she was driving by Pioneer Square, and my store was papered up, and its sign had been removed. I checked the website, and she’s right: my store is gone. I love Tully’s as a whole, but I grew attached to my branch. I really hate saying this, but working at Tully’s was the most fun, most difficult, most rewarding, outright best job I’ve ever had. If it paid enough for me to actually support myself, I’d probably never have left. But it doesn’t, and I did, so now what?
Well, the store’s closed, is what. And I can’t help feeling a little depressed about that. I used to have a dream about one day going back to Seattle and seeing all those old faces again. I knew they’d never last — not the employees, probably not even the regulars — but I have memories of them, and those memories translated into one day going back. It’s like the really shitty, retarded ending of Titanic. She’s 279 years old, but she jumps off that fucking boat and dies and goes to Titanic heaven. It’s not populated with all these hundreds of thousands of people she probably knew over the course of her life; heaven, to her, is just that one moment in time. I wouldn’t necessarily call my time at Tully’s heaven, but I do have that same type of feeling, where everything’s frozen and someday I can just go back and pick it up like I never left.
Now that the store’s closed, that dream is gone. So in honor of my co-workers (especially Sandy), the regulars (especially Drunk Dennis, whose bizarre life and hilarious code of ethics will someday form the basis for my greatest written work), and the crazies (I’m looking at you, Krazy Kelly and Crazy Crackhead), I’m filling up my Tully’s Statesmen with 16 ounces of fresh-brewed French Roast and having one more cup for you all, and for the memories.
Posted by Stan on March 19, 2006 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | Random Musings
March 17, 2006
The Horror of Spandex
I had a discussion earlier today about the horrifying fashion trends of the early ’90s: IOU shirts, Z. Cavaricci pants, the array of HyperColor apparel available (my favorite were the pants/shorts, because if somebody farted, there’d be a quarter-sized discoloration around their ass; that was comedy gold in fifth grade), multicolored “zinc oxide” to shield the nose from harmful UV rays, L.A. Gear “Lights,” Reebok Pumps. The neon-drenched horrors of the early ’90s couldn’t compare to the relatively tame turned-up-collars on polo shirts and tutu-like dresses that preceded it. But nothing — nothing! — was worse than the visual assault of spandex biking shorts.
This was one of the few trends to which I could fall victim. Did I look at spandex biking shorts and say, “I must have them!” No. My friends looked at my jean shorts and snickered because I had not embraced the latest, greatest fashion trend. I was stuck in a past that didn’t want me (fortunately, it would catch up three years later, thanks to grunge). Since all my parents could afford were a pair of Pump knock-offs and a few HyperColor shirts, I couldn’t expect anything exciting like IOUs or Air Jordans, but I could lobby for spandex biking shorts. For one thing, I went biking on almost an hourly basis, so I could argue that they were vital to my survival as an athlete. Also, they were cheaper than regular shorts.
So I got my wish — a single pair of spandex biking shorts, just for me. They were a violent, blinding shade of electric orange, with eye-stabbing fluoescent-green stripes along the sides. The only thing that could burn corneas with more ferocity was our harshest goddess, the sun. But I was thrilled — I had my own pair of spandex biking shorts. I put them on, leaped onto my 10-speed, and raced around our apartment complex to show off both the shorts and my burgeoning, pubescent package, prominently exposed thanks to the extreme tightness of the material.
I was immediately laughed at by older kids. Not for my usual problem of finally catching up with fashion trends just as they’re out the door — no, I came in right in the middle of the spandex phenomenon. I was humiliated for, once again, having “off-brand” spandex. Rather than having ultra-cool shorts that were almost entirely black, with fluorescent racing stripes, I wore a glowing target that may as well have said “I’m a big homo, so kick my ass.” It was initially humiliating, but I remained undaunted — as is the way of big kids, they’d mock anyone who was younger and/or smaller than they were. My friends would respect me.
When my friend Ryan caught his first glimpse of me, his face twisted with disapproval. “Dude,” he said in his reedy voice, “you’re not supposed to wear your underwear with them.”
What?! Who made up that rule? But as I looked down, I started to panic at the sight of my own visible-panty-line. Not only could you see the v-shape where my briefs ended — you could see all the stitching and, most prominently, where the elastic waistband started and ended. Such was the sperm-destroying tightness of the spandex movement.
So in order to fit in, I decided to freeball it for the first time in my entire life. This turned out to be the worst mistake of my entire life. As I had recently hit puberty, I started to notice fur where there was no fur before. And when I put on those brightly colored shorts and walked around unashamed, I noticed all the kids — especially the girls — giggling and whispering. At the time, this wasn’t common practice — I was actually, as a small child, considered reasonably cool. This ended when the grunge movement made me sullen and withdrawn. Then I got a computer and vented my frustrations at the world by writing hilariously bad short stories. Then I got the Internet and found like-minded trolls, and my life was ruined forever.
Sorry, slight digression. As I walked around, with kids snickering, once again Ryan approached and pointed out the problem: thanks to the magic thinness of spandex, coupled with the obscenely light color of the shorts (which apparently protected the freeballing older kids, with their black shorts), my recent growth of crotch hair was visible for the entire world to see. It not only slightly discolored the orange of the shorts, it tufted out slightly, so every single fiber of hair was visible to the naked eye, as the hot summer sun beamed down on Li’l Stan. I gasped like an idiot and ran back homet to change into normal clothes.
And I never wore spandex again.
Posted by Stan on March 17, 2006 2:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | Stories of Hilarity and Humiliation
March 11, 2006
Script
So I read this thriller yesterday that really tries to tackle the “child pornography/pedophilia/sex trade” issues, and you know what? It actually wasn’t the worst thing I’ve read. Sure, it had a lot of problems, and it honestly had the worst third act of any script I’ve read in my entire life, with the possible exception of the one I casually call Heat Lighting.
Even worse than the trainwreck of a third act itself was the very last scene. Less than a page, we have our resolution: these two family matriarchs — sisters who married and run various porn/sex-slave operations through their separate households — are in prison, sharing a cell. One says to the other, “I keep thinking about that eight year old I was with last week.”
The other sister sort of makes a face, which prompts the first sister to add, “I know what you’re thinking, but she had the body of a six year old.”
Are you fucking kidding me? I mean, this fucking thing isn’t a comedy. There are some traces of humor throughout, but it’s that stilted, doesn’t-quite-work-because-everybody-is-Joe-Friday kind of humor you see on Law & Order. But not only is this a completely absurd way to end the screenplay — it’s intended as a little, post-credit tag. It says “CREDITS ROLL,” followed by this last scene. What the hell is this, Wayne’s World? Was it a comedy the whole time, but I just didn’t get the joke until the last page?
It threw every single thought I had about the screenplay out the window, so I did what any hack would do: I chose to ignore it and based my comments on the entire story with the exception of that scene. Because, really, even if I don’t know anything but the title at the outset (and titles don’t always reveal everything), I’m usually pretty good at guessing the genre within the first five or so pages. I mean, you’d have to know that. Even the worst writers can set a tone. In unfunny comedies, you can tell the writer thinks it’s a comedy and can evaluate it based on that, because they set it up that way. And this one was definitely a thriller that descended into “serious drama” territory. I mean, it’s trying to tackle these issues in a fairly straightforward way. Then all of a sudden, a half page of jokes.
I can’t imagine it being a comedy because honestly, that half-page was funny. I laughed out loud, then said to myself, “What the fuck is this ending?” If the entire script was supposed to be a comedy, it’s pretty disappointing that the first laugh comes on page 120.
Really, I’m kind of at a loss. I went back through and skimmed it to see if there were traces of irony or sarcasm that I had simply missed. My only other explanation is that maybe the writer is a loser like me, living at home, and he or she had a little brother who got on the computer and said, “Heh, heh, I’ll write this fake ending before it gets printed.” I have no other explanation for it.
So here’s a note for writers: don’t do this kind of thing. Just don’t. Whatever compels you to do it, or if you maybe have a little brother with access to your computer, just make sure nothing this insane ends your script. Because the ending makes as big an impression as the beginning. This is the last words we read before we consider it and ruminate for 30 seconds before writing notes. We don’t want a baffling, tacked-on, incoherent half-page at the end. Not everybody’s nice enough to just pretend it’s not there.
Posted by Stan on March 11, 2006 6:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | Career-Based Rambling
March 5, 2006
Krispy Kreme Mocha
When the Krispy Kreme opened a few years ago, it was like an unhealthy man’s heaven. The first — and for awhile, only — in Illinois, and for some reason half a mile away from my house, I used to go there constantly and gorge myself on those hot, greasy, glazed confections. I had so many, and for such a long period of time, that it finally reached a point where they disgusted me. The lack of variety — sure, Krispy Kreme has donuts other than the original glazed, but they’re all terrible — and just the overkill of my excess made me never, ever want to touch a Krispy Kreme donut again.
So far, I’ve stuck with that, but I’m also extremely lazy. The Krispy Kreme is between my bank and my house; however, the nearest Dunkin’ Donuts — vastly superior in every conceivable way — is ten minutes down the road. Ordinarily, Dunkin’ Donuts is worth the extra drive, but as I said, I’m extremely lazy.
So yesterday, after depositing my last paycheck, I stopped at Krispy Kreme and ordered a mocha. Because I love the caffeine, and she loves me, and there was a time not long ago when I squinted into her eyes and muttered through a mouth full of chaw, “I wish I could quit you,” but she knew I didn’t mean it, and I knew I didn’t mean it, so the trial separation ended and we got back together. Now, we’re unstoppable…
…except when she hurts me by forcing me to stop at Krispy Kreme for a mocha. Now, their mochas are pretty good. Not as good as Tully’s, but much better than the rancid ichor those Starbucks assholes call chocolate. But I don’t mind stopping for one if I’m too lazy to go down to Dunkin’ Donuts for a slug of sweet ambrosia.
One thing is unsettling, though. Whenever I get a mocha from Krispy Kreme, I…smell the glaze. I almost taste it in the mocha, which shouldn’t have any actual glaze in it. But maybe it does, who knows? But I smell it all over my fingertips after handling the cup, and it takes days for it to go away, even if I wish my hands every hour. And because of that sense memory of gorging myself to the point of hating that original glaze, every time I, say, scratch my cheek or nose or chin…I feel a little bit nauseous.
So do particles of glaze odor get all over the cup and/or its contents — because the whole thing does stink a little of glaze in its own right — because of the powerful odor in the kitchen? I mean, it really is powerful shit. I used to take walks up a residential street that runs parallel to the street the Krispy Kreme is on, about a quarter-mile north of it, and I can smell the glaze. It’s…disturbing. But I suppose it stands to reason that such a powerful odor would cling to anything and everything it can. I think I read somewhere that milk is an odor absorber, so that could explain the whole thing.
Still…it’s unsettling.
Posted by Stan on March 5, 2006 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | Random Musings
March 2, 2006
The Only Story About a Fat, Jolly Man and Fireplaces That Doesn’t Involve Santa Claus
In high school, I spent two summers working in my dad’s warehouse, and oh, the stories I could tell. It was like working in an office-set sitcom, with all the archestereotypes you could possibly imagine: the grizzled Vietnam vet, the struggling single mother, the Italian-American boss with Mob connections, the unattractive bookkeeping woman that nobody wants to make direct eye contact with, the guy who can barely speak English and either causes or is blamed for most workplace accidents — I could go on (no, seriously, there were more), but the point is this: much as I hated that job, it was both entertaining and educational to watch this hilarious soap opera unfold before me every day after summer school.
And who was my dad, in the midst of all this? Drew Carey: the fat, bespectacled, disgruntled middle manager who does all the work of his boss but gets none of the credit. His boss — Frankie, the aforementioned Italian-American boss with Mob connection — was a little bit abusive of my father’s workaholic nature. Because Frankie wanted to spend all his time going to Sox games, and as it happens, most Sox games happened during work hours.
Shortly before I resumed work in the summer of 2000, Frankie hired Nia as a secretary. Nia didn’t help me concentrate on an already boring job: she was gorgeous, and while I could think of a thousand reasons to hire her, none involved her typing skills. Which was probably good, since she had no typing skills. Or phone skills. Or any interest in work whatsoever. Because, if you’ve caught on, she wasn’t really hired as a secretary — she was hired because Frankie was cheating on his wife and wanted easy access to his “broad.” Also, she probably said something like, “I don’t want to be a cocktail waitress anymore, so give me a job or I’m telling your wife!”
When the hiring of Nia came to the attention of the big-wigs in Gary, it was pointed out that no other branch manager in the entire company had a full-time secretary (that’s what the assistant manager is for; just ask my dad), so if he wanted to keep her on the payroll, she had to do something else. Frankie thought she should learn the sales trade. It seemed like a good match: who better to sell HVAC supplies to fat, sleazy contractors than an exceptionally well-endowed woman in a tight dress?
The problem was, Frankie left my dad to teach her sales, and she had no interest in learning anything. Her feeling was that her job was protected. In a way, it was, because Frankie really liked to toss around his Mob connections. Apparently, his father was killed by a rival Family, so Frankie is Protected For Life. I don’t know much about organized crime, but I gather than “Protected For Life” means “if you want your ‘broad’ workin’ in the same joint as you, we’ll make that happen by any means necessary, capiche?” So Frankie would walk around implying that if anyone complained to headquarters, uh, he’d have the Mob come and kill them and/or their families. Nobody believed him, exactly, but that isn’t the kind of thing you want to be wrong about.
So Nia kept her job, and every few days my dad would attempt in vain to teach her about sales. He never got very far, but he didn’t really have to: as I mentioned, the bazongas hanging out of her dress meant instant sales. Contractors would put up with anything from her — and the longer it took her to look things up or ask questions, the better, because that meant more staring time. This kind of infuriated my dad, who is under the misconception that hard work should be rewarded in business.
Things reached a boil in the fall of 2000, when I was away at college. I missed all the good stuff, but my dad said that headquarters figured out that Nia was a stool-pigeon who existed as Frankie’s plaything. It also turned out that the warehouse manager — who also kept disappearing to Sox games with Frankie and often Nia — was also involved. Frankie was cheating on his wife with Nia; Nia was cheating on Frankie with the warehouse manager. The warehouse manager was also married.
When this came out, headquarters got pissed off at Frankie, but they couldn’t really do anything. It seemed like they should have been able to, but Nia actually had reasonably good sales, and although my dad’s company likes to be a “family company,” there doesn’t appear to be any law that says two married men can’t have sleep with one single employee at the same time. Consenting adults and all that.
But they didn’t know about the Sox games, or my dad’s Drew Carey status. When the shit hit the fan with Nia but nothing seemed like it would come of it, various “anonymous tips” came from my dad’s branch, basically saying, “Frankie doesn’t do shit, [my dad] is doing all his work.” Headquarters investigated this and learned that it was true. Frankie probably gave my dad the kiss of death before taking himself “and all his customers” (for the record, he had no actual customers because he did no actual work) across the street. That’s another sitcom element: the prime competition to my dad’s business is literally across the street.*
That was the end of Frankie, but most of the people were disappointed when my dad was passed over to be the actual branch manager. No, the company had a better idea to reward my dad’s service: he’d be launching a new branch out in Rockford.
The interesting thing about Illinois is that the people in our state outside the Chicago area seem to view the city as something out of The Sting or The Untouchables: a crime-ridden cesspool protected by the hippy-dippy liberals in power. This…isn’t that far from the truth, much the way the Chicago perspective of the rest of the state (as Green Acres with more guns) isn’t far from the truth.
Rockford is a strange place, too. It’s the second-largest city in the state — and they’re damn proud of that fact — but they have a “small-town” mindset in certain ways, like loving hunting and NASCAR and hating black people. For the purposes of this story, another example is their fear and hatred of outside influences, specifically the influence of city slickers trying to peddle their wares in the city. So when a citified company like my father’s sets up shop in Rockford, the business owners of Rockford — basically the small-town version of the Mafia, so let it be said that we aren’t the only ones with organized crime — try to shut them out.
In summary, my dad’s company sent him on a suicide mission to lead a branch to success — as he had almost single-handedly led the Arlington Heights branch to success — where there could be no success. So after struggling for about six months, to such an extent that one of my dad’s employees (who transferred from a different branch) had a stress-related heart-attack that killed him, Rockford contractors finally decided to start doing business with them. But it was business on their terms, loaded with all-expense-paid (by my dad) dinners, extreme discounts, and then came the really bizarre stuff: my dad had to go to the Winnebago County Fair and bid on — and win! — a live pig one contractor’s daughter had raised. He won it — at a cost of over $500 in company money — and we had loads of pig carcass in our freezer for months. It was fairly disgusting, even from a meat fan. Also, he had to pay for sponsorship of a local racecar driver.
Maybe it seems innocuous, but it was always done in the shadiest possible way: “You don’t sponsor this racer, we don’t buy from you.” That was the bottom line: there were plenty of other HVAC wholesalers in Rockford, and plenty of them are Rockford-and-Rockford-only, so the only way they’d do business was if my dad danced while they shot at his feet. And so my dad let that happen, because his success at this job depended on the success of the branch, so he would do whatever it takes to be successful.
Adding insult to injury, the regional manager was brothers of the assistant manager. So when my dad, for example, needed help swaying Headquarters toward doing something risky, he didn’t get any help from his regional manager, who wanted his brother to take over as branch manager. If my dad failed, his dream would come true, so he did as little as possible to help. Also, if the regional manager did say to go ahead with something risky and that he’d help them come around to it — if it was successful, that was easy enough, but if it failed, he’d blame my dad and say he had no part in it. My dad was a renegade branch manager who played by his own rules.
So here’s what really fucked my dad in the end, over two years after he had started there: they have these fake fireplaces** that heat homes with that fun fireplace ambience, but they don’t require expensive home-destruction to install a chimney. A group of contractors, undoubtedly after “accidentally” pushing their previous HVAC dealer into a cement mixer, told my dad that if he invested in these fireplaces — which his company doesn’t normally sell — they would sell like hotcakes. Apparently they were all the rage in Rockford, but once they started selling them, my dad would have to keep up with demand and keep them displayed prominently.
My dad proposed this idea to Headquarters, who nixed it. He went to the regional manager, who bottom-lined it for my dad: if they invested in these fireplaces and they didn’t sell, the Rockford branch was finished, and so was my dad. So if he was absolutely sure they would sell, he should go ahead with it. If not, he should just tell the contractors to fuck off.
My dad went with it, and here’s the problem: he was absolutely duped by those contractors, one of whom (apparently) had a stake in a manufacturer of these fake fireplaces. So my dad had a ton of them, nobody was buying them, and one or more of the contractors was laughing all the way to the bank. See, because it didn’t really matter if the contractors bought them and installed them in homes — my dad had already bought them and was just reselling.
True to the regional manager’s word, my dad was finished in Rockford. He would have been finished in the company, but to reward him for many loyal years of service, they merely double-demoted him, back to being the warehouse manager in Lombard. Then, when he proved that he couldn’t wrangle the ragtag bunch of assholes in the warehouse the way he had in Arlington Heights, they demoted him again, back down to driver. Then they actually promoted him, back to the assistant manager at Arlington Heights position he had had three years earlier. Kind of a humiliating experience, and one of the many reasons I have a problem with letting jobs — especially jobs I don’t want to do — suck me in. I know corporate loyalty and enthusiasm is rewarded, but I always feel I have to keep a distance, or else I’ll get so involved in the job that I wouldn’t even notice if people were conspiring against me, like the regional manager and assistant manager were in Rockford.
As an ironic postscript, the Rockford branch did remain operational, with the assistant manager stepping up to the plate. And it became one of the most profitable branches in Illinois. Shortly before my dad received his demotion and left Rockford, he started dealing with some dot-commer who went bust. Dot-commer knew a bit about the contractors’ world, so he had spent time developing a website — basically, a contractors’ version of Amazon.com. Everything they ever needed, shipped right to their warehouse or jobsite.
But he needed some suppliers in on the ground floor, and since he was based in Rockford, he started checking out the bigger businesses in the area — the ones that would have the most “stuff.” And essentially, the website works like this: contractors find what they want, buy it, pay for it, et cetera. Dot-commer receives the order, which he then sends directly to whomever would be the supplier. And the suppliers would actually ship it direct, not unlike Amazon’s Marketplace sellers. In the meantime, Dot-commer’s selling price would be a bit more than what the suppliers charge him, to ensure a healthy profit. And since apparently the website was massively successful, as a result so was the Rockford branch. If my dad could have stayed a few more months, perhaps they would have forgiven the fireplace fiasco.
But probably not.
*I suppose I should state here that this entire lump of bullshit involving Frankie and Nia, plus all the other bizarre and hilarious interpersonal bullshit I witnessed during that summer, eventually became the subject of a screenplay I wrote a few years ago. Despite the sitcom elements, it wasn’t (really) a comedy. It was kind of a dark, depressing look at working life, and how everybody gets caught up in these soap operatics, but at the end of the day, it’s all meaningless. Or at least that’s the way I feel: you can make and sometimes keep friends while you’re working, but sometimes they’ll stab you in the back, and most of the time you stop being friends as soon as one of you leaves the job. So in the end, all the relationships that are forged mean jack shit, so why get wrapped up in the drama?
**Link Note: I have no idea if this is what my dad was rambling on about or not, but it seems like the right thing, so I’m gonna go with it.
Posted by Stan on March 2, 2006 12:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | Family: The Horror…
March 1, 2006
Systems Support Specialist
I’ve been a nerd for awhile, but never really a competent nerd, in the sense of writing code or soldering diodes to, uh…thingies that make stuff go. In fact, I’m not even strictly competent at the one thing I’m kinda good at: fixing shit I break. Usually I figure it out, but sometimes it takes me hours, days, even weeks, and oftentimes I have to go and ask nerd friends on the Internet probing questions until I have the answer.
Because of my incompetence, I’m always hesitant to find jobs in the general computer-nerd world, even though my Microsoft-employed brother-in-law has been encouraging me to do so for years, saying things like, “You know more than I do.” (MSN users: clearly you’re in good hands.) I’ll apply for them once in awhile, usually when they have such low qualifications that any idiot could do the job. And even then, I don’t get called.
So when my sister first told me of a job opening at her place of employment, and that the title was “Systems Support Specialist,” I said, “Sounds good,” while thinking, “I hope I can successfully ignore this until the position is filled.”
But at the same time, I need a job. Not necessarily a job in sunny Seattle, but I’ll take it. I’ve been there before, and while I don’t have the fondest memories, I didn’t strictly hate it. Okay, I did, but I really need a job. I’ll go anywhere and do anything. And, in point of fact, I’ve even submitted a few resumes out in Seattle, because I know I’ll have a place to stay until I get on my feet. So far, I’ve heard nothing, but the icy silence on the other end of a resume submission has never discouraged me before. In fact, it encourages me to continue reshaping my resume into a more appealing series of lies.
So I told her, “E-mail me the information.” She…didn’t do that. Instead, she called me again while I was five miles away from my cell phone and didn’t leave a VoiceMail because she assumed I was ignoring her again. What the fuck is with this family? “I really think you should get this job and want you to have it.” “Cool, e-mail me.” “No, I’ll call you, oh FUCK YOU FOR NOT ANSWERING!”
But finally she e-mailed me the info, and I checked over the job listing and said to myself, “I can’t do this job.” Granted, it specified “entry level” and none of the qualifications involved any actual employment experience in the field, but “Mac OSX, Solaris and Linux experience is also preferred”? I lost interested in Linux six years ago, and I barely even know what the fuck Solaris is! It was a George Clooney movie, right? “Experience with Wireless networking is required. 802.11X PEAP, LEAP, WPA, WPA2, WEP”? I don’t know what any of that means!
But it’s cool, I can Google and figure it out. I know what wireless networking is, I think I’ve heard of WEP, I’m pretty sure 802.11x is…something involving infrared? Heat vision? Okay, I can play it cool in the interview. When they ask, “Are you familiar with wireless networking standards?” I’ll say, “Yes.” Easy as pie. I can’t imagine them having any follow-up questions after that response.
Actually, I mostly assumed I’d send off my resume and never hear from them again. Until my sister called me on her lunch hour and said, “I’m going to see if my supervisor knows who in HR to contact so I can expedite your resume and try to get you to the top of the list.”
Top of the — oh shit.
She e-mailed me an hour later, saying she printed out a hard copy of my resume, put it in a “fancy envelope,” and sent it through inner-office mail to exactly the person who does the hiring. And suddenly I feel terrible, like I’m going to let my sister down. She’s so excited for me, and yeah, maybe I can do this job, but I really don’t think there’s any chance in hell that I’ll get it. The one positive is that when I e-mailed her the spiffy MS Word version of my resume and cover letter, she didn’t send it back with editorial comments.
So I dunno, she launched into this whole tirade about what a hard time she had finding a job, and how based on her experience and the experiences of everyone else she knows, the only way anybody has ever gotten a job is through a friend or relative who is pulling some kind of strings. Which is kind of a “duh” thing, and it’s cool that she — for the first time ever — wants to be the string-puller to help her li’l bro, but still…I’m totally gonna let her down on this one.
At least, that’s my feeling. It’s making me put so much pressure on myself, because I want to do well so she doesn’t, once again, cast her head down and take pity on her loser li’l bro. I also want to do well because, if I break the phone-interview barrier and they want to meet me in person, I’ll feel like such an ass if I spend all that money on a short Seattle trip just to blow it.
Man, I hate job-hunting.
Posted by Stan on March 1, 2006 9:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | Family: The Horror…
