So at the Sony Store, there is this cool little MP3 player that not only plays music, but it also dances to the beat it is playing. It has little flaps on each end of it and they flap and spin around as it plays whatever song - it's pretty cool. Really expensive, but whatever. The thing with them is they can dance their way right off your table if you aren't careful. So we have ours that is out on display on a podium. Of course when you're in an electronics store even the display has to look modern and cool, so naturally it does. It is literally the first thing that you see when you come into the store. They call the MP3 player "Rolly". Okay, you good?...here is where things get hilarious.
I'm having a lousy day at work. There are no customers, I've got very little to do; most people just want to be left alone and look around at stuff. Rolly is having a bad day too because someone dropped him, and now he's paralyzed from the flaps out. So all he can do now is play songs, and well that makes for a lame display. So the girl at the front desk is in the back with Rolly and my manager and they are trying to fix him. I notice no one is at the front desk to greet people as they enter the store, so I walk up there.
Standing by the Rolly's display is a young couple. I can hear them talking to each other very quietly as they are trying to figure out just what this conical looking blue stand apparatus does. The guy is squatting down looking under it for wires, buttons, anything. The girl he was with is doing the same, and I hear her say "What is this thing?"
So with a straight face, in a matter of fact tone I say "It's an invisible MP3 player". Then I wait for the reaction.
The guy looks at me and you can see the shock in his eyes. I mean he was speechless. It was like he had been waiting for someone to invent an invisible MP3 player for years and now it was finally here! His girlfriend looked just as amazed, and spoke up with all the disbelief she had just one word, "REALLY????". She then looked down the invisible invention, and waved her hand over the center of the podium, trying to touch it.
As she's doing this I say "No. It's this little MP3 player but somebody dropped it. My manager is in the back trying to fix it."
Luckily they both had a sense of humor and admitted that I got them good. I let them save face by making some joke about how advanced technology is and an invisible MP3 player isn't completely unfathomable anymore. They agreed, laughed some more, then decided that was enough technology they could handle today and left.
Nobody bought anything from me that entire day, but the looks on those people's faces was totally worth the price of admission. The thing that troubles me about this is, had there actually been an invisible piece of electronic equipment sitting there...and this girl actually hit it, and knocked it off the table. . .well didn't she think about that before taking a swing?! I mean, Rolly is pricey now. I'm sure his invisibile paint job would really sky rocket his MSRP.
Oh well. Life shouldn't be taken too seriously.
October 20, 2008
October 17, 2008
The New(est) Job
Yep, job number 3. Although job number 3 is going to allow me to quit job numbers 1 and 2 - Sony and the Country Club. Which is soooo nice because retail and waiting tables to be honest, it's horrible. I don't know anyone who likes working nights and weekends, and when you're in during the day you're bored. The store is slow, you can't make sales without customers, and you can't get tips without them either so it just totally bites. You're almost required to work the shifts that everyone else is off work and able to do whatever, like go to the mall or out to dinner, and laugh at you for being at work on a Saturday.
So 2 weeks, November 4th (election day) will mark the end of Bill's retail and waitstaff night and weekend world. I'm going to have a steady full time 40 hours at Sprint, with real benefits, nights, weekends, and holidays off, vacation and sick time, base and commission selling phones B2B. I'm excited about it. Obviously I haven't started working there yet so I can't say much more about it, but full time - oh thank god. I'm actually going to start having income that resembels a pay check. Which is good because making a living selling your body to science just isn't really life effective. They want to lock you up in sleep chambers and do weird things to you - it's just a no go for full time income. Sleep study. I mean doesn't that sound good? I sleep! Holy crap sign me up! And then you get this email about the probe that you have to wear in your rectum...........yeah I know. I thought the same thing. What in god's name do I need to wear a probe in my rectum for when you're studying my SLEEP. Electrodes on the temples, chest, stomach - okay yeah this I get, but recturm...no no research man sorry. I did do this one stress study, which was sweet. I just got paid $250 for about 12 hours of work, most of it was paperwork too. The worst part was I had to be monitored for like 4 hours with an IV, so I couldn't really go anywhere. But they had a bunch of movies! So I sat in this little room watching dvds for 4 hours and got paid to do it! Yeah I had a needle in my arm the whole time, but I'm willing to bet that some of you would prefer to get paid for watching movies with a needle in your arm than go to work. Maybe not, I don't know.
Know what the coolest thing about this job at Sprint is though? No, well I'll tell you. They contacted me! How crazy is this - I spent 3 months seriously WORKING at finding a job. Something 1st shift, no weekends, good benefits, slightly better pay than I was making down in NC, close to home, and something that I didn't have to go back to school or get any certifications for. And this dude calls me up one day as I was coming home from the country club about to go to Sony, and asks me to come in and interview. He got my resume from one of the zillions of websites that I had my resume posted on, and boom. 20 minute commute, the base is about what I made at Labcorp but I'll also make 100% commission on everything I sell above quota (which is low for the first 3 months), 8-4:30, hour for lunch, entry level sales. I even have the opportunity after I establish some clients, to go out and show them products or do presentations if I want to. My future boss said he got into this business in 2000 when the econmy was bad, and he was grateful that someone gave him an opportunity to work in sales with no experience, so he now does the same. He also doesn't expect people to stay there for more than 3-5 years unless they want to make Sprint their career. He sees the job as a resume builder, and tries to give people as broad of a work experience as they want. How great is that? Oh yeah and attire is blue jeans and a collared shirt, not even button down.
Isn't it funny. I filled out literally about a hundred (if not more) job applications and went on probably 15-20 interviews. And the job that fit what I wanted I didn't even find, it found me. Me personally, I see that as God being pretty freaking cool. You can take it however you want though. But hey mom, there you go. You've been praying for months that God would help me find a job - there you have it. Thank you for having faith knowing that in due time all that work and frustration would pay off. I don't want to get overly spiritual here, but a lot of people have been thanking me or recognizing my patience lately. And you should just know, it isn't my patience you're seeing but my faith that in due time all things will come together for good. Bad economy, crummy jobs with bad hours and low pay, higher expenses, having to ask people for money to keep my head above water, Sara working 80+ hours a week - whatever it is. Knowing the problem is already taken care of and all I have to do is just keep on keeping on and wait for the solutions to come up, man what a better way to live. That attitude has yet to be proven wrong. Hard work with the right expectation. Thank you David Horne for teaching me that. Man oh man. It really is crazy how things work out.
Hasta luego party people. I hope everyone is having a great day.
So 2 weeks, November 4th (election day) will mark the end of Bill's retail and waitstaff night and weekend world. I'm going to have a steady full time 40 hours at Sprint, with real benefits, nights, weekends, and holidays off, vacation and sick time, base and commission selling phones B2B. I'm excited about it. Obviously I haven't started working there yet so I can't say much more about it, but full time - oh thank god. I'm actually going to start having income that resembels a pay check. Which is good because making a living selling your body to science just isn't really life effective. They want to lock you up in sleep chambers and do weird things to you - it's just a no go for full time income. Sleep study. I mean doesn't that sound good? I sleep! Holy crap sign me up! And then you get this email about the probe that you have to wear in your rectum...........yeah I know. I thought the same thing. What in god's name do I need to wear a probe in my rectum for when you're studying my SLEEP. Electrodes on the temples, chest, stomach - okay yeah this I get, but recturm...no no research man sorry. I did do this one stress study, which was sweet. I just got paid $250 for about 12 hours of work, most of it was paperwork too. The worst part was I had to be monitored for like 4 hours with an IV, so I couldn't really go anywhere. But they had a bunch of movies! So I sat in this little room watching dvds for 4 hours and got paid to do it! Yeah I had a needle in my arm the whole time, but I'm willing to bet that some of you would prefer to get paid for watching movies with a needle in your arm than go to work. Maybe not, I don't know.
Know what the coolest thing about this job at Sprint is though? No, well I'll tell you. They contacted me! How crazy is this - I spent 3 months seriously WORKING at finding a job. Something 1st shift, no weekends, good benefits, slightly better pay than I was making down in NC, close to home, and something that I didn't have to go back to school or get any certifications for. And this dude calls me up one day as I was coming home from the country club about to go to Sony, and asks me to come in and interview. He got my resume from one of the zillions of websites that I had my resume posted on, and boom. 20 minute commute, the base is about what I made at Labcorp but I'll also make 100% commission on everything I sell above quota (which is low for the first 3 months), 8-4:30, hour for lunch, entry level sales. I even have the opportunity after I establish some clients, to go out and show them products or do presentations if I want to. My future boss said he got into this business in 2000 when the econmy was bad, and he was grateful that someone gave him an opportunity to work in sales with no experience, so he now does the same. He also doesn't expect people to stay there for more than 3-5 years unless they want to make Sprint their career. He sees the job as a resume builder, and tries to give people as broad of a work experience as they want. How great is that? Oh yeah and attire is blue jeans and a collared shirt, not even button down.
Isn't it funny. I filled out literally about a hundred (if not more) job applications and went on probably 15-20 interviews. And the job that fit what I wanted I didn't even find, it found me. Me personally, I see that as God being pretty freaking cool. You can take it however you want though. But hey mom, there you go. You've been praying for months that God would help me find a job - there you have it. Thank you for having faith knowing that in due time all that work and frustration would pay off. I don't want to get overly spiritual here, but a lot of people have been thanking me or recognizing my patience lately. And you should just know, it isn't my patience you're seeing but my faith that in due time all things will come together for good. Bad economy, crummy jobs with bad hours and low pay, higher expenses, having to ask people for money to keep my head above water, Sara working 80+ hours a week - whatever it is. Knowing the problem is already taken care of and all I have to do is just keep on keeping on and wait for the solutions to come up, man what a better way to live. That attitude has yet to be proven wrong. Hard work with the right expectation. Thank you David Horne for teaching me that. Man oh man. It really is crazy how things work out.
Hasta luego party people. I hope everyone is having a great day.
September 9, 2008
A bit of prologue
So, I'm sure the date will be posted on here somewhere, but it's September 9th right now. I moved from NC on May...15th-ish...I think. Somewhere in there. I don't remember. However, I've got some friends back in No' Cara-liiina (you have to say it with the accent) that I haven't talk to since I left.
First of all, I owe a shout out to all of the HPV party people down at Labcorp in Burlington. I know of at least 2 new babies in my former department, and if we're still anywhere near the same marriage:new baby rate that we were at a few months ago, there's got to be at least 1 new marriage at 5 more pregnancies I haven't even heard of yet. So fill me in. And now you have my email address, so if there are any new pictures of children on the wall by the door, send them along if you can.
Wow...so, May. Well it's been fast. Up until about a month ago, I hadn't spent a single weekend with no plans IN Providence. Sara and I were always down in CT, or had people up visiting, or I was out of town somewhere. So outside of that, here is some of the really cool stuff I did:
1. Went to Jamaica for one of Sara's best friend's wedding.
2. Went canoe-ing down the Delaware River with my dad and former boy scout troop for 50 miles in 3 days.
3. Visited some friends in Greensboro
4. Went to Denver, Colorado for another of Sara's best friend's wedding.
By the way, Negril Jamaica - totally awesome. If you ever have the chance to go take over a resort with like 40 people while you're there DO IT. If not, still go, it's a great time. And if you ever make it out to Denver, Colorado and you don't take the 40 minute drive to Red Rocks Park and Amphitheater, you'll have missed out on one of the best pieces of landscape our country has to offer. I'll ask Sara for the pictures and I'll try to figure out how to get them on here, although everyone knows pictures don't quite do scenes like that full justice.
Both of those weddings were fun. I got to make friends with a lot of Sara's med school people and their significant others who are one by one turning into husbands WHICH IS NOT OKAY. Seriously, it's like this group of crazy med school grads was like "Hey, how about one of us get married every couple months, so we can have an excuse to all get together again!". Oh, just kidding. Kind of.
Oh man, so Sara's parents rented this place in... Rhode Island somewhere south of where we are, which made it really easy to go visit them. Not that an hour drive to their house is hard to make either. But it was cool because for the first time in my life, I went clamming. That's right. I hunted for the ultimate in prey - little sedentary bivalves maybe half the size of your palm buried under 3 inches of mud. Oh believe it, at low tide we were dangerous! I think there were 5 or more of us at one point. We wound up with I don't know, maybe 6 or 7 dozen clams. It was insane. We took some home and Sara and I made a sauce out of them, which was amazing.
The canoe trip with my dad was really cool too. My old boy scout troop is still going strong. It was the strangest thing being on a camping trip as an "adult". Those guys, are...well they're something else. They all play this unofficial game called "Let's see what jokes we can say that go right over all these boy's heads". One can imagine the content of such jokes, but they tell me that they've been doing it since I was a scout. I guess when you're shorter lots of stuff goes over your head. But it was fun getting to hang out with my dad in the canoe. Although, we seemed to have a bit more drag than some of the boats filled with 12 year olds. It was strange too because it seemed the best way for us to steer the boat through the rapids was for me to scream out instructions to my dad. Tell him when and how sharply to rudder us, which side to paddle on, when to just rest and let the current take us down the river. It was ironic because I learned all of that stuff from him as a kid when he told me what side to paddle on, when to dig, when to rest etc. Outside of one little incident where the Delaware got the best of us (read spun our boat around sideways allowing water to pour over the sides thus sinking us) we did pretty well. One of the scoutmasters brought about 30 water cannons along, which made for an interesting ride. A common form of retaliation was to sink anyone you could. Thankfully dad and I had the cooler with various boys lunches in it, which was great. As we headed off each morning I'd just read the names of our allies out loud thus forming a nice unit of friendly ships that defended us quite nicely against any aggressors.
Jeez I don't know of what else I've done recently that is worth updating on. OHHHH....how about some job hunting tales. Oh man, I've gathered up some good stories. So lets see, one of my personal favorite ads was the one for a "Professional Tree Climber. Minimum 2 years tree climbing experience required". WHAT!? Where does one go to get tree climbing experience? Can you list your best friend as a reference from when you were ten? I got turned down from a job waiting tables because I didn't have enough "fine dining experience", which is pretty ridiculous. Waiting tables is waiting tables. Yeah I know, I guess they didn't teach me that in college, but I handled the biology degree just fine, maybe I can take someones food order with success as well. That was only topped by the coffee shop that called and said "Hey Bill, about the position - we went with somebody who has more coffee experience". Again. Wow.
The reason I'm trying to obtain after school positions thus robbing today's youth of glorious minimum wage jobs is only because I don't have the license to work as a lab tech in RI. Yeah, North Cackalackians, read on! It varies from state to state. Some states, like NC require just a 4 year degree to be a lab tech. Others, like the great state of RI, don't care if you have 2 years experience in a lab, unless you went to school for another year earning your CLS or MLT, then you will not be allowed to work! Yeah, I'm not gonna lie, that sucks.
So for about a month and change I was pretty hard headed and figured someone would let me slide because of my experience. After challenging the system failed, I tried to find work in another industry, but that's rough because I have little experience outside of lab work, and waiting tables...and apparently that's a fairly specialized field as well - requiring years of commitment and service in the industry for your "experience" to apply. So I started applying and actually interviewing for some sales jobs. Car sales and life insurance. Oh joy. Actually, selling cars doesn't seem to be very difficult, and you can make a lot of money doing it...but it's at the expense of your social life. You've got to work every weekend, and during the week you're there from open till close. 12 hour days. Boo to that. Life insurance seems to be the same. The interviewer told me "If you pay your dues for the first few years, work those 60 hour weeks, then later you can slow down a bit and just work a 40 hour week". I don't know. I've done 40 hour weeks. That...doesn't sound like a great reward. Now if he had said 20 hour week, that'd be more like it.
So now the current game plan is this: I've picked up a job as a banquet server. This should build my resume, which is good...and pay the landlord along with the gas and electric companies. I've extended my willingness to commute a bit, reaching further into Massachusetts - just south of Boston. There lies some hope that I can work in a lab again. Mass isn't as snobby as RI and my experience and 4 year degree is good enough for me to be gainfully employed. Thank God too because I'm pretty tired of filling out online applications and self assessment tests. OH speaking of self assessment tests, I'm part of a stress study at Brown University. 4 visits, $400. Visit one was nothing more than filling out paperwork for 3 hours. Sweetness. I also bussed tables one night at a fancy schmancy restaurant. I worked form 3pm till 1am, and made $75. I know. Do some math, $75 / 10hours = $7.50/hour!!!!
The one thing I wont do is allow talk of the economy being lousy to trick me into thinking my unemployment isn't my own doing. If the economy going down hill is the reason I can't find work then that means there is absolutely nothing I can do about it until the economy somehow gets better. So all of you who try to console me with that one, I'm not mad at you and I appreciate your empathy and concern. I've been working more diligently at finding a job, and man oh man, if anyone ever needs help making a resume or navigating one of the major job search websites...let me know. I've become a pro at it in the last couple of months.
So that's it from me for now. Hopefully some pictures will follow. Jamaica, Colorado, Providence, New-born-babies from The Corp. Who knows what we'll find on Sara's camera. So until then, have a great rest of the day...or go to bed! I'm sure people only read these sorts of things while at work, or really late night in an attempt to fight off some boredom.
First of all, I owe a shout out to all of the HPV party people down at Labcorp in Burlington. I know of at least 2 new babies in my former department, and if we're still anywhere near the same marriage:new baby rate that we were at a few months ago, there's got to be at least 1 new marriage at 5 more pregnancies I haven't even heard of yet. So fill me in. And now you have my email address, so if there are any new pictures of children on the wall by the door, send them along if you can.
Wow...so, May. Well it's been fast. Up until about a month ago, I hadn't spent a single weekend with no plans IN Providence. Sara and I were always down in CT, or had people up visiting, or I was out of town somewhere. So outside of that, here is some of the really cool stuff I did:
1. Went to Jamaica for one of Sara's best friend's wedding.
2. Went canoe-ing down the Delaware River with my dad and former boy scout troop for 50 miles in 3 days.
3. Visited some friends in Greensboro
4. Went to Denver, Colorado for another of Sara's best friend's wedding.
By the way, Negril Jamaica - totally awesome. If you ever have the chance to go take over a resort with like 40 people while you're there DO IT. If not, still go, it's a great time. And if you ever make it out to Denver, Colorado and you don't take the 40 minute drive to Red Rocks Park and Amphitheater, you'll have missed out on one of the best pieces of landscape our country has to offer. I'll ask Sara for the pictures and I'll try to figure out how to get them on here, although everyone knows pictures don't quite do scenes like that full justice.
Both of those weddings were fun. I got to make friends with a lot of Sara's med school people and their significant others who are one by one turning into husbands WHICH IS NOT OKAY. Seriously, it's like this group of crazy med school grads was like "Hey, how about one of us get married every couple months, so we can have an excuse to all get together again!". Oh, just kidding. Kind of.
Oh man, so Sara's parents rented this place in... Rhode Island somewhere south of where we are, which made it really easy to go visit them. Not that an hour drive to their house is hard to make either. But it was cool because for the first time in my life, I went clamming. That's right. I hunted for the ultimate in prey - little sedentary bivalves maybe half the size of your palm buried under 3 inches of mud. Oh believe it, at low tide we were dangerous! I think there were 5 or more of us at one point. We wound up with I don't know, maybe 6 or 7 dozen clams. It was insane. We took some home and Sara and I made a sauce out of them, which was amazing.
The canoe trip with my dad was really cool too. My old boy scout troop is still going strong. It was the strangest thing being on a camping trip as an "adult". Those guys, are...well they're something else. They all play this unofficial game called "Let's see what jokes we can say that go right over all these boy's heads". One can imagine the content of such jokes, but they tell me that they've been doing it since I was a scout. I guess when you're shorter lots of stuff goes over your head. But it was fun getting to hang out with my dad in the canoe. Although, we seemed to have a bit more drag than some of the boats filled with 12 year olds. It was strange too because it seemed the best way for us to steer the boat through the rapids was for me to scream out instructions to my dad. Tell him when and how sharply to rudder us, which side to paddle on, when to just rest and let the current take us down the river. It was ironic because I learned all of that stuff from him as a kid when he told me what side to paddle on, when to dig, when to rest etc. Outside of one little incident where the Delaware got the best of us (read spun our boat around sideways allowing water to pour over the sides thus sinking us) we did pretty well. One of the scoutmasters brought about 30 water cannons along, which made for an interesting ride. A common form of retaliation was to sink anyone you could. Thankfully dad and I had the cooler with various boys lunches in it, which was great. As we headed off each morning I'd just read the names of our allies out loud thus forming a nice unit of friendly ships that defended us quite nicely against any aggressors.
Jeez I don't know of what else I've done recently that is worth updating on. OHHHH....how about some job hunting tales. Oh man, I've gathered up some good stories. So lets see, one of my personal favorite ads was the one for a "Professional Tree Climber. Minimum 2 years tree climbing experience required". WHAT!? Where does one go to get tree climbing experience? Can you list your best friend as a reference from when you were ten? I got turned down from a job waiting tables because I didn't have enough "fine dining experience", which is pretty ridiculous. Waiting tables is waiting tables. Yeah I know, I guess they didn't teach me that in college, but I handled the biology degree just fine, maybe I can take someones food order with success as well. That was only topped by the coffee shop that called and said "Hey Bill, about the position - we went with somebody who has more coffee experience". Again. Wow.
The reason I'm trying to obtain after school positions thus robbing today's youth of glorious minimum wage jobs is only because I don't have the license to work as a lab tech in RI. Yeah, North Cackalackians, read on! It varies from state to state. Some states, like NC require just a 4 year degree to be a lab tech. Others, like the great state of RI, don't care if you have 2 years experience in a lab, unless you went to school for another year earning your CLS or MLT, then you will not be allowed to work! Yeah, I'm not gonna lie, that sucks.
So for about a month and change I was pretty hard headed and figured someone would let me slide because of my experience. After challenging the system failed, I tried to find work in another industry, but that's rough because I have little experience outside of lab work, and waiting tables...and apparently that's a fairly specialized field as well - requiring years of commitment and service in the industry for your "experience" to apply. So I started applying and actually interviewing for some sales jobs. Car sales and life insurance. Oh joy. Actually, selling cars doesn't seem to be very difficult, and you can make a lot of money doing it...but it's at the expense of your social life. You've got to work every weekend, and during the week you're there from open till close. 12 hour days. Boo to that. Life insurance seems to be the same. The interviewer told me "If you pay your dues for the first few years, work those 60 hour weeks, then later you can slow down a bit and just work a 40 hour week". I don't know. I've done 40 hour weeks. That...doesn't sound like a great reward. Now if he had said 20 hour week, that'd be more like it.
So now the current game plan is this: I've picked up a job as a banquet server. This should build my resume, which is good...and pay the landlord along with the gas and electric companies. I've extended my willingness to commute a bit, reaching further into Massachusetts - just south of Boston. There lies some hope that I can work in a lab again. Mass isn't as snobby as RI and my experience and 4 year degree is good enough for me to be gainfully employed. Thank God too because I'm pretty tired of filling out online applications and self assessment tests. OH speaking of self assessment tests, I'm part of a stress study at Brown University. 4 visits, $400. Visit one was nothing more than filling out paperwork for 3 hours. Sweetness. I also bussed tables one night at a fancy schmancy restaurant. I worked form 3pm till 1am, and made $75. I know. Do some math, $75 / 10hours = $7.50/hour!!!!
The one thing I wont do is allow talk of the economy being lousy to trick me into thinking my unemployment isn't my own doing. If the economy going down hill is the reason I can't find work then that means there is absolutely nothing I can do about it until the economy somehow gets better. So all of you who try to console me with that one, I'm not mad at you and I appreciate your empathy and concern. I've been working more diligently at finding a job, and man oh man, if anyone ever needs help making a resume or navigating one of the major job search websites...let me know. I've become a pro at it in the last couple of months.
So that's it from me for now. Hopefully some pictures will follow. Jamaica, Colorado, Providence, New-born-babies from The Corp. Who knows what we'll find on Sara's camera. So until then, have a great rest of the day...or go to bed! I'm sure people only read these sorts of things while at work, or really late night in an attempt to fight off some boredom.
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