Have you ever wondered to yourself: Am I the kiss-ass sycophant in the office who everybody hates and mocks ceaselessly behind my back? Or am I the rebel with a cause—that cause being the end to oppression at the hands of the self-appointed boss-cum-dictator?
Wait no more, the truth will be yours! You need only take this handy-dandy quiz supplied by our friends over at USA Today to determine whether you’re a brown-nosing toady—or a straight-shooter with upper management written all over you.
In the spirit of this possibly pumpkin-pie free season (noooooo!), I’ve been thinking: Wouldn’t it be nice to do something nonprofity? Something good for others?
After all, I have a rather flexible schedule, and I love to fold coats and stack cans in my kitchen cabinets alphabetically. I tend to enjoy people, and sometimes, if they’re polite and don’t throw things at me, I like to help them. Maybe it’s time to apply those talents to a greater (okay, okay, not “greater,” necessarily—but different? More needy?) cause than myself.
Imagine my surprise when—after a Union-Square-based meeting to discuss a potential job opportunity, the requisite trip to Barnes and Noble, a visit to Lululemon for workout gear, and a stop by Sephora for a replacement compact—I arrived in the vicinity of home, looked up, and found myself face-to-face with this display of fall foliage.
Only moments before, I’d also come upon a fruit market and procured three giant, juicy apples.
This all drives home the point that it’s only a week til Thanksgiving, as I was reminded earlier today. And yet, I feel so YOUNG! How the time flies.
POP QUIZ: Can you answer the following about the picture?
There’s a new job in town. Well, maybe not “town” exactly … at the Denali National Park and Preserve in Alaska. And it’s not just any job, it’s a government job, and you know what that means. (Hey, hey, lunch hour and fancy toilet seats!)
The Gig: Kennels Manager. “In addition to running Denali’s 31-animal dog kennel,” this “includes mushing into one of America’s great swaths of wilderness.”
Dear—not dear, really, you’re pretty much a step above Hitler and two or three below telemarketers—Identity Thieves, and also aspiring Identify Thieves,
Working all week means that today is a catch-up day. It’s really quite amazing how dirty the apartment gets, how long your dry-cleaning languishes at the laundromat, how your workouts suffer, or how tired you are on a Friday night when you’ve been 9 to 5-ing it, day-in, day-out.
It’s a wonder any of us who go into an office regularly get anything else done at all, and frankly, I question the wisdom of the whole philosophy. Perhaps now is the time to run strong with my 3 days of work for 3 days of life (plus summer vacation) campaign.
I believe I’ve hinted around at this before, or maybe come straight out and said it, but … the job search is much like dating. And different jobs are much like the different dating options in your life, ranging from the abusive to the adorable. Certain ones are right for certain people, and not for others. And, I have to believe, there’s one for everybody.
The job that comes to you easy, you may not want—until it’s gone, and then you live a life of regret over it. The job that’s a challenge only makes you desire it more—until you get it and it reveals that it’s a total bore and a half, and has halitosis. And the job that treats you like shit and kicks you when you’re down? Well, you’ll just come crawling right back to it in the morning hoping it will still have you, until the day that the light streams in through the dingy window of your pathetic, oppressed soul and you get the nerve to karate-chop it in the nuts and scream “I quit!”
If this week is any indication, things must be getting better, economically speaking and all. Here’s why:
1) I will have been employed by external sources, working outside of the confines of my glorious and overly decorated (according to some) apartment this entire week. Whoot. This hasn’t happened since early May, 2009. And boy, are my arms tired.
Today I continue my experimental work week by venturing into the copy division of a food magazine—one that houses actual water-bubbler-encased water, gratis coffee and tea, and a variety of kinda-sorta fancy lotions in the bathroom.
Ah, the signs of profit! Indeed, there’s even a coconut cake here, free for the nibbling, which i hear is worth the calories (though I’m still mortified enough by Nacho Cheesegate 09 to abstain).
Hey, hey, so, news y’all! Remember how the peeps at Walmart got all shithouse-rat-CRAZY last year waiting in line to storm the barracks (I mean, store) when it opened at 5 am on the day after Thanksgiving? And some poor employee got stomped to death in our boisterous Middle American friends’ pursuit of a bargain-priced flat-screen?
Well, worry ye not. Walmart’s bigwigs have put their heads together this time and come up with a fail-proof plan. See, they know a lot of people are unemployed, or tightening belts, or cheaper than they ever were, cheap bastards. Thus:
photo credit: Digital Sextant
