Went on a job interview today.
T’was funny actually, in a stupid sort of way. Let me give you the back story first. I wrote about it yesterday.
The job, I am told by the fine people at workforce one is assistant manager at a dollar store. Not the best sounding gig, but, hey, a job is a job. Poverty being a true and loyal, albeit unwanted friend at this point, I’ll take what comes along. Some money beats no money and other such thoughts come to mind.
I don’t have the name of the contact I am supposed to meet there. Leave an e-mail yesterday. No response. Try to get the info again this morning. First phone call, no dice. Second one I get through, and here I run into a problem. I am outside on a cell phone, and there is a guy working a lawnmower nearby. I can’t hear the workforce one guy, and end up asking him 4 times for the name, apologizing each time because I can’t hear him. I finally get a “Tom” that I can make out. No last name that I can make out. It’ll have to be good enough, I can work with just one name.
I get to the spot where this store is supposed to be. There is no store with the name of the place I am supposed to go to. I look around the entire crap looking strip mall, nothing. A nice King Kullen, gets me thinking, even if this thing goes south, I can at least get a nice piece of fish and some ½ price bread or sumthin. Walk to the end of the strip mall. Nuttin.
Go back, reconnoiter and see what I can see, see if I missed something. Ends up that I did. The very first place I passed was in fact a dollar store, I just passed it by, fiddling with my phone or sumthin. The name on the front is different from the store name I was given. I don’t let it bother me since it’s the right address and I go in.
Find an associate, wearing a tag that says “assistant manager” Her name was Rita or some such. When I say I am looking for the Manager, Tom, she looks at me funny. “You mean Bob?” She asks. “Ya, ya, sorry, Bob.” She says hold on a sec, I’ll go get him.
She disappears looking for whatthehelleverhisnameis. Comes back after a minute, and asks me to follow her. We walk to the front of the store, the complete opposite direction from where she just went, and tells me there is another interview going on, and it’ll just be a few minutes.
So I can cool my heels and look around the store while I wait for “Bob” to finish with his other interviewee. I get to read some interesting “funny” cards that aren’t all that damn funny. But then again, for a dollar at a dollar store, you can’t really bitch about that, now can ya? A phone rings, the cashier picks up. “MIKE, LINE 2, PICK UP” gets yelled across the store.
No one calling me, I hope.
I find that they have the break and bake frozen cookie dough my wife loves that we get from Angel food ministries. Banquet dinners. One or two other things I’ve seen at actual places I’ve bought food at. Damn this place does have some semi non-shitty cheap food. Cheap? Expected. Almost decent? Not so much. T’was a happy surprise.
Inspected all 45 types of balloons they had, and saw that they had two helium tanks. Noticed they only had 2 people on the floor, one the assistant manager, Rita, and a cashier, with Bob in his office. It being a dollar store, they don’t need a lot of people at 10 am on a Thursday, I guess. Another call comes in, another “MIKE, LINE 1, PICK UP.” gets yelled by the cashier. I was tempted to answer her with a “SCREW YOU, I DON’T WANNA” or some such, but I stifle the urge. After deciding to check to see if my wife had texted me for the nth time, the door opens, and a well dressed young man walks out, thanked by a red-faced, haggard, looking kid wearing a wrinkled, slightly ill fitting blue collared shirt.
I wait until they are done, and go introduce myself. I notice his name tag. It has the words “assistant manager” on it as well, and his name is Mike. Seems that Bob, who still has no last name BTW, is out today. So his fresh-faced protegé, Mike, gets to handle the festivities.
Nice.
Mike and I exchange pleasantries. He seems a bit out of sorts. A call comes in, Mike picks it up, works out the schedule with someone on the other end. We start to talk about the job. I begin to talk about the assistant manager spot I am applying for. He stops me and says there is no assistant manager job open that he is aware of, says maybe they just didn’t tell him about. I say maybe it was a mistake by the people at workforce. Rita comes in to get change from the little vault, which was left open, and she chimes after hearing the exchange that maybe Mike is right, but that maybe they sent me to the wrong place. Mike pointed out that though the name on the store is different, they are still technically “Dollar ****” and that they sent me to the right place, and that maybe there is an assistant manager job open.
Personally, I think Rita was right.
The job they were offering was stocking shelves, part time, 20 hours at most a week, and the pay is $7.75 per hour or some such, don’t remember the number exactly. Mike tells me that they had hired two people last week, but they might not work out, they’re still on probation, and they might want to keep me on the sidelines, just in case one of these people doesn’t work out.
I’m the backup plan, just in case the 20 year old stoner they just hired doesn’t want to load the Swanson’s lonely man dinners and 99 cent hand sewn socks made by child labor in Guatemala anymore. Just friggin great.
Mike and I talk about the basic operations of the place, talk about the cashier opening, which I’ve never done, talk about the hours of operations, the days that will be 8 hour days, and which will only be 5 hour days, and which days they might not need me at all. After that, we say our goodbyes. Wish him a good day, and thank him for taking the time out of his busy day to interview me.
The whole thing probably took 15 minutes.
Walk out, taking my tie off, thinking to myself that this may be the single silliest job interview I’ve ever gone on. Possibly the worst, but you know, I don’t know that I mind that. Means that it can’t get much worse.
I hope.
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That’s it from here, America. G’night.
Casus Belli 