Hired

Well, I think I found the job. I did a stupid thing last night, after finishing my blog, I ran out to the corner store to pick up some cigarettes and I figured I might as well grab the Sunday paper while I was out. The Sunday paper has the biggest classified section, which is nice when looking for a job, but I figured that I would get it primarily so I could do the Chicago Tribune crossword before I went to bed. So I did a little light reading, turn out Jerry Bowyer had written an editorial piece in there, nothing for Best of the Web consumption, it was more inside baseball stuff on a schism in the Episcopal Church, which we will not repeat here, simply because I would like to keep what few readers I have. But the crosswords are found in the editorial section on Sunday, so I did come across it and did a little light reading before bed.

I flip to the puzzle page, there are two, the Chicago Tribune and the New York Times, each taking half a page. The thing about the NYT puzzle is that it gets harder as the week goes on, Monday's puzzle is the easiest and I can usually complete it, by Thursday I am struggling severely and by Sunday, if I can get one corner, I consider it somewhat of a victory. The Tribune puzzle only appears here on Sunday (the NYT puzzle is in the paper every day) and it is easier, even in the clues tend to try to be a little funnier than the Times, so I do the Trib puzzle instead and if I can get more than half of it (I am not a puzzle geek, unlike Lynn who can nail the NYT Sunday puzzle without much thought) I consider it a job well done. Just a little mental exercise to help keep the mind somewhat sharp. As I am looking at the clues, I am thinking that the puzzle may be more challenging than usual, so I was going through the mental bargaining of effort to solving versus finding something a little less taxing before bed.

I opted for the less taxing route and so I read the sports page, which rehashed how poorly the Penguins played on Saturday. They really are struggling right now, only the first line is providing any offense and their goaltending to this point has been very subpar. Last I had checked, they were two games under .500 and in 4th place in their division. Not a good way to start the season. I read up on the college basketball tournament that Pitt was hosting, I think it was something like the Hispanic College Fund Basketball Classic. It was Pitt (ranked #20 in the US) St Louis (a twenty win team that made the NCAA tournament last year) and a couple of scrub school that were there basically to pad Pitt's record. Well, I read up on Pitt winning again (they would go on to win all three tournament games) and then I read some NFL stuff, basically to see if my picks were going to be as bad as the newspaper guy this week. For the record, it looks like I went 7-7 and last I saw, the newspaper guy was going to go something like 5-9, so there may be another career awaiting me out there should I want it.

I figured before I headed off into sleepy land, I would at least look at the classified ads to see if there was anything of merit. I didn't expect to find much, not that there aren't jobs, but the number of jobs looking for a part timer that fit around my schedule are not quite as likely to appear as say, professional type jobs. Still, I figured it can't hurt to look, and I came across the dreaded 3901 Forbes Avenue ad. Rich, when he reads this, can tell you just how torturous that ad really is, it is the address for the Original Hot Dog Shop. I have logged over 6 years working for them in the past and it is the one place that I try really hard when I leave (my 6 years are over three different runs there), because while it sucks, they are always hiring and I can pay the bills with a full time job there, simply because they do pay time and a half for OT, it isn't hard to get 60 hrs a week, and they pay weekly. But don't kid yourself, it is hard work, even for fast food. You earn literally every penny. I remember working in the Fry Section one year, literally the only thing sold there is french fries and it so happened it was a Saturday and Pitt was playing host to Notre Dame in football (for the old timers, it was when Pitt still played at Pitt Stadium, rather than downtown at Heinz Field as they do now) and through the course of a 13 hour shift, I sold over $3000 in nothing but french fries. No sandwiches, no hot dogs, no pizza, just potato. And unlike McDonald's where you just open bags of frozen fries, we made them on site from 50 lb bags of potatoes, so it was a lot work.

The "O" as it is locally called, you can probably google it, though you can also google "dirty O" because the bathrooms left a lot to be desired, has some really good digs and fries, but it certainly had its bad parts as well. It pays more than most fast food jobs, but like many places in that field, it still has a hard time keeping employees. As a result, rather than list the business, it just lists the street address when it puts out a classified ad. The reason I mention it is because a few spots down from the ad is another one for 3911 Forbes Avenue, and it says they are looking for a dishwasher. Now the O has dishes, but they don't hire dishwashers per se, each section is just responsible for doing their own dishes. I know that there is a bar/restaurant called Hemmingways a couple of doors down from the O, but I can't figure out why they wouldn't post their name, so I can't tell if the ad is a misprint for the O or a real ad for Hemmingway's. I figure that Monday I will take a shot and stop by Hemmingways anyhow and just take a peek in to see if they are the ones hiring, knowing that worst case scenario, I will probably hear back from Rite Aid (which I did, by the way). This would be closer to my apartment, by a few miles, Hemmingways is only a few blocks from my apartment as opposed to a three mile bus ride for Rite Aid. Sure enough, it was Hemmingways that was hiring, so I stopped in and filled out an application quickly, then came back to my apartment. They ended up calling me back in about an hour or so, asked me to come back for an interview around 6:30 pm. I went back, and the chef was unpacking stuff in the cooler, he explained what I would be doing, mainly keeping the place neat and doing dishes, which is fine with me, talk about a lack of responsibility, that takes the cake as far as I am concerned. I like part time jobs where they just tell you what to do and leave you alone to do it as opposed to dealing with the public, and having people watch over my shoulder. I will admit, at my last part time gig at Subway, my happiest days were the ones where they left me to do the dishes and didn't bother me with waiting on customers. I would just turn on my radio and bang stuff out. Anyway, I still had schedule concerns, after all, the holidays are coming up and what not and if this was going to be like K Mart, I wasn't going to take the gig, I pretty much have my mind made up now in that regard. Before I can say a word regarding my schedule, the chef tells me that they will close for a week at Christmas, since the college will be closed, they are using the time to put a new floor in the kitchen, and if I want to, I can come in and work, if not just to come back in when they reopen. Problem solved for me. The only other issue was next Friday, and while they wanted me to work Wed-Sat 6p-12p, I said next Friday would be a problem, because of the high school football stuff at the station. No problem, just work Tuesday instead I was told. So, I get to keep my bonus $200 Friday at the station and I have a part time job that works around my schedule for the holidays. Needless to say, I will be starting on Thursday.

A question came up in my last entry about why I would opt for these type of jobs. Well, in all honesty, it is because I love my full time job, it just doesn't pay enough. I enjoy the people I work with, and nobody is on so much of an ego trip that I can't crack a microphone without someone getting pissed off. There are radio hosts like that, they just want their producers doing nothing but producing the show, and not contributing on air at all. I am given some creative free reign, heck Doug has me on his Friday show as a guest for heaven's sake. I have parlayed what I do into to TV appearances as though I know what the hell I am talking about and I have even hosted for Lynn a few times during her vacations, so while the cash isn't all that it could be (it's enough to pay the bills, but I like to have a little spending cash), I tend to work a second jobs usually, and finding one that will work around my schedule isn't the easiest thing, so it means I usually end up working jobs that some people would consider less than stellar. But to me, the ends justify the means and if in the end I get to continue to do what I love full time, then a part time job isn't that much of an inconvenience.

Well, time to go check on my fantasy teams, last I saw I was still getting my ass kicked, I went 2-7-1 in hockey and was losing in both football leagues. Not the week I had in mind on the fantasy front. I did get to add another .26 to the change meter, new total being $33.14 and I do have another online survey to do, so my evening on internet isn't done quite yet.