In today's economy, hell in any economy, jobs are scare. It's an adult game of musical chairs. We're trying to teach our kids that there's an under abundance and you'll always be wanting for more. The highway is always one lane short to accommodate the cars traveling on it. My paycheck is somewhat shy of covering my bills and my party jokes never quite make it over the hump. Most people universally hate their jobs. In a recent poll, 100% of respondents declared they hated their job and they wished a broken radiator hose on their boss during rush hour traffic in the middle of a hailstorm. The poll, in case you were wondering, was conducted by yours truly with the two participants being me on two different occasions separated by and inebriated weekend in New York City.
I know there is no perfect employee; the most perfect a person can ever be is on their resume. Months later, the employer has this employee who resembles their resume like Brad Pitt is mistaken for a Buick. But we need jobs and they need people to do those jobs. Before one can get the job, they have to first survive the interview. If we could see the participants thoughts posted like pop up video, the dialog would go something like this:
Interviewer: So we know your resume is a total lie and we don't care because we're going to stick you in a postage stamp of a cubicle with little more lighting than Mandela had in prison and with an elephants helping of work for virtually no pay.
Interviewee: I just want to work for you because I know you're too stupid to realize I'll spend most of the day cruising the internet for porn and making personal phone calls between texts and naps.
A wise man once told me that J.O.B. stands for 'just over broke' or 'journey of the broke'. Our boss pays us just enough so we won't quit and we work barely hard enough not to get fired.
The origins of the word 'fired' date back to the early fourteenth century when bosses would literally set their workers ablaze thereby creating an opening. There were no want ads back then. If you saw a smoldering chair sitting out in front of a business, you knew there was as opening. The term 'fired up' came from a failed attempt to fire someone. The scorchee would get so enraged from the attempted firing that he would pummel his boss to death.
Modern day supervisors are somewhat more humane. We forget the past and when people get fired today, they view it is as a cruel way to be treated. They may be right but I'd rather be fired than have the threat of being fired looming overhead; I've worked jobs where I've been left floundering at my desk like a fish at the bottom of the boat.
Just think, only forty years of this until the retirement police outfit us with white pants and belt, a full sized Mercury, incontinence and a one way ticket to Miami Beach. I'd love to keep writing but I'm at work and its almost lunchtime.
a decidedly myopic rehashing of the not so obvious... Seinfeld should have thought of it
