What is it you've done?

I've mentioned before that one of the factors that always seems to weigh heavily aginst my moving anywhere away from Boston is the fear I'd have in trying to find a new job. And I think where that comes from is the fact that I haven't really held down that many jobs. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average American between the age of 18 and 38 has held down 10 jobs. I'm pretty far below average in that respect. I've had five. So without furter ado, my employment history:

1) Paper boy. I had this job for three years, solely for the fact that the Boston Globe offered a $5,000 scholarship for high school if you delivered papers for three years. It was pretty much what you'd expect. I had that big paper bag that you carried the papers in. When it was nicer out I would ride my bike on my route. When winter came, my mom or dad would drive me. This was a 365 day a year job, (which really sucked on Christmas), and unfortunately coincided with the time in my life that I realized that I was not a morning person. My daily routine consisted of: waking up ungodly early and getting the papers. Luckily the Globe drivers would deliver them right to your house. Throw them all in my bag. Thursdays were the worst, because that was the day the circulars came out, and you had to add them to every paper. Hop on my bike (or in the car) and ride off to my route. My route was not the closest to my house. Stephanie Hilbert lived the next street over and had that route. Even before I had my route, I covered hers a couple of times when her family would go away. My route would probably have been considered the next one over. So I'd ride over, deliver the first half of my papers. Then I'd ride to Curtis, the convienent store, and get my breakfast of ginger ale and either coffee or crumb cakes, depending on what I was in the mood for. (The taste difference was slight, but noticeable.) Perhaps I'd also buy (or steal, as those were also my clepto days) a book, or browse the small section of video rentals for anything interesting. Then I'd ride off and do the second half of my route. Wednesdays I'd drop off the weekly payment envelope. The next few days, I'd pick them back up. Sunday papers were big affairs, and winter or summer I always got a ride for those. By the end of the third necessary year, I was pretty tired of being pretty tired, so that was it for me.

2) I forget what made me apply at Thayer Pharmacy. But I remember getting the call that I got the job. It was in the middle of a band rehearsal. This was after Thayer Pharmacy had moved from it's location at the corner of Bridge and Sea street, down Bridge a few blocks because the new location had better parking. Well, "any" parking, to be more precise. It was too bad, though. The old location had very much a small town pharmacy feel to it. Almost to the point that you'd expect to see a soda fountain against the wall. I have memories of just being in total awe of Thayer Pharmacy when I was a child, simply because of the sheer awesome breadth of the items they carried. Coloring books, soda, and Flintstones vitamins...four color pens and Doritos...all in the same place? What kid wouldn't love it. There was plenty to discover in those aisles while waiting for my mother to have a prescription filled.

Years later, when one of your jobs every Friday was stocking those aisles, they lose a lot of their luster. Friday was definitely the most annoying day to work there. The truck would come and leave pallet after pallet of boxes full of goods that needed to be shelved. The make-up aisle was universally accepted as the worst, and it became somewhat of a game for whoever was on shift on Friday afternoons/nights to do their best to avoid the comsetics box.

Aside from that, the rest of my duties pretty much included just running the register. Not so daunting a task once you learn it, but there are mistakes that are going to be made in the process. Like the time I entered something incorrectly, didn't void it, and ended up with a register discrepancy in the millions of dollars.

The funny thing about Thayer Pharmacy is that they had "spies". People that would come in and pretend to be customers. They would make sure the register was always staffed, that you always made sure to give them their receipt, that you weren't slacking off, etc. And these spies were my downfall, the cause for the only job (to date) I was fired from. When you're working the register, and there are no customers, and you don't have to "block" the shelves (make everything look neat), there's not really a lot to do. So, I would read. It's often what I do when I have nothing to do. Yes, read that sentence again if you must. I'd go over to the bookshelf, pick out something, and read it. Well, one of the spies came in when I was doing that and I got reported. Funny thing is they didn't even know I was reading one of their books, that didn't matter. Just that I was reading at all. Because pretending to look constantly busy is apparently the best way to run a business.

So that was the end of my Thayer Pharmacy career.

Also, it's the reason I enver finished reading Jurassic Park.

3) Burger King. Yeah, I worked there. For a few months. Aside from stealing plenty of free chicken tenders, fried, and onion rings throughout my shifts, it pretty much sucked as much as you might imagine.

Obviously, you're weren't supposed to steal their food and eat it while working. Not that it stopped anyone. Small things, like the aforementioned fries, tenders, and rings were easy. Grab one here and there when the manager wasn't looking. Some people were moer ambituous, however. One guy had a nice little hiding alcove where he'd hide Jr. Whoppers, taking a bite at a time. And of course, there was Stu, who placed an entire filet of fish, which were pretty big, in his pocket and went and ate it in the bathroom.

However, no matter how pointless that job was, to this day, whenever I need to wrap a sandwhich in foil I still do it Burger King style. Yes, they had their own method for wrapping the burgers. And I still do it.

4) The main benefit of Northeastern university is their work study program. It's a five year plan there usually, as you take semesters off to work and put into practice whatever you're there to learn. So, my one intern opportunity from Northeastern was at Kurzweil, a keyboard company. I worked on the K2000 keyboard, mostly. There was a small room in a small office in Waltham, and in that room I edited sound samples for the keyboard and generally just played around with it looking for bugs. That was my job description. You might think: "Cool. Working with instruments. Putting together something that people are actually going to use." But it was really rather boring. Scrolling through dozens or hundreds of options and sub options looking for things that might be wrong gets tedious. And editing samples was done more by rote than any artistic decision making on my part. Basically you copied a sound wave from a DAT and when the wave reached a certain level of degredation, you cut it off. That was it.

If nothing else, I did learn a couple of things. I did pick up a little bit of how to play piano. I also discovered that when a company doesn't take out taxes for you, get ready to bend over when tax time comes around. This was also where I discovered Shanghai, which I still love playing to this day. So, that's something.

5) MIB. To be fair, I've held more than one position here, but then again, I've been here a long time. Part time back from high school, through college, and full time after that. Both the Burger King and Kurzweil fell either in between or concurrently with MIB stints.

I started here getting paid under the table from my dad to remove staples. I've manned microfilm machines older than God and louder than a train. I've stored, filed, and shredded documents. I've worked in the mailroom, the Disclosure office, and for the past few years at the Help Desk. I've administered all kinds of customer service. At least, if nothing else, I've been moving upward the entire time I've been here. It almost feels slightly like, if not exactly, a career. In fact, I seriously hope it's not a career, because if 65 rolls around and I'm getting a gold pen from the 'B, I'm going to be pretty depressed, I think.

So there it is, I've been employed 5 places in my wy working life. Knock off the paper route, as I don't think you can really count that as a position you really have to assemble a resume for. Burger King and Thayer Pharmacy? You walk in the door and fill out an application. If they need someone for the turnover machine they call you. Kurzweil? Northeastern provided that one for me. MIB? Nepotism opened the door. Job searching is a job in and of itself, and not one I have much, if any, experience in. You can probably see why I find the thought daunting.