employablog

In a little over two weeks, I’m going to be wearing business casual.  We all do it, we all do it plenty whether or not we’re going to a job, but this instance will be for a job.

After finishing all my interviews for this job, I felt pretty good about myself, I took a black and tan up on the roof of my new place, looked across the East River and took stock, looking across at all of Manhattan splayed out in front of me.

I used to watch the cars drive by across Lake Calhoun at night.  Now I do the same, looking across the river at the cars speeding up and down the FDR.  And now, I am in a different place.  Coming to New York can make you feel like an immigrant even if you are from this country, and even if you’ve spent a fair chunk of time there.  And if you spend about half of each work day speaking in Spanish rather than English, well, that doesn’t make you feel any less foreign.

But I made my dent in this city.  Each day, furiously flailing toward progress or some semblance there of, my arms have been sore, but I never stopped.  And now, in just over two weeks, I start writing Kaplan’s MCAT review content.  And who better to do it than me?  I’m going to be a surgeon, it’s set, my deposit for med school is literally in the mail, and going back to my roof, it feels pretty good.

In college I’d freaked.  What now, what after?

Financial independence, har har.

But now I’m there.  When people on the street ask me for money, I’m no longer inches away from breaking down and showing them just how poor I am.

Hell, now I can even afford to the gym I just joined.

For a long time I scoffed at the idea of Daylight Savings. Or, more precisely, at the idea of going off of Daylight Savings. If saving daylight is the goal, shouldn’t we keep it all year long?

But now, the time at which the sun sets is really not that important to me: I will be in the office whether the sun goes down at 4pm (as it will shortly be doing here in Boston), at 5pm, at 6pm, at 7pm and most likely at 8pm too. For the first time in my life, the time at which the sun rises is more important.

The only chance I have to experience actual daylight is in the mornings, before work, when I decide to go for a run. This had been progressively more and more difficult as sunrise kept creeping later and later. The ranks of the morning joggers had been dwindling, the layers of clothing required increasing.

But now that we aren’t saving daylight anymore, I have a chance. When the alarm goes off at 6:30, the sun is just peaking over the harbor, ready to softly light the paths along the Esplanade of the Charles River with a faded and cool yellow-blue glow that is the daily secret of the ambitious young professionals who meet there to fight the wind, cold and quiet to reclaim some daylight.

At the very least, the end of daylight savings has delayed my inevitable purchase of an over-priced and under-used gym membership for at least four weeks. And for that, daylight savings time, I salute you. And I owe you $85.

Tomorrow, I have an interview for a real person job, and these people actually know that I am not available for a two-year engagement.  Hell, they even know that I am not available for even one year.  The company I am interviewing with happens to know quite a bit about me, because I already work for them, in fact, they have a paycheck with my name on it, I am interviewing tomorrow to write content for Kaplan.

This is one of those things where if I get hired, I have to take it.  This job is just too happy and too professional a marriage of my skills and interests (science, writing) to ignore.  That said, it would force me to leave La Focaccia the job of my current three that takes the most hours and gives me the most money.

But though a newbie to the food biz, I’m getting really, really good, and cool things are happening.  Customers love me.  People in the neighborhood know me, and know what I’m about.  And since I’ve started working there, more people have started coming during lunch.  I mean, I’ll call a shoe a shoe when I see it, and perhaps …

My coworkers are wonderful, they care about me, and tend to not let me leave without more free food to go.  And I’m finally fluent in epañol.  Oh, yo hablo.  Todos veces, cada día.  I don’t really want to leave, but at the same time, this restaurant manager job has been and would be a sort of professional honeymoon.  Either way, I’m wearing a suit tomorrrow, and shiny black shoes.

Job interview number 11 (but who’s counting) here I come

I think congratulations are in order, for getting in to medical school is no small feat. Back in our childhood, around this time Employee Too (or more correctly, probably, his mom) would host a big Halloween party. There was candy and scary movies and a half dozen wired young boys including one particularly goofy, lanky kid who we now know as Employee Too. If you knew him then, you’re probably be feeling like me: amazed, apprehensive and proud.

Luckily, school doesn’t start for another ten months, so before we hang up the cleats here at employablog, Employee Too’s got a lot of rent to pay. Also, I hear some big career decisions may be on the horizon. Will he continue his meteoric rise in the food services industry? Or take a risk on an entirely new industry? Stay tuned to EMPLOYABLOG…

What do you do?

In college it was: What’s your major?

Now, it’s:

What do you do?

Well, in a country that values people based on their utility (generalization, but, true), this question comes up a lot.  And whether or not you try to, you (that’s right, you) make value judgments based on what people do to pay the rent.  Accounts, musicians, painters, pole-dancers, all these professions carry certain stereotypes.

Me, I’ve avoided that by juggling three jobs, and in true juggling fashion, one of those jobs is always changing, always up in the air.  But they have always been grounded in the hope that I will go to medical school next fall, 2007.  But grounding something in a hope is dangerous.  I can say, “I want to be a doctor,” or “I applied to study to be a doctor, I know that I’m not into two medical schools, but it’s still early in …” and so on.

And just as those are not impressive things to say, they also make me nervous, what if?  One of the questions that medical school interviewers ask is: “What would you do if you do not get into medical school?”

And I say something like, “be a nurse, a researcher, something in healthcare.”  And have a nice packaged answer, that is a fine career, but not the career that I chose.

But today, I tried on the Daddy Pants, and they fit nicely.

I got accepted into medical school.  Everything that I have slaved for, yearned for, nearly given myself an ulcer for and most certainly a few anxiety and sleep disorders for, is in my possession.  So now, without a doubt or white lie, I can say, that I am going to be a surgeon, probably thoracic, but it’s a little early for me to figure out a specialty.

Yeah, these Daddy Pants feel pretty good.

A large part of what I do for a living involves using the Google to track down specific facts, numbers, and statistics about the industries or companies that I happen to be looking into that day.

Of course, another large part of what I do during the day involves using Google to read news, send emails, look up friends‘ blogs (I still don’t know how to spell parantheses), check the weather in Minnesota and find the cheapest price of some classic book that I’ve happened to have decided that I can’t go any longer without reading or at least owning.

This has resulted in Google becoming hopelessly confused about me and my interests. Am I a dedicated businessman interested in tools to help me find cash flow information on the high-tech companies in my portfolio? Am I a marketer interested in buying $100k consumer preference datasets? Maybe I’m an 18-year-old myspacer who might like to watch a Coca-Cola sponsored YouTube video about a couple guys spending the week crossing the country in their new Ford Focus. Or a school librarian who needs more tools for cataloging my copies of The Old Man and the Sea and On the Road.

I’ve noticed the Amazon recommendation engine has the same problem. Its suggestions for me involve lots of scholarly studies of international relations and environmental economics (required college reading), a few John Mayer and Dave Matthews CDs (presents for my sister), and The West Wing, Seasons 2-7 (wow Amazon, really going out on a limb on that one, huh? I wonder what tipped you off?).

The point is, because my searches for work are combined with my searches for whatever else it occurs to me to look at, Google can’t seem to get a good read on where the hell I’m going with my life. Google, I feel your pain.

Really, though, most of what Google decides I might want doesn’t seem to match me at all. Google is laughably off-base. Google couldn’t be more wr— wait, how much did you say that book categorization software is? And actually, that dataset might be kind of useful, I should ask my boss if we should buy it and OH MY GOD Google knows me better than I know myself.

Employee One, let me know when you want to finish that wine, I’m always ready.

Moving to New York took a lot of time — a lot. So much time, in fact, that days were full and still I had yet to have an interview for any job, but then, suddenly I was in demand. And I felt good, no, great. This is what is supposed to happen when you graduate an expensive college, and did well, and did interesting things with interesting people.

I had interviews, some great ones in fact. I spoke to the New York Firefighter’s Skin Bank, I would essentially be a plastic surgeon on dead people. Cutting off skin tissue and brining it in a cooler to whichever hospital needed it. I would check the charts of patients to make sure they were compatible, and check the cadavers for signs of infection. It was exactly what I wanted.

I had another interview to do research for Sloan Kettering, an amazing center focusing on cancer.

I had one day, a twofer, to be:

a) A medical assistant doing blood draws, EKGs and a number of other cool things for a colorectal surgeon. Butts don’t gross me out, I am going to be a surgeon.

b) A health insurance claims investigator. I would actually understand how HMOs work, and in working for one, try and force it to do good from the inside out.

Sitting pretty behind my desk responding to emails, drinking cheap coffee and wearing my headset and a pair of boxers (it was still very, very hot), I had taken New York City by storm.

But then honesty got in the way.

Toward the end of each interview after bushels of good vibrations, they would pop the question:

“When are you going to medical school?”

This question is awkward. It’s like the STD question to a prospective partner.

If everything goes right, I’ll go to medical school next fall. That leaves less than a year for jobs that all have a substantial training investment.

“I’m a quick train,” I’d throw in, or something like that, but always to no avail.

“You sound great, BUT …

We’re looking for a two-year commitment.”

Click. Goodbye. Don’t pass go.

Suddenly I was Charlie Brown.

There are two types of jobs in this world: the kind that give you an email address, and the kind that don’t. Is this the same thing as white collar/blue collar?

Possibly. But while my favorite shirt has white in its collar, it is also Pink and Black, and sometimes I wear a blue shirt. And what kind of collar does Employee Too wear when he’s waiting tables for yuppies? My guess is that he doesn’t wear one at all.

I mean, if we’re going to use broad occupational categories to define our identities and divide ourselves politically, lets at least use categories that make sense.

If you have an email address where the part after the @ is how you pay your rent, this implies certain things about your life. For example, you are not likely to have to talk B-list celebrities from locking you in a cellar (unless you are working at a talent agency). On the other hand, if you do not have a work address, you are not likely to remember the exact time and place when you first understood how VLOOKUP worked.

@Workers, when the Revolution™ begins let’s meet at my house, I have some wine I want to finish first.

A number of strange things have happened.  Most recently, today I yelled at the actor who played Van Wilder not to lock Jesus in the cellar.  Really.

Here is how this happened, I’m going to fast forward today before I rewind to some of the random steps I took falling into this job.

With my journalism degree, prehealth studies, and research and minor in Jewish Studies and Civilization, I am a restaurant manger (amongst other thing *cough* teacher, public health researcher).

But a restaurant manager, it’s unique in two aspects, one that it is my main income, and two, that I am in no way qualified to manage a restaurant.  I am not qualified to wait, or even bus.  But during lunch shifts, I am the busser, waiter, host, manager, and so far — so good.  A friend recommened me to this job, and I got it.  Bussing.  Two, three days later, I was serving, and now I have the keys to the safe, blah blah, etc, and all that would be exciting were it not for the fact that something just really doesn’t make sense.

And, that this job, aside from the fact that I get free food, and am good at flirting and placating *cough* getting tips, is entirely irrelevant to, well, anything I plan to do with my life.  So today, things got a little intense, and forced me to evaluate all that has happened in the brief and insane period since I returned to New York City.
Back to today, I yelled at Van Wilder not to lock Jesus in the cellar.  All day, a huge production crew was filming Definitely, Maybe (due out: 2008) on the block, in front of the restaurant and next door.  And it was crazy.  Rich people, actors, directors, all that stuff and they all came to eat.  One actress really liked me, tipped me for ‘to go,’ explaining,

“I’m in service too, you’re an actor too huh?”

I told her, this may sound crazy, but I’m actually going to be a doctor.  Huh.

But back to Jesus, and Ryan Reynolds (the actor who played Van Wilder, and that guy in a fat suit in that stupid movie).  They wanted to close our basement door, those metal doors that open out of the sidewalk for a shoot.  I said, “No, Jesus is downstairs, I’ll go check on him.”

Van Wilder was wearing a hoodie, and looking sheepish for some reason.  Maybe because I dropped the ‘J’ bomb.  A production monkey asked if they could shut the door once I was down, I said “No.  Then we’ll have two people trapped in the cellar, me and Jesus.”

So I went downstairs to talk to Jesus (pronounced, “Hey-Soos”), “Van a cerrar la puerta para uno o dos minutos para la pelicula.”

Jesus said that’d be cool (”Está bien”).  I went back up, and told it how it was.  But after the scene, I had to remind them to let Jesus out, which they did.  Anyways, the day was ridiculous.  I spent the entire day translating from the film crew to my workers (English to Spanish) so that everyone knew what was going on, and making adjustments, writing checks, taking orders, signing things and managing people, answering phones, taking orders, blah blah.  Irrelevant or not, I am learning something, and even if it is limited to sore feet and English-Spanish translation, and well, shmoozing, those are all very, very relevant.  And certainly, how to flirt with old euortrash women and gay people to make money.  Give free bread, smirk.  It works — table eight said that I was adorable.
To close, Van Wilder nearly trapped Jesus in a cellar in the West Village, oh, and now I am officially an MCAT teacher, and I got a phat tip for helping a stumbling tutor to teach a physics lesson at my restaurant.

Yeah, New York, NY, it’s a hell of a town.

There was a period of more than several days after I moved into my apartment and—notably—several days after I began comfortable white-collar employment, in which I slept under some towels. Depending on the temperature outside, the number of towels ranged from one to as many as I could find, which was always four. Because that’s how many towels I own.

I was excited when my comforter arrived in the mail, prinicipally because I would no longer have to check the weather with trepidation each night to decide how many towels to put on the bed. But also, the addition of a down comforter would allow the display of my duvet cover, which I had chosen to match the walls and the furniture and my young-single-guy-in-the-city attitude.

When the big day came, I celebrated by cleaning up the remaining signs that two weeks earlier my life had been completely encapsulated in some suitcases. I straightened, dusted, put away some embarassing knick-knacks, took out some marginally cooler knick-knacks and hung up a big mirror above my dresser. Finally, my room was completely unpacked.

That night I was startled awake by an enormous sound of crashing glass. My fists clenched and for a terrifying second I realized that I was alone in this apartment. I was no longer surrounded by a girlfriend and roommates and friends and security guards and other college students up all night to watch the O.C. or study for a midterm, and now it was ‘fight or flight’ time and I didn’t feel capable of either and I was in my boxers in bed and WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT NOISE.

In the next second I saw the broken glass from the knick-knack my mirror had knocked over as it crashed to the ground. Heart racing, I pulled the comforter up to my chin and the terror subsidied. Sort of.