Sunday, March 04, 2007

• Reason #1 why I should be nominated world's biggest dork...

  I am such a dork.  Really.  If not evidenced by some of my past posts...like my failed Easy Cheese is Sexy™ campaign, getting stuck in a shirt, the tissue box in the back of a pickup truck incident, farting in the mall, the elevator "You are Here" incident (did I ever tell you all about that one?  I can't remember).  Yes, I am a huge dork.

  Since I'm not much of a phone person, I always get caught off guard whenever someone's voice mail picks up and I don't get the actual person.  I am one of those people that leaves really odd messages. "Ummm...like, yeah...I...uhhhh...I was calling...well, yeah of course I was calling...to...uhhh..." and then I get off the phone and bash my head into the wall and remind myself, "Quit leaving messages you big nerd!  Just call back later when someone is available!".  People wonder why I don't call...because I sound like an idiot on the phone.  That's why.  Here is a very good example of this:

  I had a job interview for this company that I was dying to get a job with about six years ago.  Maybe it was a good thing I didn't get the job, because looking back on it, now...it was all wrong for me.  It was a position as a copy writer.  I wanted a job with "writer" in the title desperately.  I thought that was my key to eventually getting into the career path I wanted to be in...and it was right next door to the college.  While I was there, I could possibly get my degree and life would be beautiful.

  I sent in a résumé and some writing samples.  I wasn't sure what to send in...so I sent in some lame essay about Post 9/11 America, a charity letter someone paid me $25 to write, and a movie review that I had written.  They called me back and asked me to come in for an interview.  I was psyched.  I'm sure many of you know what it's like when you're poor, broke, hungry, and desperately seeking that dream career.  I picked out my pinstripe black suit...going for the sharp-dressed-ass-kicking-tailored look.  I went to put my contacts in that morning...and then I passed, deciding instead to put on my nerd glasses...thinking it would make me look smarter and up my blonde IQ a few points.  I would go for that sexy smart girl look.  I got online and studied the company I was applying for inside and out.  I had never been more prepared for an interview in my life.

  I walked into that interview with more confidence than I'd ever had in my entire life also.  The interviewer called me into his office.  The building they were in was kind of overcrowded and rundown, but I liked it.  It felt like a place you could feel at home in and the clutter was actually kind of cheerful.  He showed me the room that would be my office if I got the job.  I think it had brown cabinets with robin's egg blue walls, but it had a door...an office with an actual door!  From a chick that's lived in cubicle land for most of her adult career, an office with a door is a rarity these days.  Big dreams were in my head, thinking about how I wouldn't have to hear the sound of me cubemates or neighbor cubicle-dwellers snapping their gum, clipping their nails, or arguing with their husbands loudly on the phone while I wrote award-winning copy...

  Or maybe not.  The copy they wanted someone to write was for promotional products that you could get your company's name, business info, phone numbers, etc. printed on.  They'd been around for many years, so they were a stable company, and I would gain the illustrious position of working writing fabulous ad copy like, "These ink pens come in a variety of heart-pounding, earth-shattering colors such as Mojave Desert, Pensive Primrose, Mother-of-Pearly Pearl, Gothic Eyeliner Black, Purple Pinã Colada Pukefest, Doodoo Brown.  Imagine seducing clients to thinking about your company (and the hot sales girl that handed them this pen) when they are given this instrument of writing, which scribes in velvety shades of black, blue, or red ink. Buy me damnit.  Discount applies if you order over 500 and believe me, everyone needs pens that say 'Bob's Paint Warehouse' for one day, when your business goes under and you are alive no more, those plastic pens will last forever and will be the only relic around that proves your existence as a speck on the butt of existence in the business world.  Order now!"  Okay, so I didn't know what the hell to write, but I'm sure I could do the job.

  "Have a seat..." the guy sat down and started firing questions at me after a momentary pause.  I was ready for this part of the whole thing.  I was even ready for the most brutal of all questions to a girl whose parents had kicked her out on her butt and who has had to spend every spare moment working to keep afloat rather than sitting in the classroom I should have been in.

  "So why should I hire you when I have five other candidates all with degrees...and one with a graduate degree?"
  He said that like I should be really impressed...and should just melt through the seat and into the pile of crap that I was on the floor of his humble office.

  "Sir, you should hire me because the President, CEO, and Founder of your company and the Vice President don't have college degrees.  They dropped out of college to start this company and you see where it got them.  It's about drive, motivation, and the will to do your best and acquire the knowledge and skills needed to do your job.  I will also enroll in whatever classes you deem necessary at the college next door to become your dream employee."

  I was doing a little celebratory, "BAM!  Booyah!  Gotcha..."thing in my head.  I even researched how the company was founded.  "I rock!" I was thinking.  He looked at me different then and kind of chuckled.  He knew that I had him in shooting down his "you don't have a college degree...DIE, DIE, DIE!!!!" statement.  Check mate.  He then reached over and grabbed my résumé and flipped through the writing samples I had attached and smiled and shook his head while he chuckled again.
  "Well, to be honest...I've never seen writing samples like these come across my desk in all the years I've been interviewing...They're...interesting...for this job..." he sighed, "You're enormously talented..."
  And thankfully, he didn't continue.  Back then, all I wanted to take from it was hearing someone thought I was enormously talented, but looking back now, I know he was thinking, "But what the hell does a review on a movie, a charity letter, and a stupid essay have to do with copywriting?"

  I was an idiot.  He concluded our interview with, "We'll call you." Someday, I will have to call and thank that guy for letting me get dressed up to come into his office and have him humor me.  That's all it was.  I think he knew that I wasn't anything he wanted for this job and just wanted to see who this dork was that sent him the pathetic writing samples I sent him.

  That wasn't the end of it.  He did call to tell me that I didn't get the job.

  I had been reading this book on interviewing...and they said in the book not to take no for an answer.  They said to fight for it and ask what you had to do to become the employee they wanted.  And so I just blurted out, "What do I have to do to get this job?!"

  And then I hear the guy's laughter...a nervous chuckle that made my stomach sink right to my toes and my face light up redder than the cherry on top of my dumbass interviewee sundae.  He thought I was implying what kind of sexual favors could I perform to get the job.  I wanted to say, "I don't mean that!!!" But what do you say in that situation.  Instead, I heard him still laughing as he said, "Uhhh...there's nothing...just uhhh...keep pursuing your dreams and definitely become a writer..."

  I guess that proves it's not just answering machines.  Sometimes I screw it all up on the phone, as well.

  I've since given up trying too hard.  I still want to send that guy a letter, though, and explain that I never have and never will offer sexual favors for a career.  After all, I was the one who got blown off for a job. 

  • 10:57 PM
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