Workin’ 9 to 5
I have a tendency to do things the opposite from how other people do things. If most people find something easy, I’ll have trouble with it, but I find the thing that everyone else is confounded by to be simple. When I was in high school, it never ceased to amaze my then-boyfriend’s family that I could hardly ever answer any of the questions in the first round of Jeopardy correctly, but I cleaned up in the (supposedly more difficult) second round (and don’t even get me started on how good I was at Final Jeopardy). The other day at the pole dancing lesson, I was a left-turner when every single other person in the room was a right turner. I just always seem to be Captain Opposite.
Case in point: it’s a recession, unemployment is through the roof and I have too many jobs1. That’s right – not long after securing the salary for my current job for the next six years through a sucessful grant application (in a really tough competition, I might add), I go and get another job offer. It’s for a job that I interviewed for back in the middle of March, when I didn’t know if my grant was going to be renewed or not, and I didn’t hear back for awhile, so I sort of thought that they weren’t interested and kind of put it out of mind. And then we got the good news about the grant, so I got busy planning and working on ramping up my program. Then, as it turns out, there was merely a delay in the interview process for job #2, but they were actually very interested in me. So much so that they offered me the job! In keeping with my policy of not revealing what my actual job is here in the blogosphere, I’m going to not reveal what my new job is. But it does have the word “Specialist” in the title. And you know that makes you jealous. Unless, of course, your job title also has the word “Specialist” in it, in which case you are all “whatev.”
The job starts at the end of May. Which gives me enough time to prepare to transition my current job to someone new and to buy a car. But that’s a whole other blog post!
1For the record, I think this runs in my family. My dad works in the auto industry in Ontario2. You know, the auto industry that is completely decimated? The factory he worked in closed down last fall and, seeing as he is 63 years old, that meant an early retirement. But the factory he worked in had to re-open because the factory where all the jobs went, in Mexico, wasn’t able to make the needed parts to the necessary level of quality and in the needed timeframe. And people need their cars to be able to stop. So they re-opened the Canadian factory, which will make parts until the Mexican factory gets running properly and my dad, a worker in the auto industry who really should just be retired, is back on the job.
2Specifically, he makes brake parts. Every time your car stops safely, you should thank him.
I know where you work! And where you’ll be working! And where you live! *mwahahahahahaha*
In college my housemates inducted me into a special Jeopardy tradition. Try to infer the correct question during the commercial break, using only the category. There is rarely a clear favorite, but most of them imply a short list. It is a fun thing to do and discuss during the break when with a group, and when you nail one in front of non-Jeopardy folks, it is creepy-impressive. Also, when in doubt, it’s Linus Pauling.
Demonweed’s last blog post..What You Should Think About Balance
Omg, I totally want to watch Jeopardy with strangers so I can do that!
“The other day at the pole dancing lesson, I was a left-turner when every single other person in the room was a right turner.”
Wait, have you ever seen Zoolander?
Rebecca’s last blog post..I (kind of) judge you when you listen to bad music
About a million times. I’m totally an ambiturner. =)
It worked today! While having an early dinner at my parents house, Jeopardy was on TV — running a Tournament of Champions no less. Faced with the Final Jeopardy category “18th century Scotsman,” I said, “who was James Watt?” When I saw “staring at a tea kettle” in the answer, I knew I had the right question. I don’t think my family got the full scope of that coolness, but they did think it remarkable.
Nice!