Your Job Doesn't Suck. Trust Me.

I have noticed that the majority of hits that this blog gets occur during working hours. Since I am certain that most of you are employed, I am guessing that you are sitting at your desk right now. You may even be thinking, "Reading this lameass blog is still better than working, because my job really sucks." If this is so, then I can say that you are mistaken. How can I know this? Because I have had the Worst Job Ever.

Three key elements are required for a position to truly suck; the coworkers, compensation, and actual work must all simultaneously suck. For example, if you work with jackasses, for minimum wage, as a Product Tester in a Fellatio Factory, your job doesn't suck. However, if you exchange the phrase Product Tester with Assistant Janitor, you have fulfilled all of the prerequisites for shittiness. I have never worked at said Factory (although it is my life's work to find it) but I have had a job where all of the conditions were met handsomely.

Compensation
This was my first job, after a career change, so my negotiating position was very weak. Essentially, I accepted a salary of 15% less than the national average in order to gain the experience that they had described in the interview. Unfortunately, they were lying.

Coworkers
This was a small company with about 15 employees. The owner, who will be refered to as Nookless Dickhead or ND, for brevity, was an absolute ass. Most of my coworkers were minority owners and they had, apparently, hatched the idea for the business at a meeting of the local chapter of Wankers of Commerce. ND was devoid of the technical skills to do anything useful, so he spent his days devising new ways of either screwing the customers, screwing the employees, or screwing the government. For example, ND terminated a competent shop electrician, who had 3 young kids and whose wife had just died of cancer, in order to give another owner's incompetent grandson a summer job. The remaining employees were told that he was "laid off" due to a slowdown. However, ND told the unemployment commission that the electrician was "fired for cause" so that he wouldn't have to pay for unemployment benefits. Nice, huh? I could devote a whole post to ND and his pal's exploits, but I'll spare you.

Actual Work
When I was hired, I was told I would be working on projects on which I would be learning technologies that would help my long term career goals. During the interview, ND showed me some of the jobs that were in progress, as examples of the job description. Due to inexperience, I was impressed. Now, having learned the forementioned technologies, I am amazed that they sell anything. Regardless, it turns out that ND and the other owners were blowing sunshine up my ass from day one. Here is what I actually got to do:

If you are thinking that I got to work in a Yoohoo! plant, think again. What ND had actually hired me to do was manage a project for the local sewer department. The project entailed modifying various poop pumping systems, while they were running.This kind of work was entirely outside of their field and they were woefully unprepared for it. ND always wanted the maximum number of billable hours, so he required that crews work on energized high voltage equipment in the rain and snow. I always refused, but I'm sure he billed them for it, anyway. Regardless, I know things about poop that no human should ever know.

Can you remember your worst day ever, at work? I can, because I had it photographed:

The thing in my gloved hand is known as a tilt bulb. It is used to sense the level of raw sewage in the hole that was behind me. The reason why I was holding is because the dental floss wrapped around it caused it to malfunction. I came to this conclusion, after 5 hours of troubleshooting, in a 105° F building that's out of the picture. All on a Friday evening, when I was supposed to be having dinner with an attractive female-type. Guess who got to remove the dental floss? So, does your job still suck? I didn't think so.