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Eighteenth Job of Bob - The all-mighty "State," Part I - job interviews from Hell, campus janitor
This entry was posted on 8/14/2008 3:21 PM and is filed under Jobs of Bob, Job Interviews from Hell.
When I got back to Wisconsin in 1992 to scope out the scene, Mom said, "Be sure and drop an application off at the "State." You must understand that she was of the generation that entered their 50s in the 1970s. Her's was a generation of farmers and blue-collar workers that had won World War II. But by the mid-1960s their bodies were worn out. Her peers had gravitated to the boon in "State" hiring as the Baby Boom generation flooded colleges and public schools in the 1960s and 1970s. A farmer that worked seven days a week, 14 hours a day for 30 years thought he had died and gone to heaven when he took one of thousands of jobs opened up at universities across the country as cooks and janitors. Most of those jobs boasted an eight hour day, five days a week. Farmers my Dad's age were making the pilgrimage to the "State" by the score after they retired from farming in their 50s.
In 1992 I had no degree and had nothing to loose, so I dropped an application off at the State Employment office on Wilson Street in Madison. In the mean time I found the job at the farm-hardware-retail-auto-service store. About six months later my Mom handed me the phone and said, "Somebody from the State."
"Come over for an interview," the voice on the phone said. I thought, "Who the hell is this?"
After some back-and-forth I remembered I had put in an application six months earlier at the "State." The University system was interested in me being a janitor.
A very nice administrator at the University of Wisconsin sent me to one of dozens of janitorial offices on campus. In retrospect, a bit too nice. Since the job was a night job, I interviewed at 2:00 a.m. in the morning. The two jokers doing the interview picked my brain for 45 minutes about manual labor skills. They explained I would be using dozens of sophisticated pieces of janitorial equipment under their direction. The older dude smelled like alcohol. The younger one acted like a rube. When all was said and done, I got up to leave and the older guy thrust a cleaning spray can into my face and said, "Wait...read the label on this spray can."
I prattled off the company and cautionary statement about the contents. Then there was a pause as they both looked at each other like a couple of punks on the play ground.
"We are surprised you can read and write," the rube said. "Most people have some one else fill out their application," he said to cap off the experience.
Wisconsin military service person of the week
Private First Class Ryan M. Jerabek, 18, of Hobart was killed in Ramadi, Iraq on Tuesday, April 6, 2004. Hobart is a small village just west of Green Bay. Jerabek was in the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force. He was killed in what has been described as a long firefight against insurgents. He had been in Iraq less than a month. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Jerabek enlisted in the delayed entry program for the Marine Corps in his junior year in high school. He did his boot camp in San Diego in July, 2003. Ryan is survived by his mother and father Rita and Ken Jerabek. The Journal Sentinel also mentioned his dad Ken Jerabek served in the Army during Vietnam. Private First Class Ryan M. Jerabek was the Fifteenth Wisconsin service member to die in Iraq.
As of this blog entry's posting date:
86,606 Iraqi civilians have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
8,530 Iraqi Security Forces have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
4,141 Americans have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
567 Americans have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
314 Coalition soldiers have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
340 Coalition soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
30,509 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
2,330 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
91 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
11 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
130 journalists (several nationalities) have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
15 journalists (various nationalities) have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.
Soldier of the week, military casualty, and journalist casualty information sources: Committee to Protect Journalists; cnn.com; Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; washingtonpost.com; thehighground.org; Wisconsin Department of Veterans Affairs; iraqbodycount.org; and, icasualties.org.
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