Story Time

It has been awhile since my last blog, but it just took me this long to think of something to write about. Hopefully my epic tale will cause a few people to chuckle at my horrible misfortune I'm about to detail. So without further ado...STORY TIME!

About five years ago I went on the single worst job interview of my entire life. The classified ad in the Star Ledger read "Sports Minded Marketing", it sounded like a perfect fit. I love sports and the marketing shit I could learn as I went along. Looking back I wish I never would have seen that ad.

The initial interview went well, he told me everything a fresh faced youngster would want to hear. They're officially licensed to sell goods of all major sports, including the sports entertainment world of WWE. They go to businesses and try to sell their goods, makes sense so far, hit up some mom and pop shop maybe and see if they want to do business with us. The job isn't 100% commission but it does factor into your salary, wasn't pleased with it but the job I was in I hated. Interview went well, they called me back that afternoon (RED FLAG!!!) to set up a second interview, where I'd ride along with one of their marketing reps.

I was going to roll with Johnny Mack or Mack to his buddies and some Asian kid whose name I can't remember. I pulled up bright and early in the morning to see these marketing people piling shit from a warehouse, which was also their office, into cars...their own cars. Mack is in his 50s, hair more gray than black, overweight and is wearing an ill fitting slacks and dress shirt, the latter with a stain on it. His car was a gray, 2 door sedan with hand crank windows and over 200 thousand miles on it.

I get in and he starts telling me about the job, which couldn't have sounded more different from the initial interview. Basically he spends his day driving around New Jersey going into businesses and trying to sell their goods to random people. We pull up to a laundry mat and he proceeds to pull an RV car, a Giants backpack and a Disney coloring book out of his trunk. We walk in and start soliciting the foreign women doing their laundry. From there we go to a Cash Checking establishment and a shitty convenience store before we are barred from hitting up Dress Barn and we hit the car to leave.

Next stop is this industrial area where one place we go to the guys there ask us if we are with the same company that sold them a shitty toy helicopter that broke after a few uses, even though Mack assured them we weren't they weren't biting on the RV car. We head further back and sell a backpack to two Hispanic gentlemen in a burned out shed who were doing something with metal. We are then kicked out of the same sweat shop twice by the foreman for trying to sell a coloring book to Mexican women working on giant showing machines. Before hitting the car we are almost attacked by a guard dog, thankfully his owner quieted him down, and I start to have an itchy hand which later turns out to be a spider bite.

We hit up McDonald's for lunch where Mack is nice enough to pay for my lunch. He then proceeds to order items off the dollar menu. Since one value meal would've cost more than his thrown together items I too order off the dollar menu. Mack was a dollar menunaire before those commercials even came out.

We head to a very urban area of NJ where we go to a Taxi depot, no one was cracking wise and Tony Danza was no where to be found. From there we go to a dog groomer where while Mack heads out to pick up batteries the owner goes to me "Hard job", so I ask her "Dog grooming?" and she goes "No, your job". I swear to her up and down I do not work for this company and never will.

Mack and I proceed to a barber shop where they are watching Chris Rock videos while guys are getting corn rows put in their hair. He is driving the RV car around while we both get dirty looks, I proceed to join them while they give dirty looks to Mack, even tough I know I look like just as much of a tool as he does. Our final stop is a florist shop run by some nice older people, they are talking with equally friendly and equally old customers. Mack proceeds to tell them I'm from Florida and this is my first time up north. When he walks away to talk to someone else and they ask me if I've ever been to the city I tell them he is a liar, I'm originally from NY and I have no idea why he said that.

The day ends with us driving back after I asked for the umpteenth time to go back to my car. I tell him outright I would never do this job and pretend to put his phone number in my cell and tell him that I'll call him. It might have been one of the worst days of my life, but certainly hilarious looking back on it. There are more small stories I could have thrown in there, but those can wait till another time.

The morally of the story is this...next time you think your job sucks, you could be driving around with Johnny Mack.