The Bi-Annual Arbitrary and Resounding Yes

Once every six months or so, I stumble across something that ostensibly should get my dander up. Something that violates one of my harsh and unyielding rules and ergo deserves the usual withering scorn and what-have-you.

But, periodically, when the moon is in the Seventh House or something, I am not outraged by a transgression, I am instead charmed or amused or otherwise have an emotion towards a job-seeker that could be characterized as positive.

I know, it's a little disappointing to me too. I strive for consistency.

So the planets have aligned just right this week and so when I saw the below...

"we are italian pizzamakers

hi! we're 3 italian boys, we come from Naples! we're looking for a job in a restaurant, with any assignment, we play italian or Neapolitan classical music! we are piazzamakers and piazzaiolo. "

...I wished I had an Italian restaurant in which to employ the cheerful three Italian boys who not only make pizza but also play Italian or Neapolitan classical music!

It probably helps that I imagine that they are either a) unbearably hot or b) look like the Mario Brothers.

Because work is all...work-like n shit...

From Craigslist's (sigh) resume posting, listed in location "RICH PEOPLE:"

"I know this may sound king of lame and all but I need someone willing to give me $15,000. I'm that much in debt with credit cards and I have nothing to pay for them. I did have a job but it's gone now. I'm trying and trying to get another job but I've had no luck. Now all my bills are due and that amount is increasing each month. Is there anyone out there willing to give me some of their money so I can at least pay all of it or half? I know you're saying get a job and all but damn I've been trying and trying, so I figured I've give this a shot and see if there are generous people out there willing to share an amount of money with me without asking for anything in return. Please, someone help me out. Thank you. I live in Riverside, CA and thought maybe L.A. county would be a good place to put this. Thank you very much. Julie"

#1? Yes, that does sound king of lame.
#2? So you have crippling credit card debt? Welcome to the USA, Sweetie. And I have three jobs to work off mine so suck it. Try harder.
#3? "Without asking anything in return"? You can't at least offer to clean a house, pay it back in ten years, name a first child after them, something? WTF?

On the bright side...

...although I have spent the past three weeks silently changing "vender" to "vendor" and correcting endless misuses of the word "there" because I am far too filled with outrage that my underling (not selected by me, naturally) doesn't know these things to approach her in any sort of friendly and/or effective manner...

...it still beats talking to the goddamn public.

Regular posting to resume soon.

In the meantime, Candidates, please note that if you choose to have a resume headline that says:

"Asian female bartender....kind of."

You make me less interested in finding out about your skills and abilities and more curious about exactly WHICH word - Asian, female or bartender - "kind of" is in reference to.

My underlings are killing me.

KILLING ME.

I feel it's tacky to bitch too much about co-workers (because they are, you know, real people as opposed to the theoretical people as represented by a resume or brief phone screen).

But I will say the following. These sentence fragments?

"The candidate presented his self well..."

AND

"She holds her employees to high standers..."

I am really REALLY the wrong person to whom to present those.

No fake. I think of all the people in the universe who should not be in charge of people with truly poor grammar, I am at the top of the list.

Like I am filled with such a white hot blinding rage - a rage that feels, as Vonnegut said in Mother Night, as though I hate with God on my side - at the existence of those sentences...it's not good. It's not good for anybody.

"Obsessive grammarian seeks position as proofreader, writer, or editor."

Thus spake the resume headline and the resume itself was refreshingly - and appropriately - completely free of typos or mangled language.

Candidate, I wish I had a job to give you. I would like to make you Manager of the World. Because if there is one thing that makes the gnarled little knot of coal in my chest almost beat like a normal human heart, it is an obsessive grammarian.

One quibble...

...the "very bright" part.

From a Craigslist "Resume":

"Need Someone to Walk/Bike Long Distances or Just Do a Lot of Walking?

I am accustomed to walking 5-10 or more miles per day. I enjoy walking and being outdoors. I'm not sure what kind of jobs would need this, but if you have one, please let me know! I'm open to any suggestions. I'm 22, female, quite strong, and very bright. If the position you're looking to fill does not require walking, feel free to contact me anyway as I do need to start working soon. No sales jobs, please. Thank you very much! : ) "

And that's it!

Well, sure! I'll be sure to contact you for any non-sales jobs I might have that do or do not require walking. I guess I know you can...um...walk...and...type emoticons. Great!

****

Craigslist...well, it's almost too easy, you know? I'm reluctant to really make a whole post out of the general economy-sized bag of nuts that is Craigslist but what blog about recruiting would be complete without mentioning it?

Gawker did a periodic piece where they would take a certain section of Craigslist - like "Missed Connections" or "Holiday Gigs", and make a pie chart out of some breakdown of the postings. I could make you a pie chart too...but...yeah, I'm not going to. How about a bulleted list? That I can do.

So here is my breakdown of resume themes as posted on Craigslist:

• Normal people looking for normal work in a normal way (snoozers!).
• People who feel that this is the most effective way to find a job: tell you about some bad shit that happened to them and then say they need a job. (End of post. No listing of any experience, education, possible benefit to the employer, etc.)
• People who are looking for a job. But can only work 6.33 hrs. per week. And only when the moon is waning. And the job must be on their bus route. And they can't work for people named "Ken" or who wear purple. And they need you to know they only eat string cheese so if you have a problem with that then maybe this isn't going to work out. You know, like Extraneous Capitalizer.
• People who sorta wanna work in some field, you know, like they'd really like to get into real estate appraisal but they don't have any experience...or they're really good at tying shoelaces do you have anything that requires tying shoelaces?...or they just want a "survival" job while they pursue their real passion...do you have anything like that? End of posting.

Since I'm obviously phoning it in today, please write your own "Gee I wonder why they're unemployed" punchline.

Happy Friday!

ALERT!! New Stupid Made-Up Corporate Word to Replace Stupid Overused Corporate Word

At some point, Office Worker, you just capitulated, didn't you?

You were initially hesitant because it seemed to be used so ubiquitously by the upper-management types. Those folks whose language seems to consist completely of meaningless buzz-word filler.

You tried your best but you couldn't resist the constant onslaught, right? You eventually started using the word "proactive."

Well get ready for the next horrorshow, proactive's heir:

PLANFUL.

Planful.

Planful.

A muckety-muck used this word in a conference call last week. I have been blissfully removed from these kinds of meeting for the past couple years or so, so possibly this is not new. Possibly this is old hat like "impactful." (Miles away, I know Gay Husband is reading this and shuddering.)

But it's new to me. New and ATROCIOUS.

Why don't you just shit on a Powerpoint and call it a day, muckety-mucks? Why use the English language at all when you clearly hold it in such contempt?

If blogs were scratch and sniff...

...mine would smell like lemon drops and cotton candy and clean puppy tummies.

Joy.

Joy is what it would scratch and sniff like.

Because tomorrow, Reader, tomorrow is the day that I NO LONGER HAVE TO TALK TO THE GODDAMN PUBLIC ALL THE GODDAMN DAY.

My head is exploding with rainbows. My heart wants to sing every song it hears.

Now if you'll excuse me, my floppy hat and I are going to go twirl on a mountaintop.

(P.S. I will continue to have some goodies. I will still be looking at resumes, so please do continue to tune in if you so wish.)

BREAKING!! Extraneous Capitalizer, Still Looking for Work, No Longer Capitalizing

Soooo...I think Extraneous Capitalizer has opted for "Sentence Case" instead of "Title Case" for her latest posting, but despite these being confidential postings, I am still pretty sure this is all the same person. Her little looking-for-work-by-outlining-my-bitterness-at-the-inexorable-march-of-time-in-poetic-format postings have become like my favorite Easter Egg of the resume search.

"Great at screening calls and getting the
messages straight.
Sharp dresser!
I don't have kids.
I don't have a husband who calls me
at work.
I arrive to work with a great "Can Do"
type of attitude with the cellphone
shut off during business hours.
Tired of the young girls who bring
nothing but drama to the office
and do not work?
I never make any personal calls at
work, I am outgoing and organized. "

I have two questions, Reader:

• How many cats do you think she has?
• How long do you think it will be before she mentions them?

Translation: "I Have a Regrettable Male Ponytail."

From resume headline:

"Business Man w/Artistic Flair"

"21 year old female looking for respectable full-time work"

And she also wants you to know:

"I have much respect for myself so please do not send any response about scams, "dancing" or anything of that nature. "

That's great, young lady, but then why do I even need to know you are a young lady at all? And especially not in your resume header. The job search isn't a chat room. You can leave the A/S off of A/S/L.

Um, ow?

How come once a month when I come to my own blog it looks like the Cyrillic alphabet vomited onto the screen?

Well, if we can see this now it means it's fixed, I guess.

Recruiter, Heal Thyself Some More

Received an e-mail today from a recruiting company much like my very own. My resume is kind of confidentially lolly-gagging out on some job boards, just to see what else might be out there.

So it is the sort of usual e-mail that I send out to candidates, but unlike the ones I send out to candidates, this recruiter doesn't bother to hide his/her contempt for her audience:

"1. Click the link in this sentence to send your resume in Microsoft Word (.doc not .rtf) format (attach it, do not copy and paste into the email) with all contact info to IThinkAllCandidatesAreIdiotsWhoMustBeSpokenToLikeSixYearOlds- AlsoTheWord"Please"IsForPussies@NamelessRecruitingCompany.com.

2. Copy and paste the title and reference number into the subject box.
Then type your current salary and minimum salary requirement next to the reference number.
Do not send a range.
Must be an exact number. Please [oops, okay, there was a "please" in there, but still.] send the very minimum that you will accept "down to the penny." This is how the subject must look, see example below:Sr. Recruiter current: $ "current pay"/hr, minimum: $ "minimum accepted pay"/hr
3. On your resume, give the best time and telephone number to reach you."

I know I always feel like I am being recruited for a company that values me as an individual and not just as a widget when I have to put my salary requirements "down to the penny" in the SUBJECT HEADER of the e-mail.

Jesus Christ I know we DON'T care about people but lord can't we pretend that we'll at least read an e-mail response instead of making it clear that we'll just delete it unopened if it's a penny over what we can pay?

TACKY.

Extraneous Capitalizer Is Back!

She's posted again and she is ready to get all highly specific on your ass:

"English Speaking Receptionist With A Voice Like An Angel

English Speaking Receptionist With A Beautiful
Phone Voice Willing To Work Hard For The Money.
I Will List What My Strenths And Weaknesses
Are So You Do Not Waste Your Time.
Please Do Not Email Unless I Meet Your Criteria
And You Meet My Criteria.

Strengths:
Great Phone Voice.
Strong Work Ethics.
No Drama Brought To The Office.
Cellphone Is Left In My Car.
Sack Lunch Brought To Work.
Organized.
Ability To Multi-Task And Finish Duties
In Order Of Priority.
Outgoing Personality.
Reliable.
Efficient.
Fast On The Phones.
Always Pleasant To Clients Even If
They Are Difficult To Deal With.
Great "Can Do" Attitude.
Give 110% At Work.
No Children.
In General A Superstar Type
Of Attitude.
Mature, Engergy Of A Young
Girl, Years In The Workforce,
Traveled First Class All Over
The World.
(These Are Equivalent To A
College Degree,Beleive Me) [Ed Note: Except for the college-teaching-you-how-to-spell-"believe" part]

I Have Qualities That Cannot
Be Trained Or Learned On A
Computer Software.

Weaknesses:
I Do Not Type Very Fast.
I Am Not Young.
I Am Not Sexy Looking.
I Am Not A Bookeeper.
I Will Not Pay For Parking.
I Will Not Accept Any Position
At A Mortgage Company.
Real Estate Development Fine.
I Will Only Accept 40 Hours Per Week."

This is all unfortunate because I am actually looking for a Sexy Single Mom Bookkeeper Who Goes Out To Lunch, Argues With Her Boyfriend On Her Cell During Business Hours And Has The Voice Of Suzanne Pleshette To Work Overtime At My Mortgage Company With Street (Metered) Parking.

Willing to Start (and Stay) on the Ground Floor

From resume:

"I really prefer to work on the bottom floors, as I don't ride elevators."

Expert At Extraneous Capitalizing Of All Words And Prose Written In Form Of Poetry

From seeking-work posting, formatting intact.

"Front Office Receptionist Looking For
A Position Answering Phones As Well
As Performing Other Administrative
Tasks To Keep Busy.
Looking For The Right Company Who
Will Not Discriminate Because I Am
Not Skinny Or Twenty Two Years Old.
Hard Worker,No Nonsense Woman Who
Needs A Job, Ready To Settle Down
Into A Basic Job.
Have Lived Life In The Fast Lane
Already! Want A Job That Is Not
High Powered Or Full Of Stress."

Twofer

The same resume from the below post also yielded this coherent gem, helpfully rendered in screaming all caps. The Crazies sure love them their Caps Lock key:

"KNOWING THAT ASSET POTENTIAL INCLUDES FAR MORE - THAN EVEN THE MOST EXEMPLARY SKILL SETS - AND BECAUSE I HAVE NOT ALTERED MY RESUME TO ACCENT - WHY WE MIGHT BE A GOOD MATCH - I OVERVIEW SPECIFICS WHICH MAY BE IMPORTANT - IN PRELIMINARY EVALUATIONS OF MY CONTRIBUTING FACTOR."

Thank you, but no.

From resume:

"All interested (qualified) Decision Makers - please dial my dedicated voicemail box. Hear my voice and feel my High Vibration."

Vernal Equinox Has Sprang, Part Trois

I just got a digital camera (I have been a film snob, then indifferent, then broke, hence my late adopting when I am usually a total tech geek.)

You know what that means, right?


SUPERFLUOUS HOMEGROWN CUTENESS, SUCKAS!

(PS: Confidential to Rube: Merci Beaucoup!)

Please feel free to insert your own reaction.

Because I am not sure where to start with this one.

From resume. Yes, RESUME:

"Interests: I am interested in the creation of Ethanol and the boom that it will have on the economy. I originally wanted to get a Patton on what is now called EthanolI thought of it way before Ethanol ever came out but was to young to know how to manufacture parts to adapt cars to run off it, but I am still willing to invest in it. "

The boom? A Patton?

Oh, and PS, no this person's experience/desired job have nothing to do with alternative energy. But regular Readers probably guessed this already.