Here, Have My Resume
February 10, 2001
The day of the Microsoft job interview began rather in a rather disorganised fashion. As Adam’s printer is currently fufilling the role of footrest much more succesfully than printing mehanism, a hasty trip to Adam’s work was required in the early morning to print my resume.
I like Adam’s work. They seem like a comfortably small, close-knit group. There’s no scary cafeteria staff around trying to have sex with me, either. That’s always a positive sign.
After Adam printed off my resume, he rustled around in his drawers and produced a glossy magazine.
‘This is a souvenir program from when the WCW wrestling came to Australia,’ he explained, handing it to me. Two red glistening orbs glared at me from the front cover, and after turning the magazine sideways I realised it was Goldberg’s chest.
‘Cool - thanks!’ I replied. Adam gets a lot of sample stuff sent to him from various advertising-related companies and he knows I’m a bit of a fan of the wrestling, so it was nice of him to save this for me. (I admit my reasons for watching wrestling are absolutely perverted, but that’s beside the case).
I stowed the wrestling magazine and my resume into my backpack and exited the buildling, scampering up the road. I arrived at the recruitment agency who were interviewing me, and realised I had 30 minutes to spare. I decided to grab some breakfast, and came very close to executing a very preposterous thought: ‘Where is a McDonalds around here?’ You can stand at any street corner in the city and locate at least three of the damn restaraunts. At least one Starbucks lately, too.
It wasn’t a fuckachino I was after this morning, however; just a plain old powdered egg muffin. I was only halfway through announcing my order to the flustered staff member when she shrieked the amount due at my abdomen. Slightly put off, I regarded her with an air of revulsion and dropped the coins due to her palm, which had been flung out towards me like a shotgun blast.
Besides, it was the first time I’d donned a suit and tie in well over eight months. I was permitted to be snide.
The lady screamed something barely understandable about free chewing gum, and immediately began craning her neck over my shoulders, ready to assault the next customer.
I shouldered my way through the morning crowd and positioned myself by a window. I noticed a scantily clad man wandering on the pavement with an enormous breadstick. Initially I dismissed him as one of the characters Sydney’s city is famous for (eg - Woman Who Pees On Stairs In Public, always a favourite!), but slowly realised he was feeding a growing crowd of pigeons.
It wasn’t long before the pavement resembed a feathered version of a Limp Bizkit moshpit and I sensed trouble was on the way. I quickly scolded myself for assuming he was up to mischief simply because he appeared homeless, and turned my attention back to my paper placemat, which informed me that Ronald McDonald honestly does feel guilty about the pollution his product packaging causes (especially to dolphins), and was donating a meagre amount of money to ease his corporate guilt.
A few mouthfuls of my muffin later, I looked up and glanced out the window again. The man with the breadstick, having attracted a large number of pigeons, was now proceeding to try and stamp on as many as he could. The passing crowd was largely suits on their way to work, and many ‘Oh!’ sounds were made as they semicircled away from the pigeon-stamper. I guess the guy had to eat somehow - quite ingenious if you ask me.
The early morning sun was swiftly heating up the city, and as I wiped my brow while returning to the recruitment agency, I cursed corporate fashion for not incorporating sweat bands into their collective catalogues. The elevator in the recruitment agency’s building was akin to a sauna - I was glad to escape it and stumble out to the agency’s reception area.
The receptionist regarded me quite strangely before requesting I take a seat and wait for the person who would be interviewing me. I’m normally regarded quite strangely anyway, but a glance in the mirror located on the wall opposite me soon revealed why.
The flour from the bacon and egg muffin had evidently rubbed off on my hands, and had been transferred to my forehead every time I wiped my brow. A starchy glue had formed at the top of my face and was already in the advanced stages of drying. I’m not sure what impressions I made by spitting in my hand and rubbing my forehead, but I’m willing to bet they didn’t gain me an advantage over any other applicants for the position.
The lady who was to interview me soon emerged from her office and politely informed me I was to undertake a keyboard typing test. I nodded - this was all old news to me, fairly standard procedure at every recruitment agency I’ve been interviewed by.
I was locked into a small cubicle with a computer, and sped through a practice of the test. I’ve always been quite confident with typing tests - my average typing speed is usually somewhere between 90 and 100 words per minute. (See? You can do anything on speed). This particular morning, I was quite obscenely confident and took a rather flippant attitude towards the test.
I slouched in my seat, glancing over my shoulder every few minutes to check if the interviewer was watching me. I wanted to look as casually confident as possible. Paying less attention to the test than I sensibly should have, I reclined in the chair and stretched my legs. It was a rather awkward position to type in - I had to stretch my arms at awkward angles - but I looked like a Fido Dido who had just learnt how to type.
As the the minutes-long test progressed, however; the disadvantages of my exhibition soon made themselves known. A shuddering cramp spidered from my wrist up my forearm, and suddenly only the left side of the keyboard was producing results. Attempts to force my right limb to return to the task at hand resulted only in a cry of pain. The receptionist shot an alarmed look at me (and why shouldn’t she? Only minutes before I’d been licking my hand then rubbing my forehead), before leaning inside the room and asking if everything was alright.
I noticed she had ‘words’ with my interviewer before I was taken into a two metre by tow metre room, with obligatory frosted grass and meaningless portrait slung on the wall. I found the lady a little stand-offish and decided that the job wasn’t for me after all (I’d suspected this before I actually had the interview, anyway).
Things were starting to verge on an argument, so it was most relieving when she asked me for a copy of my resume. Glad to break eye contact, I leaned down inside the pockets of my backpack. After some rummaging around, I located the resume, and passed it to the lady while I attempted to zip up the bag.
The zip was being most uncooperative. I tugged at it and it took some time before it would zip up. Most embarassing, especially as I knew the woman was boring holes in the side of my head with her glassy eyes.
I raised myself back up to meet her eyes and smiled, hoping it would eradicate any tension between us. I realised that a smile would not be enough as she raised not a resume, but my copy of the WCW wrestling souvenir program to my face and regaled me with raised eyebrows that formed a square angle.
‘What type of career did you REALLY have in mind?’ she quipped. I sighed and realised my chances with this particular recruitment agency were fucked from the beginning.
