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Post by Kapitan on Nov 12, 2020 13:48:08 GMT
While I was pouring my coffee this morning, I had a flashback to a summer job I had between my freshman and sophomore years of college. In addition to giving guitar lessons a couple days a week (the good part!), I worked the grounds crew of a small college where my family had deep, longstanding ties. (A brother who was in seminary there was also on the summer grounds crew.)
The "break room" was basically a garage/tool shed. Most of the crew were older, full-time guys on the maintenance staff, guys in their 50s and 60s; a few of us were students (all of that school except me). There was quite a disconnect between them and us.
On breaks, almost everyone drank coffee. (I drank Snapple. I was mocked mercilessly and did convert to coffee, begrudgingly, to avoid it.) But that coffee! It was an old pot in that garage, and I am pretty sure it was literally never washed. People added new grounds atop the old daily and just added water. When the filter was full, they'd empty and start over with new grounds. But never washing anything.
One day, some of the older guys put sawdust in another guy's coffee as a joke. (These were all guys from the older set of full-timers.) The guy took a huge gulp and everyone laughed. They let him in on what happened, and in a show of defiance, he scooped a handful of sawdust off the table and put it into his own cup, taking another big gulp--just to "show 'em."
This was my summer job that year. I have to admit, I was almost entirely useless with the actual work, and since we had little supervision, we stretched out jobs that ought to take an hour across a day or two.
All this occurred to me as I was pouring my coffee this morning. Sans sawdust.
What about you? Any funny old summer job or high-school age jobs, or stories therefrom?
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Post by Kapitan on Nov 13, 2020 14:03:22 GMT
Not just a summer job, my first "real" job--e.g. discounting paper routes, mowing lawns for cash, etc.--was at the local Dairy Queen. I got it my freshman year, when I was still too young even to legally work in the kitchen, so I was strictly cashier, ice cream products, cleanup, etc., for a while.
My first day, I went through the typical sort of initial training with one of the owners. She left, with me under the care of a "responsible adult," aka a high school junior, who just happened to be gorgeous to this young fellow... This young woman instructed me to get a drink of whatever I wanted and follow her to the back. There, we were going to grind candy for the Blizzards. (This was before the stores bought bags of pre-crushed candy. We simply ground Snickers, M&Ms, Heath, etc.) We sat there chatting and eating candy for the bulk of the remainder of my shift. She told me as long as we got our work done, once the owners left we could do basically whatever we wanted. Again--only if we got the work done, handled customers, etc.
I was in heaven. And in love. Or something similar.
As the next couple years passed, I began ensuring I'd be scheduled for the times I knew the owners would be gone. I ran a little side business of selling friends whatever they wanted for $5 cash. I ate a lot of junk food. I got to chat with the young women with whom I worked.
Not a bad gig, if you didn't mind smelling like grease when you got home. I bought several guitars, amps, and pedals thanks to that job!
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Nov 28, 2020 13:28:18 GMT
My first job at age 16 was with a long-gone company called the Keystone Fruit Company. It was a VERY small, single proprietorship, run by a 75 year-old man my Dad knew from a local bar. I rode my bike to work in the early morning and filled orders by putting produce - lettuce, celery, bags of potatoes, and all kinds of fruit - in a carton for local restaurants who called in the orders. Then some guy in a van delivered the orders. I remember each week being called into a back room and being given an envelope with my pay... in cash.
My next summer job was at a local restaurant/drive-in where you parked your car, called in your order on this...device, and a "curbie" - usually an attractive high school girl - would then bring your order out to you. The "curbies" got nice tips. This drive-in was right out of the 50's and 60's. Cars would be cruising the strip and pull into the drive-in, not necessarily to eat but to meet people. I was a short order cook and dishwasher. The best part of the job was getting a free milkshake at the end of the night when they cleaned the milk shake machine. Then, before anybody could leave for the night, and it was pushing midnight, all of the workers lined up across this large parking lot, and we slowly walked across the parking lot picking up napkins, straw papers, empty cups, french fry containers full of ketchup - and basically anything you could see. Then we went home. My fondest memory of that job was listening to the great radio station that was playing in the kitchen. The two songs that I still vividly remember playing over and over were "Killer Queen" and "Bad Time" by Grand Funk Railroad.
One of my first jobs after college - it doesn't qualify as a summer job - was as a repo man for a local bank. I really wanted to work for this bank, and the only job available was a loan collector (we called it a loan adjuster) and "repo man". If the loan customer fell too far behind on their car loan, I would give them a chance to catch up. But, if they didn't, I would repossess their car. I'm almost embarrassed to say it, but that was fun and sometimes exciting job.
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Post by Kapitan on Nov 28, 2020 14:28:25 GMT
My first job ever--like many kids back when there was such a physical product being widely distributed--was a paper route. The most popular paper was either the nearby mid-sized college-town's daily or the Minneapolis Star Tribune; our local paper was a weekly, and also somewhat popular. I delivered none of those. I delivered a small, regional newspaper that might have been weekly or twice weekly, and that some of my classmates didn't know existed. I think I would've been in about 4th or maybe 5th grade.
This job was mostly uneventful, except that we had to collect money directly from recipients. Ah, the old days! There was nothing quite so annoying as finding people on your route not at home on collection day and having to try back later, or standing there awkwardly as they dug for exact change.
The one really notable experience, though, was the old lady who lived halfway between my house and the school, maybe a quarter or a third of a mile away (which meant roughly a quarter or a third of the way across town, it being a small place). This old woman always seemed to be watching pro wrestling. This was the heyday of wrestling, when Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, Randy "Macho Man" Savage, and others were everywhere: action figures, cartoons, music videos, and, oh yeah, wrestling.
But she wasn't watching WWF, or even the second-most popular NWA. She was watching the replays of years-old wrestling that showed on ESPN during the afternoons: early 80s matches that took place in southern, regional leagues, filmed on sound stages instead of the later sports arenas with guys I mostly didn't recognize, aside from a few who eventually migrated to the big leagues. (The Von Erich brothers were prominently featured in these matches, which makes me suspect it was largely Mid-South or WCCW.)
The thing is, I'm pretty sure she thought this stuff was real, which made it odd for me, a 10-year-old kid who loved it but was well aware it was all fake, to sit and watch it with her. Plus, I just wanted my $3.75 or whatever I was trying to collect, so I could get out of there and go do whatever 10-year-olds did. Probably go watch wrestling at home.
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Post by B.E. on Jan 30, 2021 1:58:34 GMT
During my high school years, I worked on the beach in the summer. It was my first proper job at 14 - cleaning the beach. IIRC I did that for two summers, then I checked badges the following two (you gotta pay to access the beach here). Anyway, besides it being the perfect summer job, the first thing that comes to mind is the day that I signaled the lifeguards from a neighboring beach to rescue kids that were drifting out to sea. I was checking badges at the entrance of an unguarded beach when I noticed them. (We're supposed to watch, but honestly most don't.) Anyway, to cut to the chase, I had to call the lifeguards twice before they were willing to budge. Afterwards, the lifeguards thanked me and the mother of the kids went out and bought me a card to thank me. Who knows? They could have drowned. The beaches I worked were pretty quiet. Only a few rescues a year, but occasionally you read in the paper that someone drowned in a neighboring town. People don't realize how dangerous the ocean can be.
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Jan 30, 2021 15:21:58 GMT
During my high school years, I worked on the beach in the summer. It was my first proper job at 14 - cleaning the beach. IIRC I did that for two summers, then I checked badges the following two (you gotta pay to access the beach here). Anyway, besides it being the perfect summer job, the first thing that comes to mind is the day that I signaled the lifeguards from a neighboring beach to rescue kids that were drifting out to sea. I was checking badges at the entrance of an unguarded beach when I noticed them. (We're supposed to watch, but honestly most don't.) Anyway, to cut to the chase, I had to call the lifeguards twice before they were willing to budge. Afterwards, the lifeguards thanked me and the mother of the kids went out and bought me a card to thank me. Who knows? They could have drowned. The beaches I worked were pretty quiet. Only a few rescues a year, but occasionally you read in the paper that someone drowned in a neighboring town. People don't realize how dangerous the ocean can be.
Great story! Was this the Jersey shore?
I'll bet it was a perfect summer job. While "cleaning a beach" might not sound like a...desirable job, I can think of several reasons that would make it quite appealing.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 30, 2021 16:22:42 GMT
I have to be honest, if I had worked at a beach as a 14-year-old, I can't imagine getting anything done. I'll let you guess why, providing the additional hint that I've often joked with friends that in hindsight, it's lucky our high school years saw the layered clothing of the early to mid 90s instead of the later trends of tights, exposed midriffs, etc., or I would have almost certainly failed every class...
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Post by B.E. on Jan 31, 2021 2:03:20 GMT
During my high school years, I worked on the beach in the summer. It was my first proper job at 14 - cleaning the beach. IIRC I did that for two summers, then I checked badges the following two (you gotta pay to access the beach here). Anyway, besides it being the perfect summer job, the first thing that comes to mind is the day that I signaled the lifeguards from a neighboring beach to rescue kids that were drifting out to sea. I was checking badges at the entrance of an unguarded beach when I noticed them. (We're supposed to watch, but honestly most don't.) Anyway, to cut to the chase, I had to call the lifeguards twice before they were willing to budge. Afterwards, the lifeguards thanked me and the mother of the kids went out and bought me a card to thank me. Who knows? They could have drowned. The beaches I worked were pretty quiet. Only a few rescues a year, but occasionally you read in the paper that someone drowned in a neighboring town. People don't realize how dangerous the ocean can be.
Great story! Was this the Jersey shore?
I'll bet it was a perfect summer job. While "cleaning a beach" might not sound like a...desirable job, I can think of several reasons that would make it quite appealing.
Yeah, the Jersey shore. And it's not like the beaches were trashed. It was easy work. I always had it looking perfect by the time beachgoers arrived. You had to wake up early, though. That was the only drawback. You and the surfers. They got kicked out when the lifeguards arrived.
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