Temporary Insanity, Part 2

The continued tales of my adventures as a temp in SF...


After a few days of catching up on The Makeover Story, Wedding Story, Baby Story and Dating Story on TLC, I began my next assignment. I was sent to work in an expensive consignment shop in Berkeley. I walked in the front door and there was no one in sight. I slowly crept to the back of the store and was startled by the crack of a woman’s ass staring at me from the floor of one of the fitting rooms. After recalling the “how to respond to the crack of a woman’s ass” section of the temp handbook, I decided it was best to talk to it. “Hi…I’m Mary.”

A woman, in her mid-twenties, with thin anorexia-induced hair blow-dried to perfection, stood up and wiped her hands on her tight Diesel jeans before shaking my hand. “Hi Mary! I’m Sarah! I was just cleaning the edges of the fitting rooms with a toothbrush. Can you believe that?!”

If I can believe that your boobs are real, I can believe anything. “Wow…that sucks,” I said.

Sarah informed me that my job would be to monitor the fitting rooms and put clothes back on the racks. Occasionally I would have the pleasure of attaching security tags to “new” items. It was essentially the same as my high school job at the Rockaway Mall Gap, except the customers at this place were wearing Birkenstocks instead of Balloon hightops. The days dragged on slowly only to be interrupted by the occasional Berkeley shopper demanding more from her used clothing. “Do you have this in a small?” one woman said as she held up a previously worn Dolce & Gabbana camisole priced at $85. It seemed that many people were incapable of understanding the fact that it was a used clothing store. I suddenly had a vision of standing in the middle of the Salvation Army screaming, “Excuse me…don’t you have this pale yellow “My dad went to Barbados and all he got me was this stinkin t-shirt” shirt in a medium?!” Aside from being master of the fitting rooms, I fielded a variety of important questions from customers, such as, “Who picked this crappy radio station?!”

“If enjoying a little Tone Loc is wrong than I don’t want to be right. Can I get you a fitting room?” I said with the perfect blend of “Have a great shopping experience” and “May that BCBG skirt show off your cellulite” in my voice. The highlight of the job was my role as fashion consultant to drag queens. I received this job by default since the store manager was a homophobe. “I don’t mind gay people, but why do they have to be SO gay?” she said after a guy left with a bag full of glittery outfits. Funny, I thought, I do mind stupid people so why do you have to be SO stupid? My drag queen consulting job had many rewards. After one successful fashion consultation meeting involving faux leather pants and a tight tank top with a bedazzled star, the guy thanked me by standing in front of the mirrors and showing me the dance routine he made up to Pink’s “I’m Comin Out.” He was gonna get that party started, all right.

“I have a great job for you. Phone reception for a tech company. The people are great! And it pays $14 an hour!” Really?! Fourteen whole dollars an hour?! That’s so super cool that I’ll almost be able to pay my rent and eat this month! Rock on!

I followed the directions to Rancho Santa Fe Tech, but was skeptical that it would lead me to a corporation. Rancho Santa Fe sounded more like a new salad dressing at Chili’s. I must admit, the temp people were right about two things. It was a tech company and the people really were great. The slight clincher was that I was given next to nothing to do. Unless sitting near the phone waiting for it to ring, while using the Internet to stalk every person in my past is considered something to do. It got to the point where I was taking stalking requests from friends. “Uh Mare…could you see what you can find on Dave Henderson…he goes to my gym and is hot.” I was on it. Bio with pictures sent within minutes.

For about a week I was kept busy scanning and resizing pictures of ATMs taken at various angles. Apparently this salad dressing company did something with ATMs. I found it less than fascinating, but it was my career for the week, so I pressed on. When that job was finished, I was fresh out of people to stalk. So I then moved on to the important business of updating myself on the lives of the current Real World cast, researching the best eyebrow shape for my features, reading the Craigslist personals and pretending it was solely for entertainment purposes, and keeping abreast, no pun intended, on Pam Anderson’s STD issues. After a couple months of this, a permanent ATM picture scanner/internet stalker was hired, and I was on my way.

Next stop…a home furnishing chain that was closing a few offices and needed help packing. During many of my approximately three million trips across the office, my arms loaded with various office and computer supplies, I’d walk by people who were emptying out their desks. Several of them gave me looks that clearly said, “Oh my Lord in heaven, by next Monday my life may be as pathetic as yours.” Yes, yes it will, I said silently with a smile, while tripping on phone chords that were now lining the hallways. That job was fairly introspective. Most of the time was spent sitting in an office, disconnecting anything and everything. I was able to enjoy some human interaction at lunchtime, when I’d sit in the sun with the professional movers, devouring a Big Mac and sipping down Coke, as if my work throwing obsolete business cards in a trash bag was as exhausting as carrying industrial furniture on your back. “Long day, huh?” I’d say, reflecting on that binder clip that fell behind the copy machine.

“Yeah, but it’s beautiful out today. Can’t complain.” One of the movers said, as he hoisted a shelf holding ten computers onto the truck.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right” I said, while shoving the last of my fries in my mouth. I’m sure they’d be moving that copy machine out of the way soon anyway.

The tables were suddenly turned when, after having many of my resumes rejected, I got to do the rejecting. For two weeks I sat in front of a computer at a law firm and input the information from rejected resumes into their new personnel software. At first I thought this may be satisfying. The rejectee becomes the rejector. Instead, I was flabbergasted at some of the fools who were joined with me in unemployment. Why in the world was I unable to land a job when the first line of a resume written by an attorney mentions, “what I learnt in school”? And a section on some guy’s resume titled, “Outside the Box”….it may as well be titled, “Even if you’re not interested in hiring me, please call me so we can have tantric sex.”

Fortunately, my frustrations were soothed by the sounds of the radio on the other side of my cubicle. The woman who sat back there had KOIT playing all day long. As in. “K-O-I-T…smoothin out the work day…” I don’t mind being somewhere between a rock and a soft place now and then, but it sometimes got to be a little much. That is until the magical afternoon when it became KOIT kareoke. A few notes played and I immediately realized that it was the beginning of “Part-time Lover” by Stevie Wonder. I was secretly happy about this discovery. Apparently so was the middle-aged woman on the other side of my cubicle because with her thick Chinese accent, she sang along loudly, knowing every word. Suddenly the singer in her could no longer be denied. From then on she was confidently accompanying artists like Barry Manilow, Wilson Philips and Kenny Rogers. She really came into her own when she sang along with Cher. She DOES believe in life after love, after love, after love.