Shortest jobs

[Violator]

I was sent by a temp company to a place that did plastic extrusion.Person that was training people told me about a guy that had an interview the week before got the job came into work punched in manager took him to were he was working stayed for five minutes and left.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by oilfanforever

When I was 15 my mom got me a job at the Crowfoot bottle depot. I hated it.

As soon as lunch rolled around I told my boss I was going to subway and proceeded to walk straight home, never to go back. I should have handled it better...

My friends still bug me to this day about my 4 hour shift. I'm pretty much gaurunteed and message or photo every time someone drops their beer cans off.

There is no shame in this. None at all. Working in a bottle depot would be like living in my hair in 1995, and believe me, nobody deserves that. You were right to leave.

My own "shortest job" was for some cold-calling sales gig when I was maybe 18. It said right in the ad (which was in the Herald, so totally legit) that it wasn't about cold calling, but instead dealing with existing customers. That was a lie.

I would have been selling some financial "services" garbage, and not something cool like a non-stick frying pan or a thigh-strenghtening device. It was pure crookery. Now I'm not saying I'm not okay with crookery, but duping someone into buying a frying pan that will undoubtedly make better omelettes or a product that will give you wicked legs is not the same as really ripping off old people, month after month, and I was a little queasy about it.

My "interview" was very well attended. At least 40 people were in the room, and the only question I (and everyone else in the room) was asked was "can you be here tomorrow morning?"

So in the end, I didn't show up for my first day, and that was the shortest job I ever had.

[FireGilbert]

Originally Posted by Tron_fdc

It was hilarious. Every morning you would gather around a bus, and you were given your work assignments. You then paid cash ($4 each way) for the bus, or put it on your account. You then went to the farm, got paid $8/hr, then paid $20/night for accommodation. By the time you paid food and MAYBE booze, you were clearly in the hole.

I was staying in a 2br house close by that we filled with 6 people, split rent, brewed our own beer, and everyone brought home fruit and veggies for nightly stir fries. I lived with some English guy that was 40 something, just got out of jail, and would get LOADED every night singing to Oasis. It was terrifying because no one was brave enough to tell him to STFU.

I was lucky, I set up a job for $13/hr and figured out a ride to get there every day so I wasn't paying the hostel transport. Was there for 4 weeks, saved as much as possible and GTFO'd at the first possible moment. I talked to quite a few guys that were in this sh*t town (Bowen) for 6 months on their work holiday "vacation".

I will NEVER pick fruit again. EVER.

That pretty much explains everything. I do somewhat appreciate their efforts to keep the price of delicious mangoes and other fruits low however

There does seem to be a lot of fruit picking horror stories. This was in the news recently:

http://www.news.com.au/finance/small...9b6ba3611b4d41

[squiggs96]

Originally Posted by Huntingwhale

I was one of those people who saw an ad in the paper that screamed "$15/hr minimum, no experience necessary, call this number!". So I called the number, talked to someone for 5 minutes. 15 minutes later I got a call back asking me to come for an interview. Of course it was for Vector Marketing.

In 2000 I was working in the restaurant industry. I was looking for a second, part-time job, and thought the same thing as you. I was only making $9/hr, so $15 seemed like high roller status. I received the call back when I was on the golf course with a manager from the restaurant and two buddies. I asked the manager to hold the phone for me when it was my turn to tee off. I thought he would just hold it for the 15 seconds. Instead, he decided to talk to the person and said, "Who the #### do you think you are interrupting a golf game?" I laughed, but told him it was a job interview, so I was pretty embarrassed. The girl on the phone laughed it off. When I found out it was selling knives door to door I was uninterested, and called to say I would not be going in.

[CliffFletcher]

I was hanging in out Greece with a couple Scottish dudes who were working their way across Europe when we heard that working in Israel on a Moshav (a for-profit Kibbutz) is a good way to earn some money, maybe extend your trip into Egypt. Sounds like a good idea, so we take the ferry over. The agency in Tel Aviv sends us to Moshav Negev - a lonely red dot on the map squeezed between Jordan and Egypt.

We get dropped off on the highway in the desert night, taken on a tractor through layers of barbed wire fence into the compound, and sent to our individual farm hosts. My home will be a small cabin split in two. On one side three young Thai dudes who share the room look up from their skin mags to say hi. Being a European, I get the other room to myself, and told I will be the boss once I get up to speed.

Besides the Thais, the Moshav is worked mainly by working-class English youths. It happens to be Guy Fawkes night, so I join the crowd of sunburnt chavs shuffling over to a clear patch of dirt, carrying sacks of beer and a stuffed dummy of Mr. Fawkes. Beer is cracked and the dummy is lit ablaze with gasoline. I have never heard of Guy Fawkes night until now, and only gradually piece together what it's all about. Everyone keeps calling me a #####in' Yank.

The next morning, my Scottish friends and I learn more about the work. We'll be taken in tractors across minefields to the orchards, where we'll pick for 8 hours a day in the blazing desert sun. We're warned of the various poisonous spiders and snakes, and how to avoid them. Morale among the English-speaking pickers is not high - many drink away their daily wage and are effectively stranded here.

It occurs to us that we're supposed to be on vacation. So two days in, we bail. Head to Eilat to enjoy the Red Sea. No regrets.

[CaptainCrunch]

shortest job was one day selling sun subscriptions over the phone. Man I hated that job to the point that in the last two hours I was completely sabotaging my calls so they wouldn't ask me back the next day. Calling men Ma'am and woman sir. Telling them that there were better papers out there.

At the end of the day the manager said I did a great job, handed me $50.00 which was a ton of money back then and told me to be there at 4 the next day, I said thanks but no thanks, took the $50.00 and got royally drunk at the strip club down the street.

The next shortest was 3 weeks at a placement agency that worked with SAP consultants. I just couldn't stand the person that hired me and felt mislead and micromanaged.

So . . . out the door I went.

[OMG!WTF!]

I was a gallop boy at the race track several years ago. $12 bucks a ride.....if you came back with the horse. Those crazy thoroughbreds hated me cause I was about twice the size of most of the jockey's. We'd get a furlong in and they'd start trying to get rid of me. They'd try to brush me off on the gates then if I hung on they'd start bucking before the first turn. One filly named Annesnothappy bit me in the chest every time I got on her. She hated me. I couldn't handle the rejection.

[calumniate]

Mine was as a future shop salesman. I hated it, and was terrible at it. They let a bunch of us go after the holidays. Reviewing my performance they noted that I'd sold all of 1 product service plan. Lol! Guess I couldn't trick myself into believing in that crap.. ah well it was just a dumb university job. Some of the salespeople made decent coin believe it or not. It just wasn't in me

[brocoli]

I worked for Montana's for 3 orientation shifts. Got to sample the entire menu and then never served an actual shift. Did the training and realized that it was the farm from what I wanted. Great food though

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by calumniate

Mine was as a future shop salesman. I hated it, and was terrible at it. They let a bunch of us go after the holidays. Reviewing my performance they noted that I'd sold all of 1 product service plan. Lol! Guess I couldn't trick myself into believing in that crap.. ah well it was just a dumb university job. Some of the salespeople made decent coin believe it or not. It just wasn't in me

Heh I worked for Future shop for about 3 years, I actually enjoyed it, made really good money at the time, and got into their management program, which is when the luster wore off. I was there when they went public so I made a ton of money on the stock offerings. then they announced that they were expanding into the states. And my first thought was, I give it a year, the Best Buys and circuit cities are going to murder this company in the States, then follow us back into Canada and poop all over us.

But for all of the good, it was a 6 day a week 12 hour a day grind especially when you got into the MIT program, and because all of these people thought it was a career job at the time, the back stabbing and BS was completely merciless.

I also remember the morning cheers before we opened the store, so lame.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Took a summer job at a call center during University. Was there for Thursday and Friday. Grandmother died on Friday evening. Had to go to the funeral Monday and Tuesday. Came back to work on Wednesday and rather than condolences or anything like that I was immediately told I would have to make up the time on Saturday and Sunday (which was weird as I wasn't paid for Monday and Tuesday). Turned around, walked out the door, and never came back.

[4X4]

Originally Posted by TheAlpineOracle

Took a summer job at a call center during University. Was there for Thursday and Friday. Grandmother died on Friday evening. Had to go to the funeral Monday and Tuesday. Came back to work on Wednesday and rather than condolences or anything like that I was immediately told I would have to make up the time on Saturday and Sunday (which was weird as I wasn't paid for Monday and Tuesday). Turned around, walked out the door, and never came back.

Huh. I used to work at a place back in high school, and another guy called in sick three times over 3-4 months because his grandmother died. That cost him his job as well. Who are these people with so many grandmothers that keep dying on Friday nights?

[skudr248]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

I also remember the morning cheers before we opened the store, so lame.

Oh god, I remember this to. So cringe.

[undercoverbrother]

1 week as a bus boy at Bonanza, which was where the Kingshead pub is now.

day 4 I slipped on the build up of grease on the floor and was covered. The manager made me keep working. I was 14 or 15 and didn't know to stand up for myself.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by skudr248

Oh god, I remember this to. So cringe.

Here's the funny thing though. I opened the store in Lethbridge and went to work in Medicine Hat, then I went to open the Regina store.

and in all these, and I'm going to call them backwater burbs. there were almost Future Shop groupies, it was so weird, but maybe its because we were making really good money, and at the time we had to wear suits and ties everyday (and working those stores were murderous on suits) or that we would go to the bars right after closing and pretty much party til the sun came up every day.

But it was so weird, these girls would come into the stores and completely hit on the sales people.

[Sainters7]

I was a bartender at BP's for 4 days about a decade ago, when I first went back to school.

Didn't get fired or anything, I had been dating my gf about a year and figured working weekend/evenings in that industry wasn't the best way to have a healthy relationship, so I quit. Plus I was a TERRIBLE server. Like, so bad. When I could just sit behind the bar slingin drinks it was great. But during that hour switchover between the day and night waitresses I had to cover tables and I couldn't wait for the night waitress to arrive to get me out of it. I probably averaged $3 tips on $60 meals, and it was well earned.

I eventually quit and just got a typical college summer job doing commercial lawn maintenance.

[squiggs96]

Originally Posted by 4X4

Huh. I used to work at a place back in high school, and another guy called in sick three times over 3-4 months because his grandmother died. That cost him his job as well. Who are these people with so many grandmothers that keep dying on Friday nights?

A co-worker I had many years ago was dating a guy. The guy was exhausted after being up for two days straight and was in no condition to go into his job, where he worked with heavy machinery. He couldn't call in sick because he'd used that excuse too many times. My co-worker told her boyfriend to say that his mom was sick and he needed to take care of her or go to the hospital.

He called his boss and got a little carried away, as he told his boss his mom died. They gave him the rest of the week off, sent him some flowers and gift cards for restaurants, as he shouldn't have to cook at a time like this. He had to call his mom and tell her never to call his work. He left the job a few months later because he was paranoid someone would find out.

[4X4]

Originally Posted by squiggs96

A co-worker I had many years ago was dating a guy. The guy was exhausted after being up for two days straight and was in no condition to go into his job, where he worked with heavy machinery. He couldn't call in sick because he'd used that excuse too many times. My co-worker told her boyfriend to say that his mom was sick and he needed to take care of her or go to the hospital.

He called his boss and got a little carried away, as he told his boss his mom died. They gave him the rest of the week off, sent him some flowers and gift cards for restaurants, as he shouldn't have to cook at a time like this. He had to call his mom and tell her never to call his work. He left the job a few months later because he was paranoid someone would find out.

"I thought your mom died in October!!"
"Well, that was my stepmom"
"But your stepmom died in September"
"That was my dad's third wife"

[JiriHrdina]

A few come to mind
- My first 'real job' post-uni was working for the marketing department for Rogers Video in Vancouver. My salary was $23,500. I had a dank basement apartment in a bad area of town, no social life and still was bleeding money. Quit after 6 months to come back to Calgary
- After that I worked for a guy for about 3 months, selling "Total E-Clips" car shades. 100% commission. Got them into 2 local car shops and realized that it was just going to be a failure. 3 months of work for $0.
- Following that answered an ad for a "marketing job" and got it over the phone. Ignored that as a red flag and showed up for Day 1 where I learned I would be telemarketing (something I had done in my teens) in a room full of chain smoking middle aged women. Put in the day for some reason, then called the next morning and told them I was done. But I drove down and collected my $36 (6 hours x $6 per hour) for my previous days work.
- Answered another ad for a "customer service" job with Telus. I got an interview and very directly asked if it was telemarketing and was assured it was not. Showed up for Day 1 and during training it became clear it was. Stood up in the middle of training and just walked out.

During University I got hired by the company that did the Pepsi Challenge (I wanna say they were called SMG). I thought that would be a great way to spend the summer - going around cool places and giving people the Pepsi Challenge.

During training it was revealed we would be doing the "Sprint Long Distance Savings Challenge". It may surprise you but the Spring Long Distance Savings Challenge was not nearly as fun as the Pepsi Challenge. Lasted about 1.5 months.

A couple of my buddies got themselves in horrible situations where they were hired by a company for a "marketing job" (always a marketing job!) - upon which they were driven out to Butt-f*** Alberta, dropped off and told to go sell whatever cheap crud they had.

Oh I also worked for Ezra Levant.

That's a tale for another time.

[AC]

I worked one day for the Flames in their graphic design department.

Quickly realized how bad their setup was. Got insulted during the initial interview based on my CalgaryPuck account history (which is why I shortened my name to my initials only), then got insulted after the first day when I followed the lady's instructions and failed to read her mind.

Realized I had no interest getting underpaid and learning to hate something I like to do for fun.