Tuesday, November 10, 2009

GARBAGE MAN

AVERAGE HOURLY WAGE: $13.87

WOW FACTOR: 1

PARENTAL PRIDE QUOTIENT: 1

(Most parents of garbage men try to avoid the subject with a casual, “Oh, he works for the city.”)

DANGER INDEX: 4


IS IT RIGHT FOR ME?

Sanitation engineer, waste management technician, dumpster doctor, crap-quistador . . . there’s no use sugar-coating it – you’re a garbage man. But if you’re secure enough with yourself that the job title alone isn’t a dealbreaker, then let’s keep talking.

WHAT’S INVOLVED?

Picking up trash. And when you’re not picking up trash, going on strike.

Going on strike will actually provide some your most satisfying moments as a garbage collector, because there’s nothing like two weeks worth of dirty diapers and sanitary napkins piling up on the curb to make a guy feel needed.

Garbage men certainly have it better than transit workers, who have no equivalent tableau of chaos to drive home their importance to society. It’s hard to distill 40,000 people being slightly late to work into one compelling visual image.

WHAT TRAINING DO I NEED?

You’ll get all the training you need on the job. Coming in, all that’s required from you is brute strength and access to a detergent with Built-in Stain-fighting Power.™

HOW DO I GET THE JOB?

It’s a government job, so you’ll have to qualify by passing a civil service examination. But don’t sweat it – those tests are notoriously easy. Here’s a question off last year’s exam.

UPSIDE:

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. If your route’s in a nice neighborhood, you’ll find that rich folks throw out plenty of perfectly good stuff -- and in the garbage collection business, it’s finders keepers.

On the other hand, if it’s a bad neighborhood, you can look forward to the odd dead body rolled up in a carpet. And who couldn’t use a new carpet?

DOWNSIDE:

Having to answer the question, “So. What do you do?” at parties and class reunions.

Oh, and constantly smelling like ass kinda sucks too.

1 comment:

  1. Anybody remember The Garbage Man song?

    One day when he was cleaning out my garbage pail
    He dropped an old tomoato and two rusty nails
    I put 'em under my pillow
    I sleep with them every night
    but still Ma says -- Ma says -- he's not my type.
    but how I love him, even though he's a garbage maaaa, aaaan, aaan an an an.

    ReplyDelete