It's What Separates Us From The Apes

Today I spent several hours filling out paperwork at a "nationally known" contract temp agency so that I could interview tomorrow with a "nationally known" pharmaceutical company for a short term position pushing miracle drugs on unsuspecting Europeans.

I've worked for this agency before and we had a pretty good relationship until I turned down a position for medical reasons.  I thought it was cool, but I guess it pissed my rep off and he's blocked me in various ways from applying with the agency for anything with the "nationally known" pharmaceutical company.

After finally realizing what he was doing, I wrote him off as a total asshole and gave up on applying for anything through his agency.

Last week, I received a call from one of his cube mates at the agency, wanting me to come in and re-up, as there was a position open at the "nationally known" that she wanted me to interview for, because she thought I would make a reasonable fit.  Now, these people don't call you out of the kindness of their hearts.  They work on a commission, and the more people they place that their clients like, the more likely they are to be able to place more people.  Kind of like a pimp, I guess.

Anyway, I showed up this afternoon at the agency and start filling out the mound of paperwork.  By the way, I drank a bottle of water on the way over because I knew I would have to go to some lab afterwards to stand and deliver a piss sample, but as it turns out, there's a new way to screen out junkies from gainful employment.  It's kind of like a DNA swab crossed with an early pregnancy test, instead you pop the stick in your mouth and slobber all over it instead of pissing on it.  Pretty cool.  You hold it in your mouth like a thermometer for two minutes and then dip it in a tube of shit hooked up to some other shit and in less than a minute, it turns color if you are using one of the big four: pot, coke, meth or heroin.  Of course I passed and let out an enthusiastic "Yay", which caused the rep to look at me strangely.

While I'm filling out the paperwork, lady rep says that the total asshole rep knew I was coming in and wanted to chat with me for a while.  Fucking great.  But of course, I smiled and said that I'd be delighted to see him.  God I'm a whore.

Midway through signing my name to documents swearing that I won't try to overthrow the government or pinch the collective butts of my co-workers during my time of employment, Mr. Total Asshole walks in, shakes my hand with great gusto and wants to know everything about what I've been doing.

So, for the next 20 minutes, we did small talk.  His health, my health; his wife, my wife; his kid, my kid. Then we both harumphed that we'd better get back to it and said goodbye.  I finished up my paperwork and left.

When I got home, I mentioned to Jan that I had talked with Mr. Total Asshole, and she asked me how that went. And I said that it went fine.  Let's face it, unless you just hate another person to the core, you're always cordial ... or at least you try to act like a rational human being.

After all, it's just business.