"You're on your way, kid."
...is what my sister quoted to me this morning on her way out the door for work. I finally managed to get a job yesterday at a supermarket as a courtesy clerk. Not the most glamorous job but definitely a lot better than nothing. After months of trying anything I could find I end up finding work two months before I go back to school. Admittedly I didn't try as hard as I could have all this time mostly due to hopelessness which made me lazy/complacent.
I guess it really is all about just throwing yourself at everything you can think of because I didn't even come across any openings for Vons. One day last week I just sat down and thought of all the local places where I could see myself working and Vons was one of them. So I went on their site, filled out the application, and two days later I get an email saying I'm asked to go to an open interview the next Monday. Having gone to a few interviews since my last job, I wasn't excited because I was too used to rejections so it was more going through the motions for me.
I didn't really tell my mom about it until like the day before and she wasn't necessarily excited either because she knew my track record. I get up, take a shower, get dressed, and drive over. It's only 10-15 minutes away but it's in a city that I never go to because there isn't much there. It's quite residential and spacious and green and whatnot and I didn't know where I was going aside from the directions I looked up on Google. I accidentally passed the street where I was supposed to turn right so I had to make a U-turn. That particular turn onto the street is unusual too. It's not exactly a roundabout. It's got like...street curvage. It's hard to describe. Anyway, I manage to make it there in time. I pull into the parking lot, find a parking spot right up front by the doors, wander inside and go to the customer service area looking for someone who could tell me where to go, kind of stood for a minute until a worker told me where to go and I followed another one who led me into the back. I go up a short flight of stairs that leads to where the offices are and there's a group of people sitting in chairs also there for the interview, ages ranging from young to old and mostly females with a few males. I give a polite smile to all of them and find a chair for myself to sit in and distract myself with my phone until the district recruiter comes in to start business. She gives a short spiel about which positions are open and tidbits about the company and how the interview is going to be conducted. We go in order from who came first and she prints out our application and takes us into another room to do a quick one-on-one interview. It would've been the human resources office but it was occupied so we ended up in the tiny women's locker room. I was one of the latter people to show up so I waited while reading Fifty Shades Darker on my phone, at least until I got to a point where it was just too racy to read comfortably in front of strangers, after which I checked up on livejournal and tumblr.
She asked all of us to search up our names on the computer so it would be faster to print out our applications and the others were having a bit of trouble with it since they were older. Me being one of the few younger ones instantly found my application and opened it ready to be printed so that when the recruited came to get me and my application she was so pleased that I made her job easier she jokingly said "You're hired!" to which I jokingly said "Cool!" I followed her into the locker room where she asked various questions that I answered honestly like describe a situation where you were dealing with an unhappy customer and what's your favorite food and pretend I'm a customer and try to get me to buy it. To somewhat my surprise, her last question was which position I would like from the ones that were available (the three being courtesy clerk, bakery clerk, and night shift stocker) to which I answered mostly courtesy clerk because the minimum hours would be 16 a week whereas the other two would be 24 a week so that would be easier for me to deal with when I start taking classes again. After I answered that she said she would like to offer me a courtesy clerk position and that I did really well. It was strange because I went into it without the usual interview jitters as I have had super market experience before and come on, it's a super market, how hard could it be? After she was done talking to me she told me to wait a bit while she finished the rest of the applicants so that I could start the paperwork, which I ironically couldn't do because my forgetful self forgot my driver's license at home which she needed to get the background check started since that process usually takes 3-5 business days and is mandatory for all new employees. So I ended up going this morning to get all that started and came home with a huge packet of stuff to read through.
I'm gonna need to buy uniform stuff and make arrangements for training and all that jazz. I'm gonna miss not having all this free time to play games but I missed not having income a lot more.
I guess it really is all about just throwing yourself at everything you can think of because I didn't even come across any openings for Vons. One day last week I just sat down and thought of all the local places where I could see myself working and Vons was one of them. So I went on their site, filled out the application, and two days later I get an email saying I'm asked to go to an open interview the next Monday. Having gone to a few interviews since my last job, I wasn't excited because I was too used to rejections so it was more going through the motions for me.
I didn't really tell my mom about it until like the day before and she wasn't necessarily excited either because she knew my track record. I get up, take a shower, get dressed, and drive over. It's only 10-15 minutes away but it's in a city that I never go to because there isn't much there. It's quite residential and spacious and green and whatnot and I didn't know where I was going aside from the directions I looked up on Google. I accidentally passed the street where I was supposed to turn right so I had to make a U-turn. That particular turn onto the street is unusual too. It's not exactly a roundabout. It's got like...street curvage. It's hard to describe. Anyway, I manage to make it there in time. I pull into the parking lot, find a parking spot right up front by the doors, wander inside and go to the customer service area looking for someone who could tell me where to go, kind of stood for a minute until a worker told me where to go and I followed another one who led me into the back. I go up a short flight of stairs that leads to where the offices are and there's a group of people sitting in chairs also there for the interview, ages ranging from young to old and mostly females with a few males. I give a polite smile to all of them and find a chair for myself to sit in and distract myself with my phone until the district recruiter comes in to start business. She gives a short spiel about which positions are open and tidbits about the company and how the interview is going to be conducted. We go in order from who came first and she prints out our application and takes us into another room to do a quick one-on-one interview. It would've been the human resources office but it was occupied so we ended up in the tiny women's locker room. I was one of the latter people to show up so I waited while reading Fifty Shades Darker on my phone, at least until I got to a point where it was just too racy to read comfortably in front of strangers, after which I checked up on livejournal and tumblr.
She asked all of us to search up our names on the computer so it would be faster to print out our applications and the others were having a bit of trouble with it since they were older. Me being one of the few younger ones instantly found my application and opened it ready to be printed so that when the recruited came to get me and my application she was so pleased that I made her job easier she jokingly said "You're hired!" to which I jokingly said "Cool!" I followed her into the locker room where she asked various questions that I answered honestly like describe a situation where you were dealing with an unhappy customer and what's your favorite food and pretend I'm a customer and try to get me to buy it. To somewhat my surprise, her last question was which position I would like from the ones that were available (the three being courtesy clerk, bakery clerk, and night shift stocker) to which I answered mostly courtesy clerk because the minimum hours would be 16 a week whereas the other two would be 24 a week so that would be easier for me to deal with when I start taking classes again. After I answered that she said she would like to offer me a courtesy clerk position and that I did really well. It was strange because I went into it without the usual interview jitters as I have had super market experience before and come on, it's a super market, how hard could it be? After she was done talking to me she told me to wait a bit while she finished the rest of the applicants so that I could start the paperwork, which I ironically couldn't do because my forgetful self forgot my driver's license at home which she needed to get the background check started since that process usually takes 3-5 business days and is mandatory for all new employees. So I ended up going this morning to get all that started and came home with a huge packet of stuff to read through.
I'm gonna need to buy uniform stuff and make arrangements for training and all that jazz. I'm gonna miss not having all this free time to play games but I missed not having income a lot more.