TOO MANY BOYS
So it's hiring season again here at the cave. We've decided to cut back our staff slightly, but had a few guides and so on who have gone off to college and moved out of the area, so we thought we'd need to take on a couple of new people this year.
We got a call a few weeks ago from twin brothers expressing an interest in guiding - and two email inquiries from another couple of lads who knew (or were related to) people who had worked here previously. And we got another couple of random calls. We told them all that we probably wouldn't have much to offer this season - certainly nothing full-time - but that we'd get back to them to set up interviews and so on.
Now, Sean was delighted when he got wind of the twins. I suspect he had visions of vintage gay porn dancing in his head, but I was thinking more along the lines of Tweedledee and Tweedledum, so I wasn't that bothered. As they'd been the first inquiry, we spoke to them first and set up a meeting. In the meantime, we spoke to one of the other lads, Kyle, and set up another appointment. The fourth, Neal, had kinda been left at "get back to us if you'd be interested in occasional work".
Kyle scheduled his interview last Wednesday and seemed personable enough - though he has just turned fourteen. We don't mind hiring that young (the minimum age in Pennsylvania) because it at least means they'll be in the area for a few years if they turn out to be brilliant. Plus, the tour is now divided into two parts, with Sean or I doing the intro, giving historical background and so on, and the guide just taking them through the cave proper, so it doesn't seem as though the guests are being put entirely into the hands of an adolescent. Though the fact that, by the time they start guiding, they know the cave and its history intimately and are able to answer questions pretty thoroughly on just about everything from limestone aquifers and solution caves to bat hibernacula, Algonquin artifacts, and the Iroquois Confederacy, often leaves visitors sorely impressed by so much knowledge in guides so young.
Then, yesterday, the twins turned up: Stephen and (another) Sean, both seventeen (obviously). And... Oh. My. God. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. They are freaking gorgeous. And intelligent and articulate and interested in history - and don't mind a bit of manual labor, either. They're fraternal, rather than identical, twins (so they aren't quite the fantasy material they could have been), but they have a similar aesthetic - tallish, swimmer's build; dark, floppy hair - and both of them are going to be strikingly attractive young men. We hired them on the spot, giving the attraction an immediate spike in its Sex Appeal quotient. My Sean, of course, is all "See - I told you!"
Then I got a call this morning from Neal - and he stopped by this afternoon. He, too, is extremely personable, kinda cute, and very bright, if a bit soft-spoken. He's also "cyber-schooled" so I'd like to give him some opportunity to get out of the house and broaden his horizons a bit.
Meanwhile, a former guide, Eugenia (who worked for us the first season we took over operation of the cave and was here for a few weeks early last summer before spending a few months abroad prior to returning to college) got in touch with us expressing an interest in coming back more or less full-time this year. As she is one of the best guides we've ever had (and is very dependable in relation to punctuality, manning the register in the gift shop, taking on odd maintenance chores, and so on - plus making her own contribution to the Sex Appeal of the place) and speaks three or four languages, including Russian (her native tongue), she was guaranteed as much work a we could provide. Plus, we still have another guide, Lake, returning from last year. He isn't the best we've ever had, but he's fairly clever, very earnest, and eager for the work. And we have Sara, a part-time manager who's worked here off and on for about fifteen years, who is available and loves the work, though, as she teaches full-time during the year, she doesn't really need the job.
I guess work here is fairly attractive. We're pretty undemanding as bosses go, working in a cave is fairly unique of itself (and it's not hard work for the most part), and we pay more than minimum wage - though, as a seasonal operation, we could pay below minimum, as most other area attractions do. But, hey - the minimum wage is not a living wage and, even if many of our employees still live with their parents, a fair wage is a fair wage.
In short, though, we now have too many boys for too few jobs - and we're not sure how to weed them out. So we're going to pay all four of the new lads for training and see how they do from there. Whatever happens, though, I'm guessing we're keeping the twins. It may just be gay chauvinism, but if all else fails, we can always put them in loincloths and send them out to shopping malls to hand out brochures. If that doesn't drum up enough business to keep them on the payroll, nothing will. :D
We got a call a few weeks ago from twin brothers expressing an interest in guiding - and two email inquiries from another couple of lads who knew (or were related to) people who had worked here previously. And we got another couple of random calls. We told them all that we probably wouldn't have much to offer this season - certainly nothing full-time - but that we'd get back to them to set up interviews and so on.
Now, Sean was delighted when he got wind of the twins. I suspect he had visions of vintage gay porn dancing in his head, but I was thinking more along the lines of Tweedledee and Tweedledum, so I wasn't that bothered. As they'd been the first inquiry, we spoke to them first and set up a meeting. In the meantime, we spoke to one of the other lads, Kyle, and set up another appointment. The fourth, Neal, had kinda been left at "get back to us if you'd be interested in occasional work".
Kyle scheduled his interview last Wednesday and seemed personable enough - though he has just turned fourteen. We don't mind hiring that young (the minimum age in Pennsylvania) because it at least means they'll be in the area for a few years if they turn out to be brilliant. Plus, the tour is now divided into two parts, with Sean or I doing the intro, giving historical background and so on, and the guide just taking them through the cave proper, so it doesn't seem as though the guests are being put entirely into the hands of an adolescent. Though the fact that, by the time they start guiding, they know the cave and its history intimately and are able to answer questions pretty thoroughly on just about everything from limestone aquifers and solution caves to bat hibernacula, Algonquin artifacts, and the Iroquois Confederacy, often leaves visitors sorely impressed by so much knowledge in guides so young.
Then, yesterday, the twins turned up: Stephen and (another) Sean, both seventeen (obviously). And... Oh. My. God. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. They are freaking gorgeous. And intelligent and articulate and interested in history - and don't mind a bit of manual labor, either. They're fraternal, rather than identical, twins (so they aren't quite the fantasy material they could have been), but they have a similar aesthetic - tallish, swimmer's build; dark, floppy hair - and both of them are going to be strikingly attractive young men. We hired them on the spot, giving the attraction an immediate spike in its Sex Appeal quotient. My Sean, of course, is all "See - I told you!"
Then I got a call this morning from Neal - and he stopped by this afternoon. He, too, is extremely personable, kinda cute, and very bright, if a bit soft-spoken. He's also "cyber-schooled" so I'd like to give him some opportunity to get out of the house and broaden his horizons a bit.
Meanwhile, a former guide, Eugenia (who worked for us the first season we took over operation of the cave and was here for a few weeks early last summer before spending a few months abroad prior to returning to college) got in touch with us expressing an interest in coming back more or less full-time this year. As she is one of the best guides we've ever had (and is very dependable in relation to punctuality, manning the register in the gift shop, taking on odd maintenance chores, and so on - plus making her own contribution to the Sex Appeal of the place) and speaks three or four languages, including Russian (her native tongue), she was guaranteed as much work a we could provide. Plus, we still have another guide, Lake, returning from last year. He isn't the best we've ever had, but he's fairly clever, very earnest, and eager for the work. And we have Sara, a part-time manager who's worked here off and on for about fifteen years, who is available and loves the work, though, as she teaches full-time during the year, she doesn't really need the job.
I guess work here is fairly attractive. We're pretty undemanding as bosses go, working in a cave is fairly unique of itself (and it's not hard work for the most part), and we pay more than minimum wage - though, as a seasonal operation, we could pay below minimum, as most other area attractions do. But, hey - the minimum wage is not a living wage and, even if many of our employees still live with their parents, a fair wage is a fair wage.
In short, though, we now have too many boys for too few jobs - and we're not sure how to weed them out. So we're going to pay all four of the new lads for training and see how they do from there. Whatever happens, though, I'm guessing we're keeping the twins. It may just be gay chauvinism, but if all else fails, we can always put them in loincloths and send them out to shopping malls to hand out brochures. If that doesn't drum up enough business to keep them on the payroll, nothing will. :D