Robot Monkeys

For the past two weeks I’ve found myself contemplating a getting a job. A quick cursorary look in the Southern Illinoisan confirmed what I already knew. There isn’t much demand for programmers in SI. While I could easily gain employment in Saint Louis, I don’t feel like moving or commuting there. Also without copious amounts of bandwidth telecommuting isn’t an option. (Also I have serious doubts about whether I would actually work if I worked from home.)

There’s a lot of want ads for RNs and school teachers. My advanced medical knowledge is limited to the ability to fake my way through CPR, so the RN job is out. While I’m reasonably confident that I could teach eighth grade math and/or science, I do not possess the proper certification, and I’m pretty sure that getting certified involves alot more than simply showing up at the Superintendent of Schools’s office with $50 and 2 hours of free time and leaving with a type <letter><number> certificate, so that’s out.

What I’m looking for isn’t so much something to do, but somewhere to go and get money in return. (No, the unemployment office doesn’t count. I already had this discussion about whether I should draw unemployment with my parents. I argued that I shouldn’t, because it’s not that I can’t find work, it’s just that I won’t.)

Tonight I was bored, so I decided that I’d go to Longbranch and drink a cafe mocha. (In fact I’m drinking another one now in my kitchen at home. If you’re wondering who drinks that Folger’s cafe mocha stuff, wonder no more, it’s me. If I felt like justifying it I’d say something like: “My parents don’t own a coffee machine, let alone a coffee pot. All they drink is Folger’s, so I’m stuck with this.”, but I don’t. Instead, I’ll just say: “I bought it tonight. I drank it. It doesn’t taste that much different from the real one I had earlier tonight.”) While I was there I decided that the guy behind the counter had a kickass job. He sits on a stool. Talks to his friends. Occasionally pours a cup of joe, and passively (or actively) smokes, all the while getting paid $5.15 an hour. No pressure. Only negligible amount asked of you. Pretty good. In fact quite possibly the ideal job. Well, I wouldn’t want to be sitting there at 42, unless of course I owned the coffeeshouse, so I guess it’s only a locally optimum solution.

I also found myself thinking about getting a degree in comparitive linguistics. Afterall I’ve been thinking about writing off and on for about the past 18 months. (I decided that I don’t care about learning a language, as much as I care about learning how a language works.) So what can you do with a degree in linguistics, you ask? Well I believe that with, SIU’s Linuguistics department said it best. In other words: “It’s just like any other liberal arts degree. Not much, besides teach it.”

And as I sat there drinking from my incomprehenably wide mug, trying to come up with other minimum wage jobs that require almost no effort and weren’t somehow uncool, and contemplating getting a liberal arts degree, I came to the realization that I am a slacker.

I don’t work. I don’t look for a job. While I wouldn’t necessarily mind drawing a pay check, my set of acceptable jobs right now is so comically small I insure unemployment. Basically it’s coffeshop guy. I thought about mailman (or more generally, “Package Delivery Guy”), but then discarded it since they’d want me to go places and deliver stuff, or at the very least move stuff on and off trucks. That’s more work than I want to put in.

I’m a slacker; and you know what? I’m cool with that.