What Was Your First Job Ever? [Archive]

Wart

03-18-01, 03:08 PM

First job where your parents didn't pay you to clean your room or get out of the house. (I saved up enough money from that to pay for my freshman year. :D )

I made shave ice at Matsumoto's. Its probably the equivalent of ice cream in the mainland. (Milk is expensive here.) Its just crushed ice sweetened with syrup with different flavors like root beer, passion fruit--all kinds

OllieO

03-18-01, 04:08 PM

Paperround @ 15. It was good - £8 for a little over 2 hours work.

Then at 16 I worked in an office for a summer. The worst job with terrible pay ever. I shall never be stuck in an office again.

Pigsnie

03-18-01, 08:28 PM

I wanted to work in a fish & chips shop but my dad wouldn't let me. (I LOVE FISH & CHIPS!) But when I turned 16, he let me work for this friend of his, an old archaeologist who worked in the British Museum. I put all his books back on the shelves (he had thousands, they were all dusty & they were all cataloged Dewey Decimal), typed labels for his coin collection, and cleaned boring shipwreck pottery shards. "Wow, this shard looks just like Wales & this one looks like the South of France!"
Bleech!

But when he died, he left me 100 ancient Roman & Greek coins in his will, so I will always think of him as the best boss I ever had, even though he only paid me 16 pounds a week at the time.

Zephyrus

03-19-01, 07:58 AM

Wow lucky you Pigsnie, the oldest I've got are some late 18th century and early 19th century Portuguese colonial coins... :)

Ha! This is a good thread... My first job was (and don't laugh) at MacDonalds, selling their junk at the counter and occasionally making it 'round the back! ;D The pay @ 15 was something like AU$5.35/hour which went up to AU$6.55 when I turned 16 (which is US$2.62 and US$3.21 respectively) ;D !!!

That was when I decided that I will never have another boss again, nor work as a physical worker, or clean another dining room again! :D

Yoda

03-19-01, 10:25 AM

I just got my first job this month actually - I get to telecommute to work, it's basically all online, with some phone contact. Great job - pay is around the same as I'd get at McDonald's, but I get to do what I like to do, and don't have to go anywhere. :)

sunfrog

03-19-01, 10:52 AM

Delivering pizza. Wheee!
Raced my '67 Mustang all over town with the stereo blasting and got paid for it. That was a fun job. :)

like AU$5.35/hour which went up to AU$6.55 when I turned 16 (which is US$2.62 and US$3.21 respectively)

$2.62!! Is stuff cheap down there?

Pigsnie

03-19-01, 01:11 PM

Zephyrus, you can get so many reasonably priced ancient coins on E-Bay, it's almost sickening. (Just yesterday, I spotted a Dutch auction of real silver denarii at $22 each!) But how happy my old professor would have been! By the way, of the 100 ancient coins the impish fellow left me, roughly a fourth were UNCLEANED and encrusted with the filth of the centuries!!! I had to clean each one with sulphuric acid (citric acid if I thought it was gold, I only found three) and it took the better part of a year for me to do the job right. Anyhoo, because I found that I liked cleaning off the filth of the centuries (I'm good with clogged drains too!), I became a very amateur numismatist.

PS. You kids with '67 Mustangs ... ARFFFF !!!

Zephyrus

03-21-01, 09:38 PM

Nah, not really, nothing is cheap down here, probably more expensive than in the US!! It's what we call one step up from cheap child labour like in the third world countries!! ;D By the way, what's the MacDonalds pay in the UK and the US??

By the way, compared to that (which was only about two years ago), I am now working as a very part time tutor (only work five or six hours a week), and I charge $25 an hour or $30 for an hour and a half (which again is quite cheap compared to what other tutors charge over here, usually around ~$35 - $40)! :) It's better than serving Big Macs all day (and having to ask someone "Do you want any deserts with that" when they've already ordered a sundae :D)!!

Pigsnie, that really sounds unbelievable, but I've never bought anything on auction on e-bay or any other such site, so I have almost no idea how it works...(I mean with paying, delivery, trustworthiness etc.)

Pigsnie

03-21-01, 11:47 PM

$25 - $30 AN HOUR!!!! THIS IS AN OUTRAGEOUSLY GOOD SALARY !!! Why go to college at all? Hee hee. Still, that is a huge amount of money! By the way, What subject do you tutor, Oh Western Breeze? Enquiring minds want to know.

On the subjecthood of E-Bay -- type out ROMAN SILVER DENARII DUTCH SALE in the search function. (I tried posting the URL, but it didn't take.) E-Bay URL is, of course = http://www.ebay.com

THAT is quality silver Roman denarii, Zephyrus. And only $22 each for coins with profiles of the emperors -- I see some Gordian IIIs (grandson of Gordianus Africanus, murdered by Philip the Arab, his Praetorian Prefect, in 244) and what might even be a Commodus (YEAH, that Commodus, Joaquin Phoenix!) down there near the bottom of the photo. Amazing, innit? I haven't got a Commodus yet, but wouldn't it be nice to have a display of COINS OF THE DELICIOUSLY EVIL EMPERORS?

As for dealers' trustworthiness, you just have to sniff out the bad ones. Look at their feedback ratings, the ratio of negative feedback to positive, how good are the photos, things like that. I've been on E-Bay for about 3 years and So far, I've been pretty lucky, I reckon.
[Edited by Pigsnie on 03-22-2001]

Yoda

03-22-01, 10:09 AM

Originally posted by Pigsnie
$25 - $30 AN HOUR!!!! THIS IS AN OUTRAGEOUSLY GOOD SALARY !!! Why go to college at all? Hee hee. Still, that is a huge amount of money!

If you consider $25 an hour an outrageously good salary, you *really* ought to get into web development. :)

Seriously, though, it's a very profitable profession. I could recommend a few tutorials to get you started and such. A certified Java programmer makes $80,000 a year on average these days. :)

Pigsnie

03-22-01, 04:59 PM

$30 an hour is indeed a great salary for a high school student. I've played tutor in my old schooldays, and the most I could get was 6 pounds an hour! And my mum thought I was overcharging!

As for programming, I think I will pass. I have no head for such things. I will write whatever you like: mock verse, magazine articles, little bursts of fiction (and I make a pretty good living at it, I might add) but officially, I am computer illiterati.

Yoda

03-22-01, 05:05 PM

You don't have to be, though. :) Might be fun. You can always turn to the artistic side of web development - design and graphics creation.

ryanpaige

03-23-01, 12:03 AM

I made $3.35 per hour cooking hamburgers at a "gourmet" hamburger restaurant in Amarillo, Texas (called Doodles. If you're in the neighborhood, stop on by. My step-mother's father owned the place at the time, but he's since sold it.) It wasn't a bad job as far as high school jobs go. We closed at 9pm, so I was always home no later than 10pm. And they were closed Sundays, so I always had that day off. We had a pretty regular clientele, so we got to know many people in the community. And they always cut us slack when we screwed up and allowed us to provide better customer service (since we got to know the people, we could use that to make their dining experience better). And because it was "gourmet" hamburgers (sort of like Fudruckers, if you have one of those in your neighborhood), we didn't have to rush as much as someone cooking at a real fast food place would.

It also re-enforced my desire to attend college since I knew I didn't want to be slinging hamburgers all my life.

All in all, I would say it was a good experience, but if I could've made $30 per hour and not smelled like grease all the time, I would've taken it (but one couldn't start a web page creation business back in my day. Not that I would necessarily been interested in that anyway. I didn't even have a computer when I was in high school. I was too into playing guitar and growing my hair long).

Zephyrus

03-24-01, 08:28 AM

At Maccas, I realised that I never want to work at a place where your best qualities are obeying orders given by a superior and repeating the same lines over and over again like a broken gramphone :D!!

So in that regard, $30 an hour for sitting around and teaching maths and chemistry to high school students is pretty good! And other tutors around here charge $40 or $50 an hour, so I'm doing 'em a favor! ;D

As for the Roman Denarii, I can't believe how cheap they are?! It's a pretty good deal...I don't get one thing though, is it $22 for the whole lot, or per coin, or what? I would have thought that it costs something like at least a couple of hundred $$'s!

Pigsnie

03-24-01, 07:17 PM

Oh Western Wind, the denarii deal is a Dutch Auction. If you look at the merchandise description, you will see that the dealer has 778 coins for sale. Unless, bids come in for all 778 coins (which is doubtful), the price will stay at $22 FOR EACH DENARII until every coin has been sold. You can bid for as many coins as you like.

As for the availability of Roman coins, they are not as rare as you think (The most expensive -- because of their popularity with history buffs -- are coins minted by the really famous dudes, Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Nero, Caligula, Mark Antony, etc.) . Hundreds of millions of coins were minted in the course of the Roman empire, and while there are a lot of ugly, worn featureless coins out there (WATCH OUT for the "Uncleaned Roman for $1 each"), there are also a good number of exceptional pieces at reasonable cost. (A lot of these good coins are usually found in large hoards buried by Roman soldiers on their way to war.)

Zephyrus

03-24-01, 09:43 PM

Thanks for the info Pigsnie, I'm a relative newcomer to both numismatism and e-bay! :D Wasn't it Caligula that put a horse for a senator?! Nero and Caligula are definitely my favourite empereors! ;D

Yoda

03-24-01, 09:45 PM

Favorite emperors? That's sad! Almost as sad as the fact that I have a favorite font.

Pigsnie

03-25-01, 02:24 AM

For the full nasty (and sometimes spurious) history of the Scandalous Caesars, from Julius C. to Domitian, read THE TWELVE CAESARS by Suetonius. Best translation is by Robert Graves; he based his books I CLAUDIUS and CLAUDIUS THE GOD on Suety, as my loony Classics Professor liked to call him.

As for Caligula, he threatened to make his horse a Consul, but he never did. He did convert part of his Palace into a high-class brothel however, and was the first Roman emperor not to have received a state funeral.

Hmmm, my favorite emperors. Hmmm, that's a toughie: I suppose I like Caligula & Nero too, because they were the naughtiest. LOL.

Wart

03-26-01, 08:10 PM

Originally posted by TWTCommish
Favorite emperors? That's sad! Almost as sad as the fact that I have a favorite font.

I have a favorite brand of floppy disk. That's even sadder!

Zephyrus

03-26-01, 11:18 PM

Why not have favourite emperors? They were all pretty wierd, and they only got wierder and wierder...

While on that note, there's a theory that the reason why Nero and Caligula behaved like they did possibly had something to do with lead poisoning...i.e. they drank from lead cups, and all the lead dissolved. Could be a valid explanation...!

Pigsnie

03-27-01, 10:25 PM

But why would emperors drink from lead cups? I'm sure all their dishes and cutlery were probably solid gold or silver.
Which begs the question, WHAT DID THE EMPERORS EAT?

Well, one nutter, the Emperor Heliogabalus, once served 600 ostrich heads at a banquet. (Guess he didn't like buffalo wings.) while Cleopatra liked camels' heels and dor-mice sprinkled with honey and poppy seed. (Yeah, MICE, like in vermin with tails.)

merrick

05-05-01, 10:23 PM

My first job was at a pastry shoppe when I was 15. The owners were German, unfortunatly I took Spanish in school. Didn't understand what they were saying to me half the time,but it was a good job and I got paid $6.00 and hour. That was the first time I ever met a mortician too. He came in to order a casket cake, he was a strange little fellow...he went to shake my hand after placing the order, but I just couldn't bring myself to shake his hand back, even after he told me his hands were cleaner than a surgeon's. Atleast he had a good enough sense of humor not to be offended.

Pigsnie, I would have loved to have had your first job though...all the things I could have read and seen.

Kevin B

05-06-01, 12:55 PM

My first job was as being a bus boy in a restaurant. Because this position involved receiving tips, I think I was paid something like $1.35 an hour. :rolleyes

My first job after college was being a manager at a Burger King. Believe it or not, that job paid more money than most of my classmates' entry level position.

Since then, I have worked as (not necessarily in this order): :cool:
1. Financial Advisor (with all the licenses, etc.)
2. Customer Service Call Center Rep, then manager.
3. Drug Abuse Counselor.
4. Executive Assistant (i.e. high-level secretary)
5. Human Resources Specialist
6. Human Resources Generalist
7. Marketing Associate in the International Division of one
of the largest publishers in the world.
9. Bartender :D
10. Waiter
11. Telemarketer
12. Corporate Trainer
13. Pharmacist Assistant
14. Personal Trainer (certified)

Right now, I am still with the publishing company. They hired me because of the diversity of my background ... little do they realize my background is "diverse" because I don't know what I want to do when I grow up. After all, I am only 40 -- what's the rush?

Wart

05-06-01, 04:36 PM

What was your major in college--- you got into every kind of job!!!! Wow!

PigsnieLite

05-07-01, 04:25 PM

Holding the dogs leash while Pigsnie went into a drugstore to buy dirty magazines. He gave me 25 cents because I was only 7. I think he didnt pay me enough and he wouldnt even let me see any pictures.

Zephyrus

05-08-01, 12:55 AM

But why would emperors drink from lead cups? I'm sure all their dishes and cutlery were probably solid gold or silver. Which begs the question, WHAT DID THE EMPERORS EAT?

Even gold and silver would dissolve, especially from all the wine they drank! :) Whatever they ate, it was probably all the best quality food, all taste-tested as well! Wouldn't mind having a go at peeled grapes :D

Mark

06-24-04, 05:22 PM

I'll rekindle this thread:

hand?

or

blow?

whah?

LordSlaytan

02-03-05, 11:54 PM

???

Mark...I didn't know you were capable of being so dirty. :eek:

My worst job was cleaning stalls in a porno shop. *shudder*

Mose

02-04-05, 12:12 AM

The worst job I ever had involved cleaning grease traps on stoves in a restaurant... NASTY! To this day I still can't smell grease without throwing up.

As for my first job, I was a racker in my dad's factor. Basically I stood there all day and picked up mirror mounts (the part of your rearview mirror that mounts on the glass) and placed them on racks to be painted... Was not very stimulating.

r3port3r66

02-04-05, 12:27 AM

This is a great thread, why did it die?

My first job ever was cleaning up behind you folks that thought leaving your empty candy wrappers and popcorn tubs on the floor of the theater was OK. They called me an usher, but I was really a janitor that used a hand-held carpet cleaner to clean the floors of the theater. I LOVED IT! That was about 20 years ago!

hazii82

02-04-05, 02:20 AM

I worked at UPS had to quit because of school. it was a nice job

SamsoniteDelilah

02-28-05, 06:28 PM

My first job where I got a paycheck was at my parents' restaurant. I was a cashier during the slow times (I was 12) and I had to stand on an overturned milk crate to see the cash register keys.

My first non-family job was waitressing at a chicken dinner restaraunt. I grew up in Barberton, Ohio.... (Chicken Dinner Capitol of the World!) and that's what most girls my age did as a first job.

MovieMaker5087

02-28-05, 06:29 PM

Escort service. Made good money until these warts started to appear...

Tacitus

03-03-05, 07:36 AM

My first 'proper' (ie after I'd left school) job was as a care worker for adults with learning difficulties which I did for 18 months.

Great job/crap money - such is life....

Caitlyn

03-03-05, 09:52 AM

casa

03-03-05, 10:13 AM

Seriously, though, it's a very profitable profession. I could recommend a few tutorials to get you started and such. A certified Java programmer makes $80,000 a year on average these days. :)

please do, i need a better proffesion to fund all the expensive hobbies