A Job a Monkey Could Do. Literally.

I don't know how proficient monkeys are with using stickers, but I know that from years of experience with stickers, both academic and personal, that the job I had today was probably the easiest I'll ever have in my life.

My temp job today was placing stickers on these 2 and a half inch, 6 strength magnifying glasses. Whatever strength 6 means. There were 15 cases, filled with ten boxes of twelve magnifying glasses, which, for shits and giggles, I will henceforth refer to as "widgets" cause really, when in the hell have you actually encountered a widget? At least now I can pretend the math from all those standardized tests is being used.

Anyway, I was responsible for putting this companies promotional stickers on these widgets, front and back. For those of you, like me, who sucked at math, I had approximately 1800 widgets to stick stickers on. (Did I just break out my computer's calculator? Yes. And no, I am not ashamed.) I say "approximately" because one box was already open when I got there.

The people were very nice, and the offices were well done, complete with this kind of Boiler Room type of office where all these older guys were sitting at computers watching CNN's stock channel. I have no idea why. I was placed in the kitchen at a descent table, but the chairs, as I would come to learn six hours into my stint of widget stickering, weren't too easygoing on the lower back. At some point I had to sneak into the office and usurp an unused office chair for a moment's reprieve.

By the end of the day I'd completed eight boxes, roughly 960 widgets. My back was hurting, the skin on my hands were ashy, and I had two paper cuts on each thumb but damned if I let the band-aids slow me down. My onsite supervisor was so pleased with my expedient work she had me call my coordinator and used my cell phone to request me for Friday, in order to finish what I started.

While I'm happy to get the full day's work, I'm not really looking forward to stickering widgets again, even if I get to wear jeans to work and listen to my Ipod all day. Even still, I will complete my task, taking down those widgets one sticker at a time.