As you may have gathered from previous entries, I got a job. I got here on a Saturday, interviewed by phone on Monday, interviewed in person on Tuesday and Wednesday, and was offered the position by Friday.

Which was great. The position didn’t seem super competitive, but it paid well and that’s why I accepted.

Because it’s related to education, I had to wait on the results of a background check, which wasn’t difficult. I’ve never been charged with or convicted of any crimes, haven’t declared bankruptcy, and if necessary, can pass a drug test (urine and/or follicle) without any concerns. So basically, I had an extra week off while they processed what I knew would be a pass, and I didn’t have to start working until the middle of this past week.

And the job is…okay. It doesn’t seem too challenging and most of the people seem cool, but I’m not entirely sure that it’s the place for me. To begin with, several people commented on my second day (and a few on my third) that I came back, as if they were surprised. I’m not sure if they were being funny or what, but it gives me a worrisome feeling down in my guthole if you know what I mean, like maybe there have been many more of me that haven’t come back, or maybe that the job secretly sucks and they’re surprised that I didn’t figure it out sooner. Also, I was told in the beginning that while the job was somewhat sales-oriented, only directly interested people were the focus of any contact efforts, and that absolutely no cold calling was involved. While this is partly true if you shut one eye, blur the other, and get drunk enough to stop caring about things like your own personal ethical compass, there does seem to be a not-entirely-negligible amount of phone harassment going on, and the people making the calls (which includes me) are supposed to ask for cold referrals not only of the callers, but also make these referrals during their (ahem, my) own personal time amongst family, friends, and just random people on the street.

While that may not be cold calling in the strictest sense of the word and it’s not like anyone is making commission, I am not a born salesperson and it’s enough to constitute a loss of privacy as far as I’m concerned. I don’t want to ask people for their friends’ contact information, nor would I ever harangue my friends into doing something that they haven’t explicitly pursued on their own. It just seems wrong to me, and I don’t think I’d be comfortable doing it.

Also it takes me like an hour to get home every night, which might be okay for some people who live way out in East Bumfuck because it’s a mini vacation away from their houseful of screaming kids, but I am just not having it.

For these and a pinchful of other reasons, I’m not going to stop searching just yet. I even have an interview at a company I was really excited about before, but who I initially declined because this other place extended an offer right away. The pay wouldn’t be as high as it is at my current position and I know it seems like lunacy to turn away from that, but I’ve realized that I’m a little too old and a little too headstrong to go along with policies that I firmly hate, and that make me feel like less of a person for following.