Oh, So That’s Why I’ve Never Temped Before

Under the heading ‘Be careful what you wish for…’

I went in for my temp agency tests this morning, and blew the doors off: 90 wpm on the typing test (gross; 80 wpm net), and 95% on their MS Word skills test. Yippee. The folks at the agency could scarcely conceal their glee at getting someone in who actually knew what he was doing, so they set me up with a three-day job immediately. Even from its description, this gig sounded far from ideal: way out in Fairfax, doing brainless data entry for $12 an hour. But it was my first offer through this agency, and it was a new client for them, whom they wanted to impress, and who was in an emergency situation, so I could hardly refuse.

The job was this very afternoon, but I had to go home first to put on a tie and walk Buddy. And as soon as I got home from the temp agency, I wished I had turned the job down. I had a message on my voice mail (I’d forgotten to take along my wireless phone. D’oh!) from Old Homes Restored, offering me a one-day field producing gig, which unfortunately conflicted with the data entry job I’d already taken. I agonized over the phone with Beauyn and Henry for 45 minutes, because I’d make much, much more money on the one-day OHR job than in all three days of the data-entry job. But in the end, I decided I had to do the honorable thing and turn down Old Homes Restored, in view of the fact that, if I flaked on the temp agency, they’d probably never call me again. It seemed unwise to burn a bridge while I was still on it.

So then I went out to Fairfax for the job, and really began to regret my choice. It’s about the dreariest thing I’ve ever done, typing numbers and codes from thousands of invoices into a giant Excel spreadsheet. Absolutely mind-numbing. And I’ve got two more days of this, for virtually no money, when I could be directing an interesting television shoot for five times as much. Argh!