What is your Job?

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I am confused? Wheeeerrrrrrreeeee...Doooooo....Yooouuuu
woooorrrrrrkkkk? Hmmmmmm?

Just curious,
Ghosthunter

P.S.....Message from the Ships computer......
Update for your Mr.Prometheus role! Please
report to the Starship WrongPlanet when you
can!

You are a busy.....diverse.....well versed......
beaver. I will ask if you can explain what book were
you published in? Can you list the reasons for each
job or co-ownership was left or ejected from your
life. I can only type so much....so I hope this is
not a confusing message?

You guys listed here....Please don't think I am ignoring
you.....I can only type so much! Sorry for not asking
questions!

Ghosthunter

Yes, through a temp agency. I am able to do the work as well, and yeah, I agree that it can provide some stimulus, however at the same time the pay isn't that great. --most of the slave labor places that I've worked for pay barely above minimum wages, if they pay that at all. Then they can have a habit of Deducting more cash from you for hardhat rental, transport, and essentially anything they feel like charging you for.
I've actually done some studying of the buisness, and every time that you are sent out, the contractor that requests you is actually paying the temp service double what you are making.

At the same time, If you take the time to read the fine print on all of the forms that you have to sign before you go out to your first jobsite, you realise that you are essentially signing you rights away for comensation if you get injured on the job, which does happen.

Most of the contractors that hire you will treat you decently enough, but there are quite a few that will have you doing stuff that's too nasty or repetetive, or too dangerous for any of their permanent employees to do.

Also, many of the other temp workers have active drug/alcohol abuse issues, which can make a potentially dangerous situation moreso.

Still it's something to do, if you have no cash and you're in between "real employment' .

I was not published in any books, I wrote really short music reviews in a now long dead Alternative Monthly back in '88. --Hey it kept me supplied with promo copies of 5-10 record Albums ( Remember those??) a month for a short while.
I also had a local punk scene report from Maine in one of the larger Punkzines at the time. -Maximum Rocknroll,(MRR) to be exact. The scene report came out in either the December 1988 or January 1989 issue. I forget which one right off, as I actually saw it in print, though the cheapskates never actually bothered to send me a copy MRR is still published (Berkely CA) but is a very pale shodow of what it used to be. Borders is as good a place as any to get Current issues. I don't know if they still have steady international distribution, but they did atthe time that I submitted to them. I was also published in a local Maine Gay Monthly ( that is now defunct as well) whene I more or less stated in what I term brutally honest terms my frustration with the lack of any really cool 'gay' things. The next issue I was promptly smacked down by other people who were really offended by my attitude. --It really hurt at the time, and I spent the next year and a half obsessing about that as well as all of the other stuff that I was going though at the time. I also had a letter published in the one of the first Queer Punkzines, a mag called Homocore, which was put out by a San Francisco local named Tom Jennings. Last I knew, there was GIF scans of all of the issues on the internet. with my letter appearing in either issue #3 or #4. All of the published stuff was written under the assumed name of Shawn Noxious.

Sure thing, The Last line cook job I quit because the place was a hole that was owned by a very controversial man who lost a bunch of buisness here in SC because he offered a bunch of literature that said black people were better off as slaves. His name is Maurice Bessinger.... google him

I quit working at the Tysons (Jordan's Meats) plant in Maine in july of last year, because everybody said that it was going to close. Property Taxes and wages aside, as well as skyrocketing real estate values dur to gentrification indicated that the plant was going to close sometime soon, and I would probably wind up on the streets. I left fotr South Carolina and cheaper rents. Sure enough, I was reading the online version of the Portland paper back in Dec, and noticed that everybody got their 90 day notice, Tyson was pulling out.

The Convenience store job was a holdover until I got a Hernia operation. I invariably got stuck on third shift, (Yet again, it seems in this industry) possibly because I have the strange ability to smile and be polite to drunks and simultaneously convey the message of "buy your s--t and get the f(*% out of my face, you annoy me.

The Concrete countertop buisness lasted for about a year... I was was they guy that did most of the Polishing (Like stone countertop polishing) Doing that was OK, but I had had major issues with the control freak brother of the owner.--He just wouldn't get out of my face. I tended to shut down a lot, and go almost catatonic due to him. Oh yeah.... for what it's worth, he also gave me the nickname of Rainman. He said that he was my 'freind' but most of what I got out of it was the feeling that I was a completely inept a**hole, and that he was better than I because he was my 'freind'. The final straw came with him going off on me one morning and me heaving the 20 cup of coffee against the window. The fact that I was now out of a job, and the apartment above me was creating a lake of toilet water in the middle of my living room gave me the impetus of getting out of Raleigh, NC. You interested in the URL of the Company? PM me.

I got the above job by being noticed by these guys whilst being a Tempslave in Charlotte.

Oh yeah the PA rental company went down the tubes while I was unemployed, and using my business partners' computer. I went browsing for a file on it, and stumbled across his collection of Kiddie Porn. He could have my Mixing Console, I was taking all of the Microphones. He got the better end of the deal as I hauled ass out of that one as quick as I could.

I got fired from working at the last C-Store due to the fact that I knew that I might get promoted to management sometime after hell froze over. Sure, I was focused, dedicated, and loyal, but the new manager didn't like me at all, as I was I had transferred to this company right after my manager quit working at my previous place of employment. Besides, after you have guns pulled on you, sixpacks of beer (bottles at that) broken over your head you really tend to get jaded.

I quit the other line cooks job because I was burnt out working two fulltime jobs for 9 months. Also I found out that a newer linecook had recently been hired, and he let it slip outthat he was making a $1.50 more than I was. I decided to voice my protest by not showing up on XMass eve (which is one of the busiest night of the year in the restaurant industry) and let him really earn that extr $1.50

Before that, I worked for a guy making quilting machinery not once but twice. The first time I quit was due to the fact that the welder that worked with me was a genuine bona fide sociopath. I was not impressed with the fact that his brother had a pair of stolen Uzi's for sale, nor the fact that he had narrowly escaped arrest in NYC while ginding up an ounce of coke in the back seat of a car, whilst there from North Carolina for some Court case that was pending against him.
The second time I was there, was after the psycho welder was canned for threatening to beat up another employee. Unfortunately there was a real shortage of Orders coming in, so I was rather reluctantly shown to the door. Also a change in the design of the machinery made from a frame of welded Tubular steel to bolted Anodised Aluminum extrusion didn't seem to help matters much either.

Between the two times I worked here, I worked did janitorial work in a large Charlotte Skyscraper, Then moved to Columbia SC, where I worked as a tempslave for a Tree Trimming Company. Working with the Chainsaws and the the hydraulic equipment was a lot of fun, but I was only being paid $4.50 an hour to do it. ( summer/ fall of 94) after that I was doing hotel renovation work, which lasted for about 2 months. The owner of the crew stiffed me to the tune of about $1500. I moved back to Charlotte and went back to the Textile machinery company. --I think it still exists, and there may be an URL for it as well.

Before the first time I worked at the tree trimming service, I worked as a security guard at a cookie factory in the middle of one of Charlotte's roughest ghetto. --Somebody has to keep th crackhead from stealing the cookie's out of the Semi Trailers. I was let go due to a slight error in communication. In order to work for this company I had to provide background Information dating back five years. Charlotte was no problem, South Carolina was no problem either. Maine on th other hand was a problem, because I was under the impression that they would take care of the Maine check. I was called into the office one day and told that I would be terminated in a week if they didn't have the info from Maine, so I called the Local Sheriff's Dept in Maine telling them who I was and what I needed. I also fedexed them a fedex pack to send the info to the sucurity company ASAP.
The Cumberland County Sheriff's Dept did exactly the opposite, and the day I was turning in my uniform, (A day after I was let go) was they day they got the background check . --there goes that one.

I inherited the Sound engineer job at Maine's premier Punk Rock dive bar from pot dealing scam artist. I liked this job a lot, I had the uncanny ability to follow the music many bands were playing and add the appropriate effects when necessary. I ran sound for a lot of bands, some of them famous or going to be famous, (well in the underground sense at any rate) and many of them not. Sure the PA gear was lousy, but I was really obsessive in maintaining it. --Nobody had actually done that for many years at this venue. I left Maine due to the fact that I was making an average of $60 a week , which was not conducive to eating and paying rent. Besides, I was surrounded by far too many really sleazy people. --I had after all more or less burned my bridges at many of the local restaurants. I left for Charlotte, NC.

During the first month that I was working as the sound technician, I also had a line cook job at what was formerly a jewish deli ( the original owner of the deli pulled out that his new investment partner was a mafia shill) that got horrifically sleazy, and then became a really sad place. Employee turnover was a horrible problem, due to the fact that the new owner was buying foodstamps from senior citizens, his son was running a prostitution ring, and they were all laundering money for some New Jersey based Triad (asian Mafia) I got canned when I found out, and stiffed two weeks pay (around $400) The original owner was nice enough to give me $100 out of his pocket, but that was about it.--needless to say, many of the former employees of this place banded togeather and filed complaints with the Dept. of Labor. I think the State Police, the FBI ,or both wound up shutting the place down.

I was canned from the prepcook/dishwashing job at Horsefeathers a week before desert storm because I was just too strange and combative. They considered me crazy. I worked both here and at Dock Fore for about a month before I quit "--".

I worked at "--" for about six months as a line cook until I walked in one morning and found myself standing in an inch of water, in a burned out kitchen. There goes that job. --After the place was repaired, I went back for about a month. I left when the owner "showed" me how to make a 2 1/2 gallon bucket of Pizza sauce with a cup of black pepper.I was supposed to make it this way from now on. --I did some research and found out why the place burned down. The owner needed the insurance money to pay off his high stakes gambling debts.

Before that, I worked as a prep cook in another restaurant owned by a very starnge person who was a multimillionare slumlord. The entire kitchen crew got canned when the owner dictated that the kitchen staff had to pay for their meals (which is a very punitive and sarcastic thing to inflict upon kitchen staff) So one day as the lunch rush came into the place, the entire kitchen crew puched out and took a good hours' break eating lunch at the Pizza place up the street. We lasted a week later, till we were fired en masse. Oddly enough, I really alieneted nearly all the people here, except for the line cook who dropped out of college six months shy of getting his MA in psych. He was a really cool person.

Before that, I worked at another place as a diswasher/prep cook at pricey Northern Italian place. This was another job that I held on two separate occaisons. The second time I was let go was due to the fact that I was beginning to come apart. About the only way that I could deal with my sexual orientation was by drinking myself comatose, and being really rude to people that apparently were trying to help. This only fed my issues more, and I got further out of control. I had some really intense personality clashes with the sous chef (Second in command of a kitchen) and was let go. At this time, I also had this really nasty infected Eczema that eventually wound up covering a fair percentage of my extremities. He was nice enough to call it a 'Health related issue".

Before the second time I worked at the Northern Italian restaurant I made a brief move to Burlington Vt. The head chef atthe Northern Italian restaurant had a former associate who was the head chef at a rather large hotel there. I was told that there was a prep cook's job available there. I got there, and found that the "prep cook" job was in fact an 11PM-7AM job cleaning out a gymnasiun sized kitchen. I lasted two days at the job, and two weeks in Burlington before I moved back to Maine.

I initally started at the Northern Italian restaurant in 1987 as a dishwasher, and then started learning prep work. Here I observed that the fancier the restauant, the stranger the employees were. The head chef, and the Sous Chef ( who became the head Chef the second time that I was there) had massive record collections, (between 1000-2000 items) and they really knew their obscure music. They helped me broaden my musical horizons beyond the really obscure Punk rock that I was listening to at the time. I also began to observe how completely intense and high strung I was compared to most of the other people here. I think it really rubbed people the wrong way. As a matter of fact, it really alienated a lot of people. I also turned 21 while I was here, and started to drink. It was at this time that I also started to confront issues dealing with my sexual orientation, and I had really wierd issues dealing with both at the same time. The alcohol use soon became alcohol abuse, and It contributed greatly to making a bad situation worse. A (semi) famous writer wrote a book about a malfunctioning computer entitled "I have No Mouth and I must Scream". The title of that book is more or less an allusion to theway I felt at that time. So much information that needed to come out, and be dealt with, everythingallatthesametime. And no way to really get it all out. My moods would swing from defensive to morose to intense anger and frustration, and then fear, loathing and helplessness. Drinking only compounded it and made it worse. I needed to get out, for a while, and decided to move to Vt.

Before I worked at the Northern Italian Restaurant, I had my first job working as a dishwasher at an old school "Fancy" restaurant called the Art Gallery. The cuisine was somewhat eclectic, but mostly derived from classical French styles of cooking. I was here for almost a year before the owner decided to close it down. It was losing money, due to the fact that people's tastes in dining had progressed since the late sixties, when it opened. Most of the poeple here were pretty cool, though I had some issues with a couple of the line cooks. At least the Severance pay was pretty good, for what I was making at the time.

GH, I did a couple "construction slave labor" jobs at a local temp agency before starting work at my present location. Thats all I meant, sorry to confuse you.

That is a temp' agency for you! Yep!
But it is at least work. It is a idea
I am planning in my relocation plans
as well. It will start the job ethic
in the area I planning(or in this
finding) to go to school for.



This is true. $8 per hour to you is $16
to them. I worked for "manpower"
and another temp' agency for wharehouse
and stocking, inventory work before and
this was the going wage. Above minium
and below a union!



This is true, but "Manpower" did(pasttense?)
offer minimal benefits if you worked 40
hours a week, in 2 week periods. I think
it all depends on how big they were.



"Manpower" did provide some safety stuff
since they were bigger!



Theoretically you find long term to permeant
work this way though. It never happened to
me, but that is the theory!

Sincerely,
Ghosthunter

No appology neccessary! and you have been
rescued as well as penguin lust been revealed!
The villian has been found! I am now in
a cleaning up phase the Big Foot adventure!

Sincerely,
Ghosthunter

P.S.....Give "The Big Foot Adventure"
a look and you have some things to
get involved with soon. I hope you
liked your introduction! And welcome
aboard!

Mr.Ghosthunter

Hi GH, how ya doing?

Don't know how things work over there but this is a fairly common set-up over here, I'm sure you must have similar things. We do some outreach but mostly we have residential services and what is called 'supported living' in that people are supposed to be as independent as possible, ie living in flats (apartments to you) and just getting basic kind of help with stuff like cooking and shopping etc. But most people we work with need a lot more support than that.

As it happens I did start out as a volunteer many years ago due to an interest in mental diversity.

My job title is Service user involvement co-ordinator so yes, you're right. I'm not management but also not 'frontline' staff anymore, although that's where I started out.

We just did a second performance of the play, at our annual conference and it went really well, hopefully we can get more money to keep the project going.

If you're interested you can see our website - turning-point.co.uk should get you there.

Apparently the U.K is more considerate than
than the USA. We let people fend for themselves
here more often, and most outreach programs
have to beg!, you heard it right, Beg! for tax
deductible programs.

The goverment mostly covers druggies,
psycho's, alcoholics. If you are semi-normal
and underemployed your f****d!



The seniors get programs like that here, most
of the time!



Hmmmmm? Can you describe in your own
words the differences in the autism spectrum
since you have encountered or worked with them?

I am referring to HFA, AS, PDD-NOS!



Sounds like a normal progression!



What was the first play on? Who was the author?

Sincerely,
Ghosthunter

If you're interested you can see our website - turning-point.co.uk should get you there.

this is our client group



unfortunately not. I haven't worked with autistics as far as I know



the play was devised by the service users to portray aspects of their lives, it wasn't a play that was learned, it was put together from improvisations and workshop exercises

What was the plays name?

How many players?

What were there disorders? If any?

Ghosthunter

The play was called 'Inside Out' and had six service users in it plus myself and 3 or 4 members of the theatre company we were working with. Of the six, three had substance misuse issues, two had mental health issues and one had a learning disability.

What was the learning disability?
I personally had loss of hearing due to a
car accidents(age 2) and speech therapy,
thus stuttering at a young age, and communication
issues that would follow me!

What mental disabilities?

Hmmmmm?

How long was the play?

Sincerely,
Ghosthunter

Data Entry Clerk, Tier Technologies, Inc., Colonie NY USA

If you don't mind me asking, how did you get on ssdi? I would think it would be a hard process.