Most Embarrassing Job Interview

I'm having a shitty day. Last night with 2 laps to go our driver went and flipped. Oh, and I didn't mention that he was LEADING the race when he flipped? Said he caught a rut.  Oh and you didn't see that fucking rut the past 28 laps you drove by it? It took you by surprise? He flipped... with less than 30 seconds to go. And this morning was such fun fixing it up.

Ah fuck.

So to celebrate this and the fact that I wrote "you should pick me" in a job application letter I will tell you the story about when I really fucked up big time in a job interview. Hold on to your horses, this is a good one!

I was invited to audition to be a radio show host. (Would that be hostess since I'm of the 'ess type???)  I was thrilled. This was a big deal for me. Hosting a radio show! Part music, part talk show, part news and events for teens in Alberta, part ooh la la and all wow! For me at least! It was a major wowzers.

Picture me sitting in a radio booth. Talking to a mic, headsets on (huge headsets, on my tiny pinhead I actually struggled like if a street cone was balanced on top of my head), the chair is an office type chair with casters, and it swings around. I was still quite young, pretty much right out of college (in Canada a college is a college, and a university is a, you know, university, so I was pretty young, I'd say 20. Ooh, 20. Such a fun age!)

The entire interview was done like if it were an actual radio show. And I could hear my voice in the headsets. Have you ever heard your voice? Not the voice you hear inside your own head, but once filtered through all that radio technology filtering gizmo stuff? It's friggin awesome! Every time I'd talk, I wanted to stop and say "Is that really MY voice? Is that how I sound? Man, it's sweet..." But, I didn't want to appear all youngy, and inexperienced-y, and you know - hick. So I kept it cool. And just left the sound of my voice feed my self-confidence.

I was doing great! I mean it was smooth like peanut butter. The show's producer was running the deal, and I was ad-libbing, make cute remarks to his questions, a few times he even cracked up and I'd tease him about it. A good verbal tennis volley if that's even possible.

THEN! All shit hit the fan. The producer tells me how technical glitches will occur during shows. And how most times the only thing that works is the mic and the host's voice. So he tells me to improvise and talk for 5-10 minutes. You know, tell a story. Easy enough. Suuuuurrrrreeeee.

I had just finished spending my summer working at a summer camp. The sleep-away type. Not the have your mom drop you off in the morning type. So I figure I'd talk about my past couple of months with the kids and the zany stories. Zany. Yeah.

Little did I know, I ended up sitting there telling them about how one day this kid thought it'd be really funny to take all the younger campers' teddy bears and drop them in the outhouses. Really funny indeed. And, I kept on sharing this wonderful story about how us camp counselors had to take our turns trying to salvage these teddy bears from the piles of poop beneath the seats. And how once we'd saved the loved teddy bears from said piles of poop we had to take our turns in squeezing and oozing the poop out of these beloved teddy bears. And I kept telling the story of the trip to the laundromat, and the need to re-wash 5 times to get the odor out of the fucking teddy bears... The whole time I'm screaming inside my head to just shut the fuck up! And inside my head is answering but what do I do? I can't just stop and change the subject! And the screaming voice is yelling that YES I CAN JUST CHANGE THE SUBJECT! MOVE ON!

To this day I will never forget the look of terror on the producer's face. I'm sure this is what went with that look: "Ohmygash this stupid bitch will be talking about poop? Live? On MY show?"  Oh, did I mention this audition was for a national radio corporation called CBC? Kinda like PBR... Yeah. Not poop territory.

I SO did not get THAT job! Nor did they ever invite me again to audition... Now, do you all feel better about yourselves because you've never done such a stupid thing? See. That's why I was sent here to you. To help you feel good. Ah such nice warm and fuzzy stuff today!