The Job Hunt 2

Thankfully, at the time of this posting I am gainfully employed. I am currently working at a local Circle K gas station earning minimum wage. The biggest problems I have working there are that they do not pay enough for me to be able to live on my own and like most people, I do not want to work at a gas station for the rest of my life. That said, even with its downsides, Circle K is a good steady “in-between” job for me while I search for my next career job. I am an aircraft mechanic by trade, and a web/graphic designer by passion. I can also write, report, film and photograph pretty much anything if given the right tools. I have a lot of skills that could help me land a really good job somewhere. The only problem is finding that job. I recently applied for an aircraft maintenance job on NAS Pensacola, but was turned down for the position. I have also attempted to apply to Coca-Cola as a merchandiser and to yet another aircraft maintenance opening for a different company on the Navy base.

A good while back, one of my regular customers came into the store and told me about an open position for an airframes/hydraulic mechanic for aviation company L3 Vertex. This job would have been a good for me. It pays 25.50/hr, benefits, payed vacations, the whole nine yards. On top of that, I would have been working on the aircraft that Naval Aviators become pilots in, helicopters, and even on Blue Angels. The best part was I would have been working in the Blue Angels hanger doing a job that I truly love to do… work on airplanes.

My interview went pretty well. One of the interviewers was the father to some friends of mine from high school. I had the experience, the skills, and the willingness. What I didn’t have, however, was a collective bargaining agreement. Turns out that the L3 Vertex H-60 helicopter program is scaling back. That means that some of those employees would be moving, or leaving the company. Since there was an availability in the trainers section, my spot went to one of those guys. Bummer. At least I developed a report with the company that I feel left a good impression for latter down the road.

That opportunity closed, I tried to apply to Coca-Cola as a merchandiser. Merchandisers are the workers that come into a grocery store between shipments to restock and arrange product. They also deal with the grocers to order more stock and handle breakage and set up displays. Not a glamorous as working on Blue Angels, but still a step up from where I am now. I am still working on confirming whether or not my application is loaded into their system. Getting a hold of a human resources representative is proving to be rather difficult.

Going back to aircraft, I have also applied for a new posting with L3 Vertex, and hopefully this time they will choose me. Additionally, a new civil service contract for Air Force training aircraft is about to post job openings as well. That too would be on NAS Pensacola, just down the road from the L3 Vertex hangers. I will be applying for that as soon as it becomes available.

If all of the current opportunities turn out to be fruitless, I will once again start applying to print shops, and send out resumes to graphics studios. The truth is that even though that is where my passion is, I don’t have the certification, formal training and experience to be competitive. I have that with aircraft maintenance.

Whatever the case, I plan on continuing to search for my next career job. It is out there, waiting for me, and soon I feel that I will be out on my own once again.

Psst….. Store Inspection Tomorrow

“Psst…. Store inspection tomorrow.” That was a status response from my friend and co-worker Heather on Myspace from last night. I didn’t give it much thought, since I really haven’t had to deal with inspections working in the middle of the night. This time, however, would be a different case.

When I got to work, I was greeted with a sizable stack of boxes, cases and totes left untouched from the morning shipment from our grocery vender. Mind you, I helped receive that shipment some 15 hours earlier. A good deal of the order was taken care of, but there was still a lot left. I guess day shift got busy and couldn’t finish, and I wouldn’t expect swing shift to have time to do anything. Ok, no big deal. I go into the office to clock in, and there is a new note from the boss to 3rd shift.

Our boss, for that matter our store, likes to leave notes to us on a semi-regular basis giving us tasks to do. This note was basically a carbon copy of the checklists we already work by, but it had a few extras as well. Most notably, finishing the grocery order, scrubbing all the cabinetry inside and out, and that our boss’ boss’ boss would be inspecting the store in the morning. It said that if the store wasn’t perfect, then we would receive disciplinary action. Kinda annoying to be honest. I feel like if I just do my job, and do it right, I shouldn’t have anything to worry about. It is rather irritating to have people down your back, worrying about things to the point of making you nervous to. I don’t care about the inspection because I know that if we just work like we should we will be just fine. At any rate, we had what had become a rather long list of tasks to accomplish during the night.

Erick, my partner in crime for the better part of the last three months showed up, and we started to rock and roll. By the time he showed up for his shift, I already had a large chunk of my tasks either done or started. About 1 am, a man showed came into the store and headed toward the bathroom. I said hello and turned my head down. I then realized that it was my boss, in street clothes and he was headed straight for my register. Of course. At the time he choose to count down mine, I hadn’t dropped any money in a while. Opps. I got a write-up for having way too much money in my drawer, mostly due to the 70 bucks in ones I didn’t realize I had.

So we spent the majority of the night working our tails off with the boss there too. Every so often our paths would cross and something would be added to the list of things to do, making for a long night. Our night got even longer when three customers decided that they wanted to smell our selection of fragrances and put a scent cloud in the store. Erick and I both have allergies. The smell burned my eyes a little, but I had taken Clariton before work so I was okay. Erick, other the other hand, was a mess. Blood shot red eyes, trouble breathing, dizziness. He ended up being out of it for about 2 and half hours. That back logged the whole night, and put a rush on us getting our tasks done in time. We pulled it together and by the time I left, I felt like the store was in awesome shape. I think the inspection will go just fine, at least on our end.

Wow, what a night. They aren’t usually that busy. We got a lot done, and did a good job at what we did, distractions and all. I felt good about what we had accomplished. Life is Good.