I went on three interviews last week, and another on Monday. The first interview was at Roman’s Café on Ventura Blvd. The job didn’t pan out, but I had my first celebrity sighting while I was there. I saw Harland Williams (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0005558/) eating lunch and reading the paper. He seemed very disappointed after awhile that nobody made a big deal or recognized him. I personally can’t stand his stand-up routine, and his movies are even worse.

On Thursday I went to Las Vegas with Amy. We spent a few days there. I only ended up going to the Venetian though because it was raining. Overall I wasn’t really impressed. Television makes Vegas look like a giant wonderland…but it is really just one street, and then housing for the surrounding miles, and as soon as you get over the hill outside of town, you get nothing but desert for hundreds of miles (not counting the “town” of Jean, Baker, Barstow, etc.). The place might be nice to go to and spend a bunch of money and live like royalty, but I wouldn’t want to live there. I found out gambling isn’t really that fun either. The hotel gave us $20 free to gamble with…we both agreed that the slots were boring.

On Monday I interviewed with Ethos Design in Glendale. After waiting two hours (yes you heard right ladies and gentlemen), I finally got interviewed by the owner (?) of the company. He seemed very angry for some reason and kept asking me pointless questions that I couldn’t answer like “tell me what you could do for us” (before anybody explained to me what the company does) and “what production assistant skills do you have” (that term varies in meaning from company to company). The “interview” lasted about two minutes. After giving (and getting) the worst interview of my life, the man said “ok, well, how about we start you off at 20 hours a week and go from there. Come in Wednesday at 10.” So, I had a job. So, I bought professional clothes. So, I get a voicemail from Aaron around 8pm saying that the secretary at Ethos called and said they decided to go with someone else for the position. Very Very unethical. Before buying the clothing I went and got a smog check. “Thng” checked my car and said I passed everything but the computer link up. He said he would make a deal and only charge me $20 to have it tested again after I got my car fixed. I had another idea.. After getting back to Amy’s house (I was visiting with her that day) I looked up some information on the internet. It turns out that all new Mazda’s (and many other makes and models) are not supposed to connect to the “OBDII” computer system and can bypass the test. I got that information from the official DMV website. The site also said that all smog check technicians were responsible for knowing that information. So, I had caught “Thng” red handed.

The next day I went back to the smog check place with Amy (it was by her house) and demanded that he give me my smog certification and not charge me twice. He agreed. While he was doing the computer work-around, I received a call from a company I interviewed with on Wednesday last week. They offered me a job. I took it. I then had to go out and buy even more clothing because this job requires a button down shirt/ tie/ dress shoes. All in all, I ended up spending $250 on clothes in two days.

I started work today and worked for 9 hours. My morning commute was about 40 minutes, and my evening 30. I think I can reduce both of them by changing my hours. The company is a little flexible about when I come in as long as I get in 8 hours a day. My supervisor seems nice; in fact everybody there seems nice. I’m getting paid more than at my previous job, and once I’m off new-hire probation I’ll be eligible for some benefits. The job is on Wilshire Blvd, the heart of downtown Los Angeles…well…more like across the street from downtown. Oh…and the company serves free breakfast every day.

As Elvis Costello says: “Welcome to the workin’ week”