Tribute to WW

November 20th was my last day working at probably the most miserable place I will ever be employed! I may not have ever had to work fast food, but I've spent 18 months of my life doing phone surveys. Since I haven't worked fast food I can't truly compare them, but I can't imagine ever wanting to do either for very long.

I first worked there during the fall semester of 2008. I loathed it. Yet somehow I was enticed there again. There is something to be said for weekly paychecks and flexible hours; 4 hour shifts and a minimum of only 12 hours a week; knowing that you can request as many days off as you want, as long as you request it the week before; showing up to work in your pajamas (for the record, I never did that, but I could have); and working on homework between calls. Sounds pretty decent, huh?

It might sound good, but that's before you think about the constant rejection; supervisors who often seem to forget that you cannot possibly control how many people answer the phone, how many people who answer the phone will qualify for your survey, or how many of them are willing to complete your ridiculously long survey if they do answer and qualify; trying to do homework...you just barely find your spot to start reading again before somebody else answers the phone; and political surveys. Who likes to do political surveys? I wouldn't like to answer the questions those people tried asking me. Quite frankly, it's nobody's business. But I got paid to do them, so I asked the questions.

Anyway, I desperately needed a job in the fall of 2009 so I gave WW a call. I remembered what to do so all I had to do was show up for work the first week of the semester! It really was a lucky thing for us. Joshua started working there as well. I didn't loathe it entirely like I had before, but let's just say it was never going to be my favorite place to work. It might be safe to say Joshua despised it. For me, it was the thought of going to work and actually getting there that was terrible. Once I got there it wasn't so bad. Plus, I got to sit by Joshua while we worked on Saturdays!! (That was the only day we worked the same shift because of our class schedules.)

Joshua quit during the winter semester of 2010, and I continued to brave WW alone. They did move to a new location. That made it considerably more pleasant. The got some new computers, chairs, headsets, and there were more than two bathrooms! In the old building I must have always had to go to the bathroom at the same time as everybody else. The line seemed to fill the whole little break room. Now there are 4 bathrooms! There are still long lines sometimes, but they don't even compare to what they were like before.

I'm a miserable dialer. I rarely got pr (the number of surveys we were supposed to get per hour). It didn't even matter what survey I was on. However, my quality was awesome so I normally dialed on the best surveys anyway. I always tried to get pr. I'd even put away my homework and word searches sometimes in hopes of being more focused and getting more surveys. That never seemed to help anything. I'd just get bored, so I'd pull them out again before too long.

Basically I was never good at the job. They paid me better than most jobs I could get in Rexburg (which still isn't saying much), so I kept going to work. There's one thing I'm proud of about my time at WW - I had time to finish a word search book I'd had at least since I was 8! (I know I'd had it that long because there was one word search completed in crayon with Kelli's name and a date by it.) Yeah, I'm a pack rat. But I was able to throw it away after coming home and showing it to Joshua. I also finished a couple of word fill-in books. Time well spent.

I was a little bit sad as I turned in my 2-week notice. I'm not sure why. I'm very happy to be moving on to better things, and a better paying job. Somehow I grew to be a little attached to the place though. The supervisors were cool people and I enjoyed chatting with them. There was some camaraderie in knowing that our lives all sucked a little as we worked at good ole WW.