I hate hate hate job interviews. One in particular will always stick out to me. I answered an online ad for a web designer and ended up in a half set-up office complex complete with the blonde receptionist doing her nails and a slightly overweight middle-aged yuppie in the office beyond. I never found out what his business was, but everything about the interview creeped me out, like I was being offered a job designing websites for the Mob like in The Firm. I was promised one of the larger (and currently unfurnished) offices, state-of-the-art computers, and a killer salary. He was high energy and spoke fast. He’d take phone calls as they came no matter which of us were talking. Though I was pretty sure all this was fly-by-night, flash-in-the-pan bull crap what made me absolutely sure I didn’t want to work for the guy was the way he treated his laptop.

This was probably 2000 or 2001 and though laptops existed nobody really had them, not like now. They were huge, heavy, ran hot and were very, very expensive. So this guy has his laptop open on a side desk. Windows was drawing colored pipes as we talked and the whole time he pushed his finger into the screen absentmindedly watching the colors swirl around his finger. To me this was the same as watching some jerk light a cigar with a hundred dollar bill. I had never owned or even used a laptop, but I knew you weren’t supposed to jack with the screen like that. I figured if he had no respect for the screen then he’d have no respect for me.

A bit later on my way out I got a wild hair and asked the lady doing her nails a question. “Does he yell?” I asked. “What?” she said though she heard me just fine. “Yes,” she said after a moment. “Yes, he does.” I thanked her and walked away from that whole mess.

Within a month I had been asked to join the staff at a huge church in Kansas City as Assistant Youth Pastor. It’s a lot cooler when they call you.