Are Those Shoes?

I like my baby raisin' job. Is it the best and most meaningful I've ever had? Let's see: drive-through cashier for a multi-national fast food company; pizza dough maker and delivery driver for another multi-national fast food company; overnight security guard in empty office buildings; photocopy machine operator (officially I was a "Systems Coordinator" for a litigation document management company, but really, I made copies); cubicle filler in an overstaffed and underworked office. Yep. Best. Most meaningful.

But it doesn't pay that well, so I'm always keeping an eye out for additional revenue streams. While I was on USAJobs.gov looking for the part-time nights and weekends IRS job that I saw advertised on TV but which only seemed to exist in San Antonio and not Austin, I saw a posting for TSA Security Screener. It also said part-time flexible scheduling, but it didn't have specifics. So I applied.

Saturday, I celebrated my birthday by taking the qualifying exam for the job. Then I continued the celebration by ushering a basketball game, where I got my first "Will you take a picture of us?" moment. It was a wild time; It's good to know that at 36, I haven't forgotten how to party!

Anyway, I'm not supposed to discuss the contents of the exam, and I'm not the kind of guy who wants to screw around with the Federal government. But I will say I have new respect for the people who stare at those x-ray machines and less optimism about the actual effectiveness of that kind of visual screening process. A lot can slip by.

But I passed the test. I almost immediately received an email informing me that I would be "notified in the future regarding the next steps in the evaluation process." I don't know what that means, but if someday I hassle you at the airport, try to remember I'm just doing a job, and all I really want is to finish my shift and go home to my two loves. Come to think of it, if I make you move out of somebody else's seat at a basketball game, try to remember the same thing.