I Suck At Scheduling A Census Employment Test

a few days ago, my friend (hot amy) first notified me about a possible part-time gig for the upcoming 2010 census. basically, the gig is a census taker. according to the job description, the community serving census taker visits residences with a small hand held computing device to verify address lists. the job sounds easy, right?

now, i was not looking for a part-time job or anything. hot amy seemed to be promoting the opportunity and naturally i humored her by agreeing to partake in the census fun. plus, i figured the census would be something similar to the time hot amy and i trekked all over boston taking pictures of cows during the cow parade for my friend (andrea)... because at the time, hot amy and i both worked in town.

needless to say, the cow parade excursion was fun. hot amy and i did not kill each other after the excursion, so i would say it was a success. incidentally, the cow parade was the first time i really got to know hot amy. before then, i simply knew her as karen's "fringe oddball friend" who i would occasionally see and who would not say much to me at all. i think her boyfriend at the time said more to me than she did. interestingly enough, i believe she had the "hot" moniker back then because i think my friend (garv) had already met her by then.

for anyone curious, the cow parade is an event whereby local artists create cow statues and randomly scatter them throughout boston. afterwards, the cows are auctioned off for charity. andrea simply wanted pictures of all the cows.

regardless, i figured this census gig would be like the cow parade... except this time we'd get paid for keeping each other company and hanging out. the first step, however, in the application process was to schedule a census employment test.

now, i suck at scheduling a census employment test. apparently, the test is supposed to make sure you have the mad skills to be a census taker. (i am already sensing another possible wagered competition on who gets the better score on the test.) as hot amy and i wanted to take the test at the same time, i contacted the census to set it up so that we could take the employment test together.

the exam scheduler (lydell) at the census office in new bedford must have thought i was crazy because i kept having to call him back to tell him if a particular date for the exam he suggested worked for both hot amy and i. lydell even gave me some ribbing about how many women's phone numbers i have in my cell phone because i took quite a while to scroll through my cell phone's address book to get hot amy's phone number. (i needed to provide lydell with her phone number for scheduling purposes.) for anyone curious, hot amy is under "h" in my cell phone... which i had forgotten when i was scrolling down the list.

when all was said and done, lydell was kind enough to schedule the exam for both hot amy and i in quincy... at the thomas crane public library. so finally... 2010 census... here we come!