Five Non-Existent Jobs I'm Uniquely Qualified To Do
What's on your list?
We all have those obscure skills that nobody wants to hire us for, but that we’re excessively proud of. Anytime I get to deploy one of my uniquely particular special skills, I always say, “Why can’t this be my job? I should have a business where I just go around doing this for people in the neighborhood.”
I’m very interested to hear if you have weirdly specific, unappreciated skills that people should absolutely hire you to do, but never will. Please tell me about it in the comments, and I’ll choose one at random to illustrate, and I’ll mail the winner the illustration.
OK, here are mine:
Bug relocator. Is there a bug in your house? How exciting! I am not only interested in what kind of bug it is, and how it got inside, and what it might be planning now that it’s had a look around at your place and the various bug-friendly amenities you offer…but I’m also happy to calmly and safely escort the bug (or spider! Especially spiders!) back outside. Just give me a call and I’ll show up with my jar, my sheet of stiff paper, and a stepladder. Oh, and in the case of bees, I’ll bring a flower, because I am also uniquely good at convincing bees to involve themselves with a flower long enough for me to (safely! kindly) enclose them in a jar and return them to the great outdoors.
I would love this job. I only want to do it in my neighborhood, within walking distance, so I could meet my neighbors. I would expect them to befriend me and offer me some sort of post-bug aperitif as part of my compensation package.
Parallel parker. Scoot over and let me do this. No, I do not need to look at your stupid rear-facing camera. I am a parallel parker of the grand old twentieth century, when we knew how to line up our tires, whip the steering wheel around, look backwards, and snap that vehicle into place. Few tasks are more satisfying than a solid parallel park, done right the first time. I would parallel park people’s cars for free.
Ant detective. Related to, but different than, bug relocation, I have infinite patience for sitting on the floor near your windowsill and watching the epic journey those tiny black ants are taking from a pinhole-sized gap around your window, across the wall, around the doorway, and into your kitchen. I will hang out for as long as it takes, observe the ants, and then seal up the hole with my handy tube of silicone sealant. Some ant lives will be lost in this process, because we don’t want any survivors left behind to chart a new path out of your house and tell the others. So we’ll have to Windex those away, and I’m sorry about that, because ants are fascinating and well-behaved by ant standards, but they don’t belong in your kitchen.
Clock re-setter. This job will, I fear, be rendered obscure by fancy wireless clocks that re-set themselves. But I have always been the person who can figure out the weird combination of buttons you have to press on your car radio to get the clock to re-set. I’m very good with stoves and microwaves, too. Anything in your house that displays the time and has not entered the smart home interconnected era, I can re-set twice a year and whenever your power goes out. I do realize, of course, that I’ll be faced with the Santa Claus problem here—gotta do the whole world (or the whole neighborhood) in one night—but I’m up for the challenge. Maybe I’ll have some elves to help me out.
Crepe flipper. Several years ago, I decided I was going to figure out crepes once and for all, because they make a very satisfying low-effort dinner if you can just get the details dialed in. Well, I have indeed dialed them in, and I can get your crepe out of the pan, flipped over, and ready for its cheese and leeks and mushrooms and what have you. This service will include an assessment of the batter and adjustments if necessary, evaluation of the hotness/greasiness of the pan, and, of course, the flip itself, timed using my own proprietary method, for which I will bring the correct turning implement. (No, I will not be tossing it. I will be turning it, like a civilized person. If you want your dinner thrown wantonly into the air, call an Italian.)
Tell me about the one weird thing people should hire you to do!
Or maybe you also have a list of five. Anyway, describe it in the comments and I’ll pick a winner and mail them an illustration of their strange obscure job.
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I am a detangler. Yarn gone wrong? I can right it! Got a complicated necklace with knots? Knot anymore!
I am also a bug remover (but have required a consultant for a giant house spider-I was not properly prepared,) and ant entrance detective. I have experimented with a variety of sealants, ant traps & piles of borax/cinnamon to block that entrance. They are impressively persistent beasts.
Amy, you need to check out the person responsible for all the clocks in Windsor Castle: https://www.bbc.com/news/in-pictures-54387428 You could be an apprentice to him.
My non-existent job was one I did while working at an actual job in an office environment. Co-workers would bring me their sad little planters with sad little houseplants all crammed together and ask me to "fix them" since that little planter was from their beloved parent's or grandparent's funeral and thus those plants meant the world to them. I'd get out some scissors, and we'd talk about their departed loved one while I trimmed out dead leaves, pulled out rotted plants, and explained the perils of overwatering in a container with no drainage. I sometimes gently suggested they get a nice pot with drainage holes and repot the one or two plants still living. Then I'd send them off with their partially-revived planter and a plan to save the remaining plants.