The Interview

I'm typing this in the front room of my house where the dessert table is still littered with crumbs of fudge, chunks of cakes and a punch bowl of eggnog left over from the Christmas party last night. It went well. There is much to clean, but as I told Chris, I have to just sit down and blog for 15 minutes before today's craziness ensues. Ooooh, the craziness.

Anyway, the interview went well. It was weird, though. There were three other applicants, and all four of us were scheduled to show up at the same time. So we all met in this library, sitting at a table facing each other and struggling to make polite small talk when, really, I believe that all any of us wanted to do was stare each other down and say, "They's only room round these here parts fer one of us (spit)!" This is actually how editors talk.

We were interviewed by five doctors who called us into their offices one by one. They seemed like nice guys. Some of them asked tough questions like "where do you see yourself in five years," and "what do you think is your greatest weakness and your greateast strength?" I think I answered the questions well, though. If I don't get the job it was atleast a good interview experience. I got along with them all pretty well and I totally hit it off with the other editor, the guy who's so overwhelmed with work that the doctors decided he needed another editor to help. We joked around the whole time, so I hope he has a say in the hiring. Out of my three competitors, I'm only worried about one of them. He's a little younger, good looking, experienced, and has no children. I think I'm a little more experienced than he is, from what he was saying. But, you know. I worry. The other two I'm not too worried about. One of them showed up 45 minutes late and the other was very mousy and quite dull. The editor and I were talking about what we liked to read and, in an effort to include her in the conversation, I asked her what she enjoyed reading.

She adjusted her glasses and said, "Oh, I don't have time to read."

The editor and I were taken aback. She doesn't have time...to read? Editors...they, like, read. Sigh. With my luck she'll get the job.

There was one doctor who was really funny. In fact, he asked me if I had a sense of humor. I asked him if that was important for this job and he replied, matter of fact, "Yes." Then a few minutes later he asked if I play sports because I "looked athletic." I never know how to take that observation. On the one hand it could be a compliment that means, "You look strong and in shape, yet feminine" and it could be "you look like a pit bull." I'm going to assume he meant the former. I told him I play softball, and I don't know why I said that because I haven't played in a long while. But he seemed interested in that and asked me a couple of questions about it, and then there was this silence. He began jotting something down and I felt pressured to say something so, without thinking this through, I said, "I had a sports injury once. I took a line drive in the head when I was pitching and got a concussion. It was cool, I was proud." He looked at me and then he scribbled something in his notebook and said, "Brain damage."

So besides that everything was smooth. I gave them some samples of my writing. They want someone to start by January so I'm hoping I hear something soon. If I don't get it I'll keep trying, but I hope I do.