jobs I've never had

I've had a pretty varied working career so far, I think. I've worked at a library, as a janitor, as a furniture mover, as a teacher, as an office assistant, and as a salesman, among other things. But for some reason I like to lie about what I've done for a living, especially when I don't know the people I'm talking to. I enjoy seeing how people respond to the little stories or hints of stories I drop. I know it's BSing, but I just get a kick out of playing with people's heads now and then with things like these:

* Pasadena Water & Power.

I have a second-hand orange tee-shirt. It says "Pasadena Water and Power" on it. Obviously, people sometimes ask if I actually worked there, since it's not like you get those shirts off BustedTees or something. I'll almost always respond with, "Yeah. I don't like to talk about it." Straight face. Usually I'll get a strange look back, but I'll keep mine blank and then change the subject: "So, dude, what did you think about the stuff about AIG that came out in the news lately?"

* Butcher

When I go to the bar to shoot pool, I'll occasionally tell people I used to work as a butcher. Usually I'll say something like, "I'm not that great at pool--better than a lot but, y'know--but I know how to cut," followed by the above. The first time I did it was pretty amazing; I told this guy right after I got a difficult shot in, and he stared at me a second. When I looked back up at him, he asked me, "Really?"

I struggled internally to keep a straight face, and just said, "Yeah, dude."

"Wow," he said. "So . . . didn't it kind of stink?"

"Well, yeah," I replied. "But you only notice it for the first week or so. After that, you're just going to work, y'know?"

"Huh. That's incredible. It wasn't gross?"

"Naw, dude. You get used to smells, and it's just--y'know, it's a job."

He left it alone after that, but when his friend came up he introduced me after a second, "Yeah, man, this is Jon. He used to be a butcher, man!"

"No shit, dude?" the guy said, looking at me. "Cool." And we shook hands.

* Idaho potato farmer

This sounds ridiculous, but I have my reasons. Some people actually have a hard time believing that I was born and raised in California; I guess I'm just not bro-some enough or something--too clean-cut and generally politely soft-spoken. I've had so many people ask me after a bit of conversation if I'm from out of state, from college on, that I just got into the habit of telling them what they apparently want to hear. At first I'd protested, leading--surprisingly, to me--to further disbelief ("No way, dude. You don't act like you're from California"), so I picked a state off the top of my head that, one, I figured most people wouldn't actually be from; two, sounded like a likely place for someone as awkward and un-Californian as I seemed to be; and three, wouldn't have a specific, attributable accent people might expect to hear. So I said, "Well, actually, I'm from Idaho."

"Idaho?" someone would respond.

"Yeah," I'd reply. "Up in the panhandle." I figured adding something specific like that, that people wouldn't be likely to care to ask about or think of, would make it sound more believable.

"Huh. So're you from, like, out in the country up there?"

I couldn't believe that just saying I was from Idaho wasn't good enough, so I threw out, "Uh, yeah. I actually grew up on a potato farm."

"Really? How was that?" they'd ask.

And, of course, I'd answer, with a kind of facial shrug, "Boring." At that point they seemed to see something in my face that inspired doubt--maybe they noticed I was kind of laughing at them inside--and recognizing that, I threw in something totally ridiculous as a red herring. "Well, except for this one time. All the potatoes went on strike--just the yellow ones, though, 'cause the red ones didn't care, 'cause they thought the white potatoes were getting way too much attention for how mealy they were."

Of course, I could always tell people the governor of Idaho is an Otter, and they'd never believe it.