I have two candidates. One is directly related to mormonism, the other, not.

#1: I was the president of the teacher's quorum, and 15 years old. The bishopbric first counselor was in charge of us, and he owned a meat packing facility/slaughterhouse down in National City. He decided that he'd "help us out," and give the teacher's quorum jobs working at his slaughterhouse on weekends. He'd pile all of us into his big van, drive us down to NC, and amidst the leftover, not-well-cleaned-up cow remains, we'd do maintenance work. Painting walls & pipes, cleaning out the drains (full of all sorts of nasty stuff), etc. We'd work 8 hours two Saturdays a month, and get $10 for the whole day (minimum wage at the time, 1975, was $2.10 an hour).

The job disgusted me. The pay disgusted me. I knew the counselor was only doing it to get cheap, under-age labor off the books, not to teach us "the value of hard work." After doing it 7 or 8 times, I started begging off, claiming to be sick or having track practice. Finally I grew a set, and (on Sunday at priesthood), told him I wasn't going any more. Once I stood up to him, all the other teachers quit, too.

#2: While in college, I answered an ad for a job at a collection agency. They put me through two weeks of training, and I got my license to be a collector. It seemed ideal -- I'd work a 4-hour shift from 5-9pm, and could make as much as $30 an hour -- if I managed to bully/guilt people into paying outstanding debts most couldn't afford to pay. I did the job for about 4 weeks after I got my license, then quit. Spending every evening calling mostly down-on-their-luck people and bullying them to pay up didn't sit well with me. It felt like tithing settlement, or worse. Yes, I agree people should pay their debts if they can. No, I didn't want to be the one screaming at them, lying to them, or bullying them to get them to do so.

What was your worst job or two? Did mormonism have anything to do with them being your worst?

I was an admissions counselor at a small community college. I'm still in higher education, but the school I was recruiting for was the local college that everyone knew about, but no one wanted to go to. My boss didn't seem to like me much, and I was never actually trained on how to do my job. When mistakes were inevitably made, I got chewed out for not asking more questions. When I asked more questions, I was chewed out for not paying more attention and learning the first time. I could never win. My boss constantly used my own anxiety against me - when she needed to discuss some area of performance that needed improvement, she would always e-mail me and say something along the lines of "We need to meet to discuss some concerns about your performance. Let's set aside some time in 3 weeks." She knew I was going to spend the next 3 weeks agonizing over it and she loved it. I quit to take a MAJOR pay cut, I just needed to get out of there. I spent every morning before work laying in bed with a stomach ache because of how stressed she would make me. I know it is the definition of unprofessional, but I let her know how miserable she made me during my "exit interview" (one last chance for her to tell me how much I sucked). The last straw was when she called me in the office and chewed me out because one of our incoming students who the college had given a full ride was pregnant and had to withdraw. I asked her if she thought I got the student pregnant, then asked why the hell she was wasting my time. I don't use the word "hate" often, but if there is anyone on the earth that I hate, it's that woman.

While at BYU I got a job loading and unloading freight for a lot more money than I cold make on a campus job. No one trained me or explained and I couldn't figure out the system of how to put the correct box on the correct truck and in which order. I got fired in no time. I have never been in such an unfriendly environment. All the mormons at BYU were at least fake friendly.

Luckily I got a job right after that at a super busy gas station that paid $3.00 hr when campus jobs were $1.60hr. And the boss was great. This was full service and sometimes as much as 7 below in the winter but everyone who worked there were so fun and mostly Jack Mormons from around town.

Best job ever besides what I do now was working summers on a ranch when I was a kid hauling hay and working with cattle. I loved horses and the country and me an my brother worked with two others our age who were also Bishop's kid's from another ward. There was never any Mormonism to it--the only bit of normalcy in my life at that time and the world still seemed to have endless possibilities ahead. They all ended up super religious in the end and all still live near there. They are horrified at what I became. I miss who they were then. Good times.

Do you want fries with that?

Customer: there are maggots in this sausage patty!
Me: OMG!!!! Show me!
Customer: see these little white things?
Me: yes, that is fat from the sausage
Customer: no! Those are maggot eyes!

Repeat a variation of this conversation 10 times a day, every day I worked for 2 years.

Working in a menswear store. The boss hated me. I hated the job. Spending hours folding clothes, obsessively straightening them, repackaging dress shirts, and then vacuuming at the end of the shift, all for peanuts.

The one plus was that I got a great employee discount and the main company owned some other stores. I loaded up on new clothes and shoes before I joined the Peace Corps.

Seriously, though. I used to work for a veterinarian and cleaned up dog and cat messes. I used to shovel horse manure. I waited tables and was even a social worker (with the actual degree). I'd do any of those jobs before I'd work in retail again.

It's a tie between highrise window cleaning and asbestos removal. I will not elaborate.

I just happened to always find shitty jobs, to always remain employed and do what I had to do to make a buck or two.

Working in a Salt Lake meat packing plant was pretty bad.
I don't think I ever got used to the bad smell and I brought the odor home in my clothing.
I remember one guy using the band saw to slice T-bone steaks and he was doing it really fast and I kept thinking he was going to cut off his finger. Sure enough, a short time later he did just that.

I thought that steak tasted odd...:)

Ward Mission Leader.

7 days a week.

2 years.

No pay.

No help.

Japan Nagoya Mission 1976-78. Pay was lousy. Hours horrendous. Boss was an asshole.

Winner! :)

Worst as a kid....our ward had "paper project" to raise money. We collected old newspapers, took them to a warehouse the church was leasing and they were shredded and baled for recycling. My dad made my brother and I get up early every other Saturday to collect papers from our neighbors. He drove and we ran to the houses, knocked, grabbed the piles and loaded them in the car. Then we unloaded them at the warehouse. That took at least half of every other Saturday I had as a kid. We got nothing but the joy of service. Only fun part was getting to jump into 10 ft. high piles of shredded paper before we left to go home.

Worst as an adult....worked in a lumber mill after starting college. long 2x4 and 2x6 came down a chain and was cut into length and grade for ladders, garage door parts, finger jointing, milling, etc. Early mornings, open mill, freezing cold. Started as a "stacker" pulling the cut wood off a conveyor and stacking it according to length and grade on pallets. Became the "tallyman" and had to wrap and band-tie the stacked pallets. All the other guys chewed tobacco and spit on the floor. When I ran the band-tie under the pallet, it came out with "chew spit" all over it....nasty. I finally complained and they made everyone start spitting into a cup or bottle. I did that for almost a year and the entire time was thinking "this job is why I'm going to college."

Best.....I have a great career now, but my best "job" was while I was at BYU in the late 80's. I studied engineering, but I was head scenic artist for the theater dept. Made more than double minimum wage. I was also the lead singer/ guitarist in a gigging oldies/ classic rock band. And my sister had a best friend in Orem that had a dried flower business at her home. We picked and pressed flowers from her garden. could make up to $10 an hour doing that. All of that allowed me to support my wife and 2 kids while I went to school full time.

I'll retire in 8-10 years and look forward to dropping my engineering job and getting back to more art and music.

About 25 years ago I was trying to generate some cash for groceries and other bills as we were really strapped and a guy I knew called me and asked me to come work the sugar beet harvest. After one day I knew it was gonna be a challenge. He was ill prepared and had done almost no pre-harvest servicing on this stuff. All his equipment was worn out and/or broke and I was hired to be an operator, not to be his mechanic/welder. That and listening to he and his wife's constant battles and his mother weighing in on those battles made being there almost painful so I lasted 5 days.

I kind of feel sorry for the guy with the sugar beet farm. Obviously, he was dead broke, desperate and in an unhappy marriage: a trifecta of misery. His equipment wasn't ready because he had no money to fix it. You know, the local wards should have gotten involved because that was a real charity case.

I was a hotel maid in the era of shag carpeting. The hotel used to rent rooms just for football games since that was in the blackout days and they had a big satellite dish.

Trying to get popcorn out of shag carpet was a nightmare. However that hideous job did encourage me to get an education so I would not be stuck doing that for life.

I tend to tip the maid at hotels I stay at VERY WELL. They have to worst job in the place.

Anyone who has had to clean a house tips better than average, I've found. I also am a very generous tip-giver for those in service industries.

I liked retail, because I worked at a ladies' boutique (remember those), I Magnin, in California. I also got to model, which paid a lot more. I knew some of the other clerks from high school, and some of the customers were friends of my mother's. Friendly, and up-beat. In those days, we weren't required to up-sell, or meet any quotas--just help people, be cheerful, and fold clothes.

Worst job was working for Mormons in Utah, at the Utah State Bar. The job turnover was ridiculous, yet no one cared about it. Someone or other was always crying in the women's rest room. I would go to pick up papers from someone's desk, and there would be a new employee there, or the desk would be empty. That office was the definitive "bad-vibe" winner, of all the places I'd ever worked. Petty gossip. Back-biting. Competition. Scape-goating. Lying. Way too much church-talk. Everyone hated everyone else. They hated you even more if you did a good job, or if you were popular with the attorneys, because it made the other employees look bad. Everything was backwards. I was quiet, and stayed under the radar, had lunch in my car, to avoid having to hear nasty gossip. That's how I lasted as long as I did. I set a new record!

The state of Utah doesn't understand how important morale is in the work-place.

The most fun job I ever had was in a start-up company in Silicon Valley, by a group of engineers, who left Lockheed. I was assistant to the president, but I also got to write brochures, create the diagrams and models, hire new office personnel and screen resumes for the others, do drafting, figure out how to cope with an expanding office, purchase equipment, organize symposiums, and make travel plans for people flying all over the world. I didn't mind working overtime and weekends. Those were exciting times!

Variety in work tasks
Lovely private office with a view
15 minute commute
Working with nice, interesting people
Growing with the company
Company Stocks!

I still have the stocks, and they will help support me for the rest of my life! I was in the right place, at the right time. The atmosphere was electric with excitement. Everyone was positive. We were like a family. They gave me a wedding shower, when I left to get married.

Anonymous clerk Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Worst job was working for Mormons in Utah, at the
> Utah State Bar.

Was part of your job sending out naked boob pics?
Or is that a new thing?

https://www.exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,2087859

:)

I worked for my dad on the farm for YEARS. I don't know which was worse, hoeing beets, hauling hay, picking up potatoes, hauling potatoes, picking corn, even topping beets that we dug up in the snow covered fields. I told my grandpa I'd never marry a farmer. I almost did. (I was dating one seriously when my gay boyfriend/husband decided he wanted to get married. Stupid me.) I never thought I'd say I miss the farm, but I do now that it is gone and my parents are gone.

Other than that, probably fast food. Housekeeping at a hospital was better work than fast food. I only did the housekeeping for 3 months. I liked being busy all the time. The other women sat in the bathroom on the couch most of the day.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/08/2018 03:36PM by cl2.

But working with a group of screaming attorneys always tops the list. They like to argue.

Also, screaming attorneys with aftershave on makes it worse.

My apologies to non-screaming non-argumentative attorneys.

I've only had one 'bad' job: My BYU temple bride and I tied the knot on 5/30, the first Saturday after school was out. We'd already gotten an apartment that we moved into around the 6/7, after the parent-funded honeymoon. I had summer school classes and figured following one of those floor buffers for 8 hours a night might be fun, from 10pm to 6am, five nights a week. I figured that since I'm a loner, there'd be no problem. Then I'd take a nap, go to classes, and then sack out in the afternoon. Seemed ideal.

Turns out I hate missing sleep. I lasted two nights. And this was when the hourly rate of pay was $1.00.

Q: "How do you make a million dollars at BYU?"

A: "You work a million hours."

Then Mr. Steak opened and I had a dream job. It's been dream jobs ever since. I retired late last year after 37 years as a self-employed insurance investigator. I stopped commuting in 1978, which living in SoCal was like a new lease on life.

Following a floor buffer down a deserted corridor in a deserted building is kind of soothing, but sleep is much more soothing.