Quiz: Is this a doctor or a jazz singer.

One day I took my lunch hour and never returned.

It was when I worked for Dr. Worm in Manhattan about 14 years ago and it remains to be about the most spontaneous thing I've ever done. I worked for her for one and a half days. One and a half days too long. While everyone else in the office was nice, I didn't like her. Even when she told me how important she was and how the governor phoned her all the time. It was the time when managed health care was just taking off. I think the employment head hunter sent me to her because I was from the Midwest and gullible, and you know, that so-called Midwest work ethic.

It was when I first moved to NYC and was looking for a job. Seems like there wasn't a lot of employers in Manhattan looking for someone with experience in youth and camping ministry.

Meanwhile I worked another temp job too, at General Refridgermetics. They sold refrigerators. And my job was to answer phones and file all day; working among all these poor salesmen (and I do mean 'men') whose jobs were to simply sit at a bare desk and make cold calls to sell refrigerators. Just seemed so bleak. It was not exactly on a subway line so to get there I drove from the bottom of Brooklyn to the top of Queens, with very careful directions from Bob. Yes friends, I could never make that drive now. It was the last stop before crossing the bridge to Rykers Island, literally. Anyway, they were nice there too and even wanted to hire me. But I simply didn't see my destiny as a receptionist in a refrigerator warehouse. Just couldn't do it. I mean, it was an honorable job and all, but I was going crazy by the end of the day. You try saying it over and over and over, "Hello, General Refridgermetics, can I help you?"

And I couldn't work for Dr. Worm either. And you know what else. . .she was a dentist. A little detail that she didn't easily mention. Nothing against dentists, I mean I need to see one actually. But whenever someone insists on being called "doctor" and then you find out they are a dentist, let's face it, it just says something.

So on my second day with Dr. Worm I left for lunch and never returned. I suppose that was a Midwestern passive aggressive tactic. I did not say, "Dr. Worm, you are an inscrutable fruitcake and I quit." I did not tell the headhunter that she had better not send me to anymore jobs like that. But my way to the highway was so much easier.

And when I got home, feeling all crummy and weird because people from the Midwest don't just quit jobs like that; well, there was a message from the human resource director at Lutheran World Relief. And could I please call her about a position that had just opened. No kidding, that was the note on the kitchen table the day I left Dr. Worm.

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So anyway, here' s the treasure for tonight. Jeni from Campus would be so proud. It's the public radio music website. It's free and it's fabulous. I already downloaded a play list of jazz tunes about autumn in New York, Nickel Creek in Concert, and songs by a Filapina crooner named Charmaine Clamor. It's like our lonely old house is now a jazz club. And a bluegrass festival.

Goodnight.

With love, T

P.S. Quiz Answer: The picture is a jazz singer; the aforementioned Charmaine Clamor. Listen to her and absolutely melt. This is definitely NOT Dr. Worm.