I read an article about weird jobs and made me wonder what the weirdest, strange, most unusual, off-beat, peculiar job you have ever done in your life?
Why did you do it? How long did you stay at the job? How long ago?
The only thing I can think of right now I did many years ago. My first husband and I use to do side jobs for a flea market guy. One time he brought a truck load of extension cords up from down south in big barrels. There was thousands and thousands of them!
He hired us to take each one and put them in piles according to sizes, indoor, outdoor, and colors. Once they were sorted we were then asked to put them in bins per a certain amount.
Talk about a boring, weird job! I can assure you it wasn't something I put on any applications...extension cord sorter for 2 weeks. lol
I have to say the weirdest thing I've ever experienced while working was walking into a grain feed silo in Texas only to see literally hundreds of mice in the silo! There were so many my partner was able to scoop up handfuls of mice!
Can't recall ever having any really strange jobs tho. I did work in an exotic animals pet store in Florida once tho and cared for and handled alot of strange animals!
I don't think I've ever had a strange job, but I've worked with lots of strange people.
Once I talked to the nurse at the company I worked for. She said she used to be a whistler for the race horses. She had to whistle for them before the race and that was the horse's signal to pee. Have to have an empty bladder before the race.
She had to whistle for them before the race and that was the horse's signal to pee.
Oh that's too funny! lol I bet she heard a lot of jokes on that one.
By the way..how do you train a horse to pee on whistle command? Is it just one type of whistle they will pee for? Or, here's one that I'm wondering about, will the horse pee without the whistle too? Or are they so trained that they won't pee unless they hear the whistle?
I tried researching this on google. Found a few things that were interesting.
A jockey will make a shrill whistle noise right before the race to get the horse to pee which can sometimes reduce the horse's weight by a few pounds and will help them to run faster.
Another statement I found said the opposite. It was mentioned that the horse would run faster because it needed to relief himself and after the race the jockey would whistle and the horse would pee a lake. Hence the old saying...having to pee like a race horse when you have to go real bad.
Yet another place stated the race horse vet would whistle to the horse that was trained to pee with the whistle sound so they could test the horse's urine after the race.
So, I have no idea exactly how or why they do this. But I do know that it is a special 'whistle' noise made by the mouth and not an actual whistle. At least I figured that out. lol
Someone asked about the origin of that expression on answers.yahoo.com and here's the response:
Racehorses are commonly given Lasix ( aka Salix) which is a powerful diuretic. They pee a lot right before they race, we're talking gallons and gallons. The medication is thought to help prevent nasal bleeding, which sometimes happens when racehorses supremely over-exert themselves.
More answers found right here on The Bubbler
Quote:
Originally Posted by keith
Ahh, whatever the deal is, there's a reason for the "pee like a racehorse" expression. Weird.
Dirty Jobs show! That is actually a pretty cool show to watch. I only caught it a few times but very interesting. I watched where they were taking apart and cleaning a massive pipe organ in a huge Church. I don't remember the full details but I do recall it was a very tedious job that actually took years to complete an organ.
Makes you wonder, how does a person actually get involved in the jobs that are very 'different'? Do they get up one morning and decide to go to Massive Church Pipe Organ Cleaning class 101? Or is there a school somewhere that offers instruction on how to do weird jobs and where to find them? lol
I read an article about weird jobs and made me wonder what the weirdest, strange, most unusual, off-beat, peculiar job you have ever done in your life?
Why did you do it? How long did you stay at the job? How long ago?
Tell us the details.
These aren't terribly weird, but here goes:
BEST: Drove a bunch of sixteen-year-old girls home from downtown to far south side four nights a week.
ANOTHER BEST: Pool maintenance (check the pH level once an hour, keep the riff-raff out) at a sprawling West Allis apartment complex one Summer that got me paid while I wrote a business plan in the sun that I used to raise $80k in a private stock placement at about 22 years old.
ANOTHER BEST: I'm working right now don't you know...
WORST: TOWER RAT That's what they called the physical security job I had as an MP at a nuke site in Germany. Sit in a 40-foot tower. No reading, no radio, only a "commo check" of the field phone line once an hour. 4 on / 4 off for 24 hours; ended up being 30 on / 18 off with drawing weapons, standing formation, clearing weapons, etc.; often worked the 4-off, sometimes straight through. Constant.
Best and worst: Coaching youth baseball and basketball. Best part working with the kids; worst part trying to get the parents not to act like kids!
Sometimes those jobs don't already exist but someone rather finds a need then fills it (which is how I've often found work). Lots of times they start out as hobbies and grow into full time work.
Come to think of it, I had a friend that worked at Ward's Scientific many years ago. He tended to the "cleaning rooms", areas where beetles stripped flesh off anatomical skeletons (animal skeltons mostly) used for classroom work, or so his story went.
Quote:
Originally Posted by pk
Makes you wonder, how does a person actually get involved in the jobs that are very 'different'? Do they get up one morning and decide to go to Massive Church Pipe Organ Cleaning class 101? Or is there a school somewhere that offers instruction on how to do weird jobs and where to find them? lol
Groan!! Ok, anyone else have any weird jobs to add?
This thread reminds me of the show "Dirty Jobs".. some nasty jobs on that show!
LOL I was going to say just this..... but you already said it. I think that show was canceled. I remember watching and the whole crew went over into something gross ruining all the cameras etc.....
I dont know that I ever saw a new episode after that, and I also thought they commented on how that was the last show because of all the cameras being ruined...am I right????
I dont know that I ever saw a new episode after that, and I also thought they commented on how that was the last show because of all the cameras being ruined...am I right????
Check out the following link Carol and anyone else interested in the 'Dirty Jobs' show. I think it looks as if it is still on and doing good.
I haven't had extended cable for awhile so I'm missing alot of good shows like Dirty Jobs and Bizarre Foods :P I miss my SciFi, Discovery, History, and Food Channels!
This really isn't weird (to me) but I was actually hired for a job once based on my ability to search the Web and find nearly anything!
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that would be too funny!
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