Tuesday Favorites...First Job

CDGator

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What as your favorite teenage job during the summer?
 

Gator By Marriage

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@CDGator Favorite or first?

My favorite was the lumber yard I worked at for two summers. It was a very old company (founded in 1860’s) and they had a mill that did some first rate carpentry. I learned quite a bit about wood and life - it was my first real exposure to rough around the edges blue collar guys.
 

CDGator

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@CDGator Favorite or first?

My favorite was the lumber yard I worked at for two summers. It was a very old company (founded in 1860’s) and they had a mill that did some first rate carpentry. I learned quite a bit about wood and life - it was my first real exposure to rough around the edges blue collar guys.

yes, it’s called Tuesday Favorites but I’m really looking for first. So favorite first. :lol:
 

TLB

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First paying job was a bag boy at Albertson's on 13th. Me and some of my teammates joined together. Within a few months, they all quit, but I kept going. Petty politics and bullsht finally drove me out. From a bag boy position, mind you.


Favorite job was my first REAL job, also still in HS. In my senior year, one of my buddies had been 'working' for a home heating company. Kid wasn't spoiled per se, but it was known he didn't bother to pick up paychecks and never really wanted for anything. He quit showing up and the company asked the HS Key club for another employee so I said 'why not'. It was perhaps my favorite job because as a young mind, headed toward an engineering field, it taught me a wide variety of things that have served me well throughout my life. I learned about delivery = how APRiL runs E-W, and how house numbers are laid out; a LOT about the layout of Gainesville; about operating a small business; about driving a forklift, rebuilding pumps, welding tanks, changing out transmissions on our vehicle; about construction equipment an development sites (we fueled their equipment as well); and about various other entities in town (undercover GPD was next to us and used us for fleet fuel). Good people, good work, great experience.
 

gingerlover

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First was a waiter at this small restaurant in my home town. They originally made me a dishwasher, but when I told the owner the lady who ran the store said that men could only be dishwashers he quickly put me on the floor with the cheerleaders who worked there. I was 14 got a ton of free food, worked with hot girls and made good tips being one of the only restaurants in town.

The other jobs I did in high school were pretty fun at times. I worked as a cashier at a CVS one summer and that one sucked.

Worked another summer bagging groceries and fetching shopping carts at a Winn Dixie. Would immediately come inside and stand in the frozen food for a while it was so hot. To this day I will do what I can to return the cart. 16 and a abundant amount of alcohol available to me.

Had another year working at a pool supply store. At first it was great as I was in the small store that was run by me and two other high school kids with a smoking hot lady that worked next door that came in constantly. They then moved me to the store in the ghetto and it sucked.

My favorite was when I worked at this small gym. I was the only guy, once again with a bunch of hot high school girls as coworkers. The only issue I had is that the owner is probably running around somewhere right now in a pink hat and hated men, so I got most of the grunt work and an inquisition when I told one of the girls they were an idiot. You would think a gym would be fun, but the fatty to hot ratio is really skewed the way you wouldn't like. Eventually came back after one of the head trainers bought out the owner and it was much better.
 

TheDouglas78

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My first job was planting trees... At 11 I was carrying the bag and the dibel. We would have the mass planting happen the year before, and we would go fill what didn't survive the first year. We would plant between 10,000 to 15,000 trees every Christmas break. My brother missed the tree planting, due to the harvest rotation. Did various lawn work and farm work through my teen years.

My first real job was unloading trucks for Target on Archer Road. We would unlock the trucks and then stock the shelves.
 
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Gatordiddy

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First job in Tally was at 14 - Pro Pools. Did inventory, cleaning and unloaded trucks. I also set up their Christmas tree lot and it was the first time I ever "saw" snow when I unloaded the trees from Michigan. Also ... I have PTSD from unloading truck loads of fiberglass insulation.
Got paid under the table...so that was good.

First REAL job was at the Burger King across from the clown college on Tennessee Street. Worked the drive thru, which did not suck in the least. Also saw Ron Simmons come through a couple of times in a really really nice Trans Am. Always wondered how a college kid could afford a car like that.
 

Detroitgator

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First paper route was when I was 8 or 9. By 12, had multiple morning (Detroit Free Press) and afternoon (Detroit News) routes. Did Iron Work with my Dad when I was 16-17 when he was down again with cancer. First "real job" when I was 16 or 17 was as a dishwasher (I was the "Hobart Prince", my best friend was the "Hobart King", we would wear Burger King paper crowns while working). Then the Hobart King and I joined the Army together, went through OSUT together, then same squadron together in Germany. Lost touch with him in 1989. Ran into him in Afghanistan in 2008 where he was training the Afghan Commandos (SF) and I was supplying them with "stuff." Ran into him again 2 years later when he was part of the program in UAE where the Sheikh brought in 300 Colombian mercenaries. We've stayed in touch ever since.
 

NOLAGATOR

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First Job was cutting lawns.

My Favorite was Vet Assistant...wanted to be DVM after that...Awesome boss.. Still my favorite of all time.
 

B52G8rAC

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Taught canoing and swimming at Camp Euchee for two summers. Ran the mess hall for lunch and dinner. Worked for the camp ranger maintaining facilities on the weekends. Great time, good experience. 10 dollars a week and room and board.
 
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cover2

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My first job (and one of my favorites, though it didn’t start out that way) was working for my granddaddy on his shade tobacco farm. I started when I was seven and toted the “turns” of tobacco from the primers to the barge. It was hot and hard for a kid my age and being the only white person on the crew, I caught quite a bit of hell from the older boys, but it helped toughen me up. Also, the older lady that packed the barge, Ms. Fanny Butler, looked out for me and was very encouraging. She knew I loved football and would tell me about her grandson that played for the Atlanta Falcons, James “Cannonball” Butler, and I always hoped I’d get to meet him, a real professional football player.

Before all was said and done, I progressed to punching up sticks of tobacco to the hangers in the barn, to hanging, which required me to climb up in the barn and take the sticks from below and hang them on the tiers. It was hot work, especially when your back was up next to the tin roof of the barn, 40-50 feet off the ground. I also became responsible for firing the barns each evening as part of the curing process. We’d prime Monday through Thursday and on Fridays I learned to break down the stringing machines and clean the gum build up and trash out of them. We also had a big garden and I’d pick whatever needed picking, peas, butter beans, squash, etc., on Fridays and a lot of days after work ended.

I learned a lot of things that have helped me through life: hard work never killed anybody (though it has scared the shti out of a bunch of folks), following directions and doing what you’re told, standing up for yourself when need be, saving part of your wages for the future, and working even when you didn’t feel like it. It was a pretty good time in my life.


First REAL job was at the Burger King across from the clown college on Tennessee Street. Worked the drive thru, which did not suck in the least. Also saw Ron Simmons come through a couple of times in a really really nice Trans Am. Always wondered how a college kid could afford a car like that.
He couldn’t, but booster Walter Blount of Blount’s Plumbing could :)
 

Alumni Guy

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First was a cashier at Publix, thought it would be good to get experience with money. Should have been a bag boy, they got tips and could hit on the girls. But, all my buddies bought beer through me as I checked their ID and rang em up like they were 21.

Favorite was in college (if that counts), where I worked as a runner for law firm one summer. Spent all day in my car, driving and picking up documents across Tampa and the state with a few diversions to the beach or my girls house.

Sometimes, I got to drive the boss’s brand new S class by myself. Rolled down the window, blasted the stereo and acted like it was mine. Banging hot receptionist that I flirted with all summer was an added bonus.
 
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Went thru FBI clearance right after graduating from high school, and over the summer worked at the local office typing reports, then doing research, etc. Fantastically interesting job. Then they wanted to transfer me to the Wash, DC office but I wanted to go to college. Even though I ended up with a good pretty high paying career, I have often wished I had gone up to DC and worked there in the FBI office (under Hoover) for at least a couple of years. There were some drawbacks in that anyone you wanted to date had to be checked out thoroughly, the secretarial staff (all female) had to live in a dorm-type facility and you were transferred frequently throughout the US, but did have the opportunity of going to Europe also.
 
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GatorBart

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Favorite? NFW
Detassling corn. Paid well for a 13 yo. Delivered newspapers before that.
First real job was washing dishes at a country club. That sucked too.
 

soflagator

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Favorite? NFW
Detassling corn. Paid well for a 13 yo. Delivered newspapers before that.
First real job was washing dishes at a country club. That sucked too.

Worked at a family member’s gym as my first job. Just straightening things and cleaning the bathrooms.

But like you, my first official job was washing dishes at a restaurant that served until like midnight. Dreadful.
 

ThreatMatrix

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Must have been 15 or 16. On my girlfriends living room floor after school we were going at it hot and heavy. Then she reached in my pants and I got my first hand job.
 

flg8rfan

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Milhopper Publix in Gainesville, bagged/threw stock in the late 80s and 90s. Had a blast working there, all of my coworkers worked and played pretty hard and we got along well together.

Married a couple of girls I worked with there, still with the second one all these years later.
 

CDGator

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Milhopper Publix in Gainesville, bagged/threw stock in the late 80s and 90s. Had a blast working there, all of my coworkers worked and played pretty hard and we got along well together.

Married a couple of girls I worked with there, still with the second one all these years later.

Wait, Publix sells wives?
return policy?
 

Durty South Swamp

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Janitor and handyman for a church when I was 14. I mowed lawns in the summer before that.
 

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