An Unconventional Interview

I am obsessed with Mexican food. I love it. I can’t get enough of it. If we are what we eat, as they say, then there is definitely a mariachi band playing in my stomach.

A few jobs ago, there was a Chipotle across the street from the office. Many days of the week there would be a bit of an exodus from the office to Chipotle at lunch time, and I’m sure you can guess who the ringleader typically was. The people who worked there loved me—maybe even more than my friends at California Tortilla, if you can believe it!

As you may know, once a year, Chipotle offers free burritos to anyone dressed up like one of their foil-covered masterpieces. Don’t think I was going to let the office miss out on that most sacred day!

On this particular Free Burrito Day, there was a new girl interviewing for a job, but good impressions were not about to keep us from free Mexican lunch.

Here’s the story.

It was a warm fall day when a bright-eyed, young girl, yet untarnished by the ways of the mean city streets, stepped out of the elevator. She hoped that our office would be the Mecca of professional authority where she would learn the skills that would eventually allow her to take over the world.

A ripple went through the office. At first blush one might think that in such a den of epidemic work ethic my coworkers and I were irritated to have had our concentration broken by a stranger being escorted to the conference room.

Oh, that ripple was anxiety, for sure, at this stranger’s presence. There was no way her interview would interfere with the biggest event of the day. My coworkers and I had big plans, damn it!

Let’s listen in to the conversation that was happening in that conference room*:

My coworker (an Appalachian State University graduate): It’s awesome that you went to Appalachian State! It fits very well into my master plan to convince everyone that the mountains are completely awesome and fussy, city sophistication is overrated. Eventually you and I will teach these fools from their “northern” schools, where they didn’t have to bundle up in four layers of clothes to march across the street to the outhouse in the middle of the night**, what a REAL education was! We’ll have the dress code here in the office changed to hiking boots and flannel shirts in no time!!

Interviewee: Umm… that sounds great, but by the time I got to ASU, we had gotten running water in the dorms and there were very few bear attacks on campus anymore. I’d really like to talk about the work you all do here, though. I’m looking for a serious place where I can build my career on a foundation of appropriateness and utmost professionalism.

Coworker: Right. Did you bring your hiking boots to DC??

Interviewee: Would you like to see my portfolio?

Then, a ravishing young brunette*** burst through the conference room door: Nicole, it’s time.

Interviewee: …And this one here is my award for just being an all-around awesome contribution to humanity… Uh… Excuse me?

Coworker: Oh my gosh! We need to wrap this up! Are people getting ready?

My coworker, Nicole, escorted the interviewee out into the hallway where there was a tinfoil frenzy going on and people were in various stages of head-to-toe tinfoil coverage.

Ravishing Brunette, handing out rolls of foil: Here, Nicole. Oh, we have extra. Here, New girl. Wrap yourself up.

Interviewee: WTF??

Another Coworker: Oh yeah, we’re definitely going outside dressed like this. Come on! Get to dressing like a burrito!

And that’s the story of how our dear friend Amy abandoned her ideas of working for a tight-laced, nose-to-the-grindstone, conservative work force and ingratiated herself with her future coworkers while covered head-to-toe in tinfoil. She thought, “This may be the absolute, bat-shit, craziest place ever, but it sure feels like home.”

Oh, and Nicole’s still working on the total domination by the mountaineering set, but gave up hope of converting anyone in our office. Once she discovered Ann Taylor, though, she too became pretty comfortable in the “big-city” ways.


* = A slight dramatization

**= Appalachian State is in the mountains, and the common joke among those of us who had never actually been there was to imagine it as especially primitive. Yes, we thought we were hysterical.

*** = Obviously, me.