"Trap Door House"

So I've been slacking on the blogging front lately. But I've been going on a lot of job interviews in the last two weeks, swimming a lot of laps (a mile on three separate days this week), and haven't been out partying much. Now I'm going to share an experience from last week that took place on a job interview. Of course I'm not going to name the company or exactly what they do. Here's the tale:

Part of the job interview process for this particular company involved going along with one of the employees on the day to day task. The employee visits residential areas and goes house to house. That's all I'll say about the job itself. Let's just say the experience quickly went downhill as we headed to the area for the day. We left East Memphis on I-240. We got to Malfunction Junction and took Midtown I-240. It was at this point the interviewer asked me if I could define "demographics." Apparently you can be considered for this job and be a moron at the same time.

We eventually took the Jackson Ave exit. Now for those of you who are well versed in the Memphis layout, you don't really go to the Jackson Ave exit that often unless you are visiting a few select places. Most other areas that you go to are...well unsafe. We headed down Jackson Ave and passed Alex's Tavern. We then passed Rhodes College. We turned left onto some random road and drove past Springdale Elementary. It was at this point I really became nervous. Most white people don't go into the residential areas around there while wearing suits. I started doing a mental inventory of everything in my pockets and wallet just so I'd know what I was going to lose in the inevitable mugging. The interviewer turned down one residential street and then another residential street. All of a sudden we stopped and it was time to get out and walk the street visiting all these houses.

The first house we went to had these two guys living in it. Let me describe them. They were in their early 20s. That's not the interesting part about them though. They had very dilated pupils and bloodshot eyes. They were giggling at everything that was said. Hmm...I think they were stoned...at 1PM. They definitely looked like winners.

We went to a few more houses. After we finished with the folks at the last house we were about to walk back to the car when the lady gives us a warning: "If yall go to anymore houses on this street, be sure not to knock on the 'trap door house' over there." Now I'm not well versed in the etiquette of the ghetto or the most uptodate slang from North Memphis, but I know a 'trap door house' can't be a good thing. I said "thanks" and started walking towards the car. Unfortunately the interviewer didn't just take the warning to heart and asked the question all of you are thinking:

"What's a trap door house?"

I knew what one was when I looked at it. The lady replied "the crack house right over there." I knew it was it was a crack house. Here's a great description of it: Plywood covering everying window and a rap blasting car with spinners out front every other minute. Random guys walking in and out all the time.

Needless to say I stopped the interview when we got back to the office. I thanked them for the opportunity, but told them I could not consider any job that required me to knock on a crack house door. Of course I did this in a very professional manner. On the post-interview questionaire, there was a question that asked what was the worst part of the interview. I answered "being warned not to visit a crack house by a customer."

(side note: whenever you go on a job interview and another male candidate is wearing black pants, a shortsleeve black shirt, a black tie, and an all black fedora hat try not to laugh)