My first job was an incredible experience from beginning to middle. I started life as a professional designer at a small boutique shop in mid-town Omaha that was dominated by women (I was, and remain to this day, the second-ever man employed there), which informed much of my burgeoning design style. It was fabulous from top to bottom. Days were spent with catty gossip, making things look beautiful, and almost certainly inappropriate jokes about the bombshell designer's plush beaver toy that sat on her desk.
From middle to end it was a slow decent into madness. After my first year on the job I had decided I had learned everything there ever was to know about design (that's right: suck it, Milton). This remains true to this day -- I suppose everything else I've learned on top of what I knew then is probably just filler. My senior colleagues, some with ten to 15 years of experience, begged to differ. And sometimes shouted to differ. Confident that I was God's gift to the masses, I strode on unabated to my undoing.
I can't remember precisely what it was that set events into motion, such is often the case with back-breaking pieces of straw, but eventually during a heated conversation with my employer, (an at-her-heart kind and wonderful woman who I worshipped and who never once made an alteration that didn't result in something looking better) she took a deep breath and drew back the hammer. The Hammer of I've Got To Fire Your Ass.
This is where it gets funny.
It was April first. April Fool's Day, 2004. Earlier that morning -- I shit you not -- I made a joke over e-mail to a Pre-Superstar Designer® Drew Davies that I should prank being fired. And after the complete mess of the termination, the crushing blow of knowing I had let down a woman I so highly admired, and the humiliating walk out the back door with my tail between my legs, the e-mails started pouring in. And bouncing back.
And for a few hours, that fateful day, while I was wallowing in my misery, my friends thought I was the funniest bastard on the whole planet. "OMG! Nate is bouncing back e-mails like he's 'no-longer with the company!' Hilarious!"
Eventually, the next day, after I had made enough phone calls to snuff out the rumor, these e-mails were politely forwarded to me by my now former employer. At that point, it gave me the first dose of humor I'd had in the preceding 24 hours. There was a string of e-mails, some with multiple recipients, trying to figure out if my prank was so awesome or a horrible coincidence. I've always found irony to be the best form of humor, and this was the best ever.
Young brash designer makes a joke about getting fired on April Fool's Day only to be fired on April Fool's Day and have no-one believe him. What a gem of a story that will make in exactly 4 years.
Happy anniversary!
Mmmm, very tasteful headline font you have there... thanks for reminding me to deactivate it on my system :)
I always hate stuff happening on April 1st that should really only be a joke but isn't. Getting fired must be among the top ones I can think of, though I have yet to be fired from a job. (not too hard as a student)
Is that Comic Sans you're using above Nate?
Peter, glad you liked the headlines all being in Papyrus for the day, and the body copy of the site moving to Comic Sans. For those that did not notice, good job on removing these 'fonts' from your machine.
I remember that day. The day I felt like a total shmuck.
First. I send Nate an email saying he should tell everyone at his former school (the one he was speaking at that night) that he had just been fired. Almost immediately I get a bounce back saying this person no longer workers for said design firm. I reply, saying "Good one Nate. That bounce back thing was impressive." Again . . . it bounces back. So I roll with it.
Show up at Nate's former college that night and listen to Nate make his former profs uncomfortable with stories of days gone by. All in all it was a good talk. Go to talk to Nate afterward . . . and he wispers, "I just got fired today." I say something like "nice, you are keeping this going". My wife is saying the same thing. "Nice try Nate".
When we finally figured out that it was true, we felt horrible. We went to Nate's hotel room with a six pack and comforted him. That was a very weird day indeed . . . or mabye this has all just been a four year long April Fool's joke. You decide.
Oh my, Comic Sans too? I'm glad I had not forgotten about deactivating that one, though I keep it around just in case I have to scare somebody.