Will I Say, Will I Do Anything You Want?

It’s the time of year that I love and dread. I’m hiring people to work in the lab for the spring semester. The process is exciting, in a lame way. People put in applications electronically, I read through them, pick out viable candidates, make contact with them, set up interviews and pick my team. It’s kind of like fantasy football except it’s real and much less sweaty. I’m using the European definition of football, by the way. Really, this is a very important week for me, although I’d rather be in Guatemala with my Dad.

Seriously, though, proper hiring is the key to me not having a frustrating semester. Well, I’m going to be working on my thesis, so frustrating is graded on a sliding scale. But hiring the right people makes the difference in whether or not the computer lab runs properly or runs into the ground. There is a certain element, though, of regret in the process. Surprise, surprise, Seth finds a way to indulge his masochistic love of regret. Yeah, I know, but I can’t help but lock up when I’m forced to pick my players. Weighing schedules, experience, personalities, and thinking about how those will all mesh together in all the different possible combinations of people is just mind-blowing for me. Perhaps my mind is easily blown. Perhaps I’m too taken with the path not taken. Thankfully I had to make the decision, as someone was waiting on me for dinner. If not, I might still be agonizing about it.

I wondered today, as I often do, how different things could be. For instance, did you know that Sylvester Stallone was originally cast as Axle Foley in Beverly Hills Cop? Yeah, true story. That would have been a massively different movie, and probably not nearly as great as it turned out to be. Yeah, that’s right. I love that film with an undying devotion that defies all logic film student snobbery. I watched it again today, at work, and I was surprised to see the amount of social commentary crammed into the first few minutes. Really, though, any social commentary in a Simpson/Bruckheimer film is something to write home about.

Anyway, I hired some kids, and I think I made the right choices. It’s hard to tell though. I mean, you never know when someone is totally bullshitting you to get the job. I know I’ve done that before, in order to close the deal. Job interviews, auditions, dates... sometimes we say whatever it takes just to win, or at least not to lose. I’d like to think, though, that after three semesters of doing this, I’ve become better at spotting the hackers and the non in this process, and those students that I hired today will turn out to be wise choices. Here’s hopin’!

[takin’ the taken path at biblebeltbabylon.blogspot.com, xanga.com/moontos, and blog.myspace.com/moontos]