What’s the loneliest job you’ve ever had? / LJWorld.com

Asked at Dillons, 1740 Massachusetts St. on March 7, 2011

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“I worked in a marina during the winter. That was pretty lonely.”

— Chelsea Meyer, tutor, Lawrence

“I worked in a library but it wasn’t as lonely as I would have liked.”

— Jack Wright, bank teller, Lawrence

“I was a hostess at Ole Tapas, which used to be a restaurant on Mass. Street. I was the only high school student. All the college students had a lot in common and I didn’t have anything to talk to them about.”

— Lily Boyce, geography major, Lawrence

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killjoy 2 years, 2 months ago

Great answer!
That was worth staying up until midnight to post.

I had a booth right off the mall in Wash. DC that sold, "I'm proud I voted for Obama" buttons.

beatrice 2 years, 2 months ago

Perhaps he works nights. Alone.

Agnostick 2 years, 2 months ago

No, that would be against child labor laws...

http://www2.ljworld.com/users/ku_law/comments/

parrothead8 2 years, 2 months ago

This comment was removed by the site staff for violation of the usage agreement.

nobody1793 2 years, 2 months ago

Trolling the internets trying to be "first". The pay sucks, but at least everyone thinks I'm hip and clever.

RoeDapple 2 years, 2 months ago

Space freighter pilot to the Andromeda Galaxy. Sometimes I would not hear another human voice for centuries.

Boosh 2 years, 2 months ago

Roe, sounds kinda like my loneliest job. I worked for kdot one summer, mostly in the far western parts.

RoeDapple 2 years, 2 months ago

Have you ever ridden in a cab when the driver didn't want to talk? There's a job where you meet new people every hour of every day yet many of them seem so eager to talk, connect, bond, if only for the few moments you spend with them. Strikes me as a lonely profession, and reminds me of this song . . . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5dwks...

Did_I_say_that 2 years, 2 months ago

How many miles are there, on average, between payphones?

misterlee 2 years, 2 months ago

It's a toss up between being a night auditor or the overnight shift on the radio. There's no one else in the building for most of the radio shift, but I talked to listeners, and some of them called with requests or just to chat. A night auditor closes out the business for the day, but also checks in late arrivals and checks out early departees. Some times of the year there aren't many guests at a hotel/motel. Does guard duty in the military count?

Come to think of it, the lonliest job I ever had was writing. The interviews and research involves others, but the writing itself is a solitary task until the finished product is turned over o the editor.

geoismeo 2 years, 2 months ago

It must be lonely being such an important person Tom.

rtpayton 2 years, 2 months ago

Didn't know that Fruit of Loom hired you.

misterlee 2 years, 2 months ago

I do. He autographed a copy of his first single for me. It was done by the Chapin Brothers. I forget the songs on it.

LadyJ 2 years, 2 months ago

Do you think JK and Whitney are lonely? Are they sitting in a cubicle all day and night and monitoring our comments and making sure we are behaving? I'm imagining them out to dinner or at a party with their smart phone in one hand while talking to someone, watching our comments and keeping us in line. Do they take turns on "blogger duty"? Do they ever get a call in the middle of the night because "they're at it again"? Now that would make a story.

vertigo 2 years, 2 months ago

Like a toilet flushing? That would be appropriate. ;)

yankeevet 2 years, 2 months ago

patrolling the DMZ on the Korean border.........

Jean1183 2 years, 2 months ago

Vet, are you tall? Seems like I read an article once that said the patrols on the DMZ were all 6' or taller for the "intimidation" factor. Just wondering if that was true.....

FlintlockRifle 2 years, 2 months ago

Sitting in the jungle in the rain in Nam, scared to death

KansasPerson 2 years, 2 months ago

Comment threader. Where's the love? No love.

looza 2 years, 2 months ago

I sold K-STATE National Champion t-shirts on the side of the road. Nobody stopped to buy one.

richfree 2 years, 2 months ago

I pulled weeds out of a soy bean field, by hand, Aug. 1961...... made $0.75 per hour.

LadyJ 2 years, 2 months ago

snicker, snicker :)

snap_pop_no_crackle 2 years, 2 months ago

When I was in school for my taxidermy degree, I did an internship as a polecat boiler. Nobody would come with 10 yards of me that whole summer.

RETICENT_IRREVERENT 2 years, 2 months ago

T_O_B, Politician? If a person is not actively sitting on a governmental committee seat appointment or is not a current elected official does that not just make them a unemployed architect with no architectural schooling associated with a local church eco-guilt group who entertains designs of being a politician while supporting juvenile homo-erotic art highlighted by choosing a name historically associated with pederasty on a local newspaper comment section?

CWGOKU 2 years, 2 months ago

Public Relations Manager for Idi Amin

Agnostick 2 years, 2 months ago

Seasonal data entry at IRS... 6pm-2am. Surrounded by people... all compartmentalized by dividers and personal cassette players.

Good second job, though!

Agnostick 2 years, 2 months ago

Well, since I've already been a shill for Uncle Sam... how bad could it be?

RoeDapple 2 years, 2 months ago

Hollis - Mark Z. sent me a pm. "Roe, you are boring. Go away, please! AAArrrrggggghhhhh!!"

remember_username 2 years, 2 months ago

The Few...the Proud...the Lonely...

The USMC, stateside California, late 60's - early 70's full-on anti-war fervor. All that free love and nothing but scorn for a guy with a buzz cut. Oh well, made up for lost time in the 80's.

ohjayhawk 2 years, 2 months ago

Cleaning out the frozen food cases at a supermarket with a power washer. Usually took from 7PM-2am on a Sunday night/Monday morning.There were night stockers in the store, but no where near where I was working.

Pywacket 2 years, 2 months ago

Well, there were those decades as an Andalusian sheepherder, when sometimes I didn't see another human being for weeks at a time as the woolies grazed the high country.... Or maybe when I was a lighthouse keeper on the coast of Newfoundland--icebound in winter for months on end... Of course, for sheer loneliness, it would be hard to beat the years of banishment to Outer Mongolia for political agitation... Spent most of the time keeping the yurt warm and hunting for my next meal.

Wait--are we talking about THIS lifetime?

gsxr600 2 years, 2 months ago

Forever alone.jpeg

Kontum1972 2 years, 2 months ago

BenHet / Dak To SF Camp/Kontum...defending the bases from the little bad guys...

K_Verses_The_World 2 years, 2 months ago

Life sometimes must get lonely

scopi_guy 2 years, 2 months ago

Maytag washer repairman

rtpayton 2 years, 2 months ago

In New Orleans if your a repairman it's legal to show your crack. Otherwise, it's illegal to expose the crack (funny law but true).

RETICENT_IRREVERENT 2 years, 2 months ago

Trophy husband.

xbusguy 2 years, 2 months ago

now that's funny

edson443 2 years, 2 months ago

Working for Cellular One in one of their many large call center cube farms. Watching that business crumble was so very satisfying.

Dejacrew423 2 years, 2 months ago

Being a stockroom in a factory where all the other employees were from Laos and spoke Lao all day which I was convinced went something like, "oh look at the little white girl over there.... she's so dumb....."

radiohawk 2 years, 2 months ago

Night watchman at the Bowersock hydroelectric plant/Kansas Color Press paper warehouse. Pretty creepy.

lee66049 2 years, 2 months ago

Overnight radio DJ soft rock station. Now that is lonely

riverdrifter 2 years, 2 months ago

In January, 1980 I was a station clerk for Santa Fe Railway. I was laid off but they had a temporary vacancy as station agent in Skull Valley, Arizona, about 80 miles northwest of Phoenix. I took it. The old depot is now like a museum or something. I'd guess they don't have to shoot sidewinders coming up through the flooring with .22 birdshot anymore.

BigPrune 2 years, 2 months ago

Working on the interior of a house in the middle of the night with the occasional mysterious laughter coming from the darkened basement. Scary and lonely, especially when on the last night, ready to walk out the door, I called out for the ghost to show itself and the only remaining light that was on blew out immediately, leaving me in total darkness.