Census Job

Image source: BCNN1.com

So, as I mentioned before, I got a full time job with the U.S. Census Bureau that I started yesterday (Wednesday).  I went in for training at 8:30 in the morning and had to wait about 45 minutes before there was an employee free to train us, they're that busy.

Training was one of those boring ones where you sit and fill paperwork out while the trainer reads a script.  Luckily, office clerk training is only a few hours long (unlike the enumerators--door knockers-- who have to train for 3 or 4 days).  I also got fingerprinted, which was an interesting experience since it was my first time.  It just seems like there's no easy way to do it.  The guy did notice the interesting groove pattern on my left hand index finger.  :)

Then we had lunch break, and then I started work.  They really didn't have assignments for us, so I was passed from person to person until I was in the area with the schedule I wanted.  Then they just kind of threw me in and said 'good luck!'  Happily, I was able to figure things out quickly, and a couple hours later I was walking around the office doing things like a professional. ;) Ok, maybe not quite, but I felt really comfortable.

The office was so busy that they called in enumerators to help out.  And, they told everyone in the office that overtime was open.  Sweet!  I ended up staying until almost 11pm.  Talk about making some serious money!

I spent the whole day doing QC (quality control) for the enumerator binders.  I got pretty dang good at it, too, after that long.  The hardest part was that we had so many different supervisors telling us to do different things, and we didn't quite know who to listen to.  There wasn't much of an order to things, so that gave me a chance to put my love of organizing to work.  I think this job is really going to satisfy that love.  And, I kind of like the hectic setting of the office because there's always something to do and that drives me.

I also had to learn a lot of acronyms like LCO, FOS, QC, EQ, LMR, NRFU, etc.  I think the government probably has more abbreviations than the Church!  Haha.  Good stuff.