I was out earlier today and a school bus full of screaming kids passed by.
I figure a bus driver has to be the worst job in the world - at least for me.
Specifically, a school bus driver - with all those screaming kids. I couldn’t last for more than about ten minutes. I’d take the bus back to the depot and I’d be out of there like a shot.
How about you?
I’m not asking about the worst job in the world in absolute terms. But, for you - in your opinion - what would it be for you?
I’m not good with small children, so that would likely be it for me, also. That and a job in retail sales. The horror stories I read on this board and hear from my son make it sound like something that would make me homicidal in about a week.
Portable Toilet Cleaner
Flatus Odor Judge
Animal Masturbator
Sewers Cleaner
According to Norm Macdonald it is Crack Whore Trainee.
Jingle singer for commercials. I can’t even sing, but singing horrible rhymes about the power of toilet bowl cleaner is about as sad as sad can be.
Runner-up might be golf caddy.
Anything where I have to stand in place for more than 15 minutes. Cashier, construction flagman. Anything like that. Walking is fine. Standing still kills my back.
I’d vote for slaughterhouse line worker. Gross, boring, repetitious, physically demanding. You stand for your entire shift, slicing the same pieces of meat over and over again. If you’re lucky, maybe you see the sun when you take your breaks.
After having watched Deadliest Catch for most of its run, I’d put crab fisherman up there too. They’re well paid, but cripes, it’s physically grueling, gross (the bait), extremely dangerous, and probably wears out your body in fairly short order. I’m in my mid-40s, and my joints are already showing signs of wear; if I’d been a crab fisherman in my 20s, I’d probably be a candidate for multiple joint replacement by now.
Been there. Done that. The answer is baby care of any type. Babies aren’t even human in my opinion. They’re like proto-human larvae that spew shit.
Guard at Buckingham Palace.
Being Mike Rowe.
Waiter, in food service. I eat whatever I can find in a dumpster, so I’d never be able to gauge whether a diner is going to be happy about the way I present his dinner.
I take a job seriously enough to care whether I perform satisfactorily, and I’d never be able to be a waiter and have a sense that I am any damned good at it.
I also cringe, in principle, at the concept of servility, and I’d begrudge everyone who needed to have their food carried over to their table for them or their water glass refilled from a pitcher.
I’d take the busload of screaming kids every time, over a table of hoity-toity diners.
Any sort of job that involved calling strangers on the phone. Even ones that aren’t cold calls. Like if part of my job at the dentist’s office was to call a list of 30 people to remind them that their appointment was next week? The idea makes me physically sick.
Department store Santa. Everything about it offends me.
Ooh, that’s a good one. Any guard where you’re not allowed to speak to anyone, must stand still in full regalia in all weathers, but are actually a highly-trained professional must be a terrible job.
Cold calling is horrible. I refused to do it when I sold RVs. “Hi, are you interested in paying $200,000 for a depreciating asset? Do what to my mother?” It would be even worse to be one of those people who work for scam callers.
Somebody above mentioned slaughterhouse work. I’d also add slime line at a fish processing plant. Blood, stench, guts, goo, all while sweating in a rubber suit.
People who do this, or voiceover work, make a lot of money. So do people who perform Muzak; that is mostly done by moonlighting symphony orchestra performers, and if they’re union, they can make $50 an hour or more. 
Around here, they have refugees working in the local meatpacking plants because Americans won’t do it. Even if they apply, that plant won’t hire them because we know about things like worker’s compensation and labor laws. :mad:
A lotta bad gigs out there.
I remember a bunch of us construction slime were discussing the worst job in construction.
One guy said, “The folks who hang sheet rock”.
And another quipped, “No, its the ones who deliver the sheet rock to the site”.
I once worked for a firm that collected “wastewater samples” for companies doing business in Chicago. The companies would then pay the city “fees” depending on how dirty their effluent was…
Basically, it was handling sewer water day in and day out.
I think I am still scarred by some of the things I saw/had to do.
I can state categorically that as of 1994 “sharps” containers were not as widely utilized as I thought. After lifting up a manhole cover to sample a certain hospital’s sewer discharge, it was not uncommon to see used syringes and bloody rags floating by…:eek::eek::eek:
A pig slaughterhouse was as nasty a place that I’ve ever entered in my life !
No need for the gory {pun intended} details.
A business that made pork rinds was interesting. I lifted their manhole cover only to see the ENTIRE sewer filled up with pork “foam” which was the consistency and texture of whipped egg whites.
Don’t get me started…
.
When I was young our family raised some pigs, there was a small pool dug and used to contain the pig feces. I used to lit the bubble on the surface to set them on fire.
Oh please do. We *really *like gross around here.
Mike Rowe has certainly demonstrated quite a few gross jobs. Oyster shucker, working below decks aboard a factory fishing boat, etc.