Casual Friday: Roller Derby Referee

My good friend Rich Z, professionally known as Nixon Kutz, was kind enough to send me his interview about what it’s like to be a Roller Derby Referee just in time for Causal Friday. Woo hoo!

The sport of women’s roller derby has been around for almost 100 years with few changes to the “flat track” rules since the 1930s. One of the first promoters of roller derby was sportswriter Damon Runyon, who is best known for writing the short stories that were later adapted for the musical “Guys and Dolls” — and, of course, for inspiring the term “Runyonesque”.

Although the popularity of professional women’s roller derby has waxed and waned throughout the years, it has remained one of the few women’s contact sports (besides “jello wrestling”) that has entered the popular culture — iconic enough to even be featured on VH1’s Rock of Love 2 reality show last season.

But what it is like to officiate at a sports event that races around a track at 20 miles per hour and has a vibe somewhere between the X-Games and rubgy? Is it fun? Is it dangerous? Do the crowds really go wild when someone goes down? (Editor’s Note: Nixon Kutz asked me to tell you this in answer to these questions: “ Yes, it is dangerous, people do get hurt. Is it fun? Hell Yeah! The crowd doesn’t go wild when someone goes down, they go wild when they see a well placed, hard hitting block executed!”)

Let’s find out about the wild world of roller derby from Nixon Kutz:

When people ask you “what do you do?” how do you describe your job?

Well one of the things I do, outside of my regular profession, is I am a women’s flat track roller derby referee. Actually, I am the head referee for the Morristown Madams. They are the flagship team for the Western Jersey Outlaw League. My duties are overseeing the other 6 referees necessary to a roller derby bout, interfacing with the statisticians and score board operator, along with also watching the action on the track. There are times when it feels like I am a cat herder.

What are the things about your job that you love?

I enjoy the fact that it is somewhere between an amateur sport and a professional sport. The true meaning of

International Intrigue Contest

I’m still pumping out emails in order to find the next Cool Job for y’all…when the replies come in I’ll be good for weeks and in the meantime I’ll try to keep everyone mildly entertained.

Today, there is a mystery for us to solve! Put on your deerstalker, grab your meerschaum pipe and follow me!

I like that people are reading My Cool Job, and although I don’t care too much about the numbers (I’m much more flattered when people actually stop by to comment), I do look at the wordpress ’stats’ page every once in a while. Today, I noticed that there have been 6 visitors today to my little corner of the web that were referred by this address: http://blog.fc2.com/.

The address looks rather innocuous and boring, doesn’t it? i thought so too, until I started surfing the site in question only to discover unicorns, bunny rabbits, Ze Frank-ish ‘duckies’, lots of pictures of cute kids and strange food, and interesting tidbits like this: “‘ve D&G BODY ジオン d’erlanger 90’s L’Arc～en～Ciel L’ALSACIENNE color’s B’z GRILL’OR 浜崎あゆみ,talkin’ pop’nmusic color’s～“.

Small though my readership may be, I do know it includes people from literally all over the world, so I’m hoping that with the combined brainpower, language skills and sometimes weird but always entertaining imagination power of the Cool Jobsters we can figure this out together.

Here are some of my guesses as to what it all might mean:

1) I have a bi-lingual reader who likes My Cool Job but is too shy to email me and let me know;

2) This is a clever ploy by the skate punks who invaded my blog a few weeks ago to drive me insane with curiosity;

3) It’s all meaningless: just another computer-generated link to a blog that was created by a robot program;

4) Japanese actor, musician, fashion model and ultra-hottie Tadanobu Asano has received the psychic transmissions I’ve been sending every time I watch Last Life In the Universe, Zatoichi and Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl. The link in question is just his way of saying “Ohio!” to his biggest fan*;

5) OK…now it’s your turn. What does it all mean?

Best answer gets a prize!

*Note: For those of you not familiar with Tadanobu Asano (aka the “Johnny Depp of Japan”), this guess is about as likely as Brad Pitt stopping by your house for a cup of tea, but equally nice to imagine. Sigh.

The Cool Job Search is On!

Yes, Cool Jobsters, I did give it my best shot today to find someone to tell us about his or her cool job, but alas my email box remains empty as of this moment. Rather than allow you to think I have neglected my corner of the blogosphere, and rather than tell another story about a cool job I’ve had (I’m saving those up for when I really need them!) I’m going to give you a list of the cool jobs that I’d most like to feature here in the near future.

Here they are in no particular order:

1. Sommelier

2. Taxidermist

3. Trauma surgeon

4. Celebrity Impersonator (I’d prefer Elvis, but I could live with Marilyn)

5. High School Chemistry Teacher

6. Rock musician

7. Farmer

8. Private Detective

9. Choreographer

10. Luthier

These are all cool jobs that interest me, and most of them are jobs that I’ve been attempting to feature on the site — but for whatever reason I’ve been unable to make it happen. If you have one of these jobs, or know someone who does, or even know a friend of a friend of a guy who you think might have mentioned that he knows someone who has one of these occupations, please drop me a line at jimsmuse@comcast.net!

I do promise you something fun tomorrow, even if I have to run myself over and then interview the paramedics on the way to the hospital. How’s that for devotion?

The Casual Fridays

If you’re old enough to remember when Ray Bans and Reeboks were the hot fashion accessories, ties were thin, parachute pants were obligatory, and Square Pegs was the best show on television — then you probably remember the music trend called “Ska”.

A blend of Jamaican rhythms, screaming horns and punk attitude, Ska was cooler than pop, more sophisticated than punk, and rocked out large without the need for big hair.   (Note:  Yes, kids, that is a “chunky and spunky” Sarah Jessica Parker in the lower right of the photo!)

I’ve been missing bands like The Toasters, Madness and Fishbone for years and feared that the Ska trend had run its course.

So what does all this have to do with Casual Friday on My Cool Job?  Well, it turns out that Ska is apparently alive and well in Las Cruces, New Mexico and being performed on a regular basis by The Casual Fridays.

I’ve just spent a delightful 20 minutes listening to the music on their MySpace page, and if you miss the Ska days like I do, then I highly recommend that you give them a listen!

And if you’re too young to remember Ska the first time around:

a) You’re in for a treat, because it’s infectiously fun music; and

b) I’m jealous!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Geologist

Today’s entry is at the request of My Cool Job fan Angela B, who told me she has always been interested in volcanoes and wanted to find out more about what it’s like to be a Geologist — a profession I previously knew little about. But no longer.

A few clicks on the web later, I arrived at Cool Jobster Jessica Ball’s very entertaining blog Magma Cum Laude. As the title implies, it’s a blog written by someone who loves “hot rocks” and has a great sense of humor.

According to my research, the word “geology” was first used to describe “the study of solid matter that constitutes the earth” in 1779, but the actual “matter” that geologists study is far older than that — millions of years older, in fact.

So how did the Painted Desert get “painted”? How did Mt. Everest get so high? Where does the magma that spews out of an erupting volcano come from? These are just a few of the types of questions that you can search for answers to when your “cool job” is Geologist!

The ‘interview’ below is one of the best-written and most engaging entries so far, and I’m thoroughly pleased to introduce Geologist Jessica Ball and her “cool job” to you!

When people ask you “what do you do?” how do you describe your job?

Geologists are like detectives, only most of the events we investigate happened thousands, millions, or even billions of years ago. We like to pick apart puzzles and answer questions, and we’re always developing new tools with which to do so. Occasionally we get to experience geology “happening”, like when a volcano erupts, an earthquake or a landslide occurs, a tsunami or a hurricane strikes, or glaciers melt and ice caps break up because of global warming. But we’re constantly asking questions about the world around us, and trying to find the best ways to explain what we see.

What are the things about your job that you love?

I love that geologists have the opportunity to spend so much time outside, or “in the field”. We visit some pretty amazing and beautiful places, and it’s even more fun to go somewhere when you’re able to figure out

Internet Celebrity - Me!

Well, perhaps I am exaggerating just a bit.

But if you’d like to know why I call myself ‘jimsmuse’, what my favorite word is, or how I find contributors for My Cool Job then please be sure to read all about it here: Interview: My Cool Job.

I am certainly not in the same stratospheric “Internet Celebrity” league as the Numa Numa Guy, Randy Constan aka Peter Pan, or Seth Godin — but I think the ball must be rolling now that I’ve been interviewed for Sky Fishing by My Cool Job contributor and commenter Prairieflounder (you can see his MCJ entry here).

PF has also recently become the Pied Piper of Steampunk live action roleplay (and general exploding mayhem) by founding the Steampunk Action Shooting Society. Please be sure to address me at the Victorian Era Monster Shoot as Dr. Mabel Prescott: and do be polite, as it is entirely possible I may have hidden a derringer under my petticoats.

Library Assistant

I think libraries are awesome. Whether it is the Library of Congress, the New York Public Library, or my local smalltown library that has about half the amount of books that I do (not including the ones I keep forgetting to return), there is something about the library atmosphere that I love. I know I can learn about books that I might like to read on Amazon, but there is something much more satisfying about finding the Dewey Decimal system number for a subject I’m interested in, then diving into the stacks to see what’s available. (My favorites? 133.4, 646.7, and 530 — I head for those first in any library I enter. How much more of a library-geek could I possibly be?)

While librarians may have the stereotype of being stuffy and sometimes stern in “shushing” everyone who talks, this bad rap is nothing compared to historical library-tyrant Ptolemy III of Egypt who reigned from 246 BC to 222 BC. Ptolemy was the ruler who founded the Great Library of Alexandria, which some scholars have estimated contained almost a million documents — a pretty impressive feat considering that the printing press and the HP Laserjet had yet to be invented. So how exactly did Ptolemy amass this amazing collection? Simple! He decreed that any document, scroll or book in any written language would be confiscated from any traveler entering the port or city of Alexandria and copied for the library. No exceptions, and yes, it included what we might consider to be some rather privacy-invading search activity. It was kind of like the Patriot Act, Egyptian-style.

But let us return to the present day, where a library does not usually strip-search you looking for scrolls when you enter, and where the possibilities of information retrieval and entertainment can seem limitless. The slightly mysterious but very cool S. Le of “I feel unusual…” liked My Cool Job enough to take the time to fill us in on what a cool thing it is to get to spend every workday in the “stacks”.

Thanks to you, fellow blogger, and I do promise to finally get my overdue books back soon!

When people ask you “what do you do?” how do you describe your job?

I work at a Public Library. My main jobs are working at the Adult Dept. Circulation desk and heading up the Interlibrary Loan Dept. I also do some computer tech type jobs, maintain the shelves of new fiction, new non-fiction, mysteries, westerns, science fiction, and regular fiction room. Obviously we are a medium sized, small city library. We all have multiple jobs!

What are the things about your job that you love?

I love the library itself because it is very old. It was a high school in the 1950’s. It is fun to see all of the new books before they reach public display. It’s sort of like working in a candy store for the book lover. I usually

Magician

There is something about the world of magic that brings out the childlike wonder in everyone, even a cynic like me. Whether it’s seeing a helicopter disappear onstage (which I did last year in Vegas, and yes, it was pretty awesome) or having someone pull a quarter from my ear, I can’t get enough of it.

Today’s contributor Wayne Kawamoto is one of those people who makes his living by keeping folks asking, “How did he do that?” He is not only a professional magician who performs regularly in all types of venues, he’s also an author and teacher of magic, which makes the job that much more cool, in my opinion. I’m glad that there is someone willing to teach the next generation how to keep magic alive for everyone.

One of the reasons I admire magicians so much is not only their ability to entertain, but the years of dedication it takes to perfect their craft (i still have trouble shuffling cards, let alone making them do anything else!) But if you have the dexterity and the devotion, and happen to be someone who likes to astound and amaze and entertain, then magic just might be the cool job for you!

So what tricks does Wayne have up his sleeve? Let’s find out!

When people ask you “what do you do?” how do you describe your job?

I am a full time, professional magician and implicit in this statement is that I’m an entertainer. I perform at restaurants and bars and company and family events, anything from on a formal stage to a backyard.

I’m also a writer. My new beginner’s magic book, Picture Yourself As a Magician is now available through Amazon and will be in Barnes & Noble and Borders bookstores.

I also teach magic through my video podcast. I’m also the editorial guide for Magic.About.com where I write about magic.

What are the things about your job that you love?

I get to make a connection with a variety of people that I would normally not have anything in common with. And I get to entertain them and leave them laughing and feeling good.

I once entertained the Los Angeles Dodgers and in any other situation, I would have just been another fan. But I was able to show them tricks and connect with the players and their families. And this same

Comic Book Writer

I hate putting “filler” in this blog with so very many cool jobs out there to still be discovered, but I am awaiting some answers to recent interview inquires and at the moment I don’t have a completed interview to post.

Fortunately, I myself have had quite a number of “cool jobs” here and there over the years that I’ve been saving up for an occasion such as this.

Believe it or not, one of them was writing stories for Marvel Comics in the early 90s.

How did I get this cool job, you ask? Nepotism, of the most blatant sort. If you know nothing whatsoever about comic books, and don’t really care to learn more than can easily be absorbed by hanging out with comic book fans all day (just picture being trapped in a room with 20 Kevin Smiths — that is what the late 80s and early 90s was like for me) — but you still want to write for Marvel Comics, then do the following:

1) Marry a guy who works as an assistant editor at Marvel Comics Group;

2) Make sure that you mention numerous times in a condescending way how easy you think writing a comic book would be;

3) Make sure the guy you marry cannot remember correctly the number of pages that should be in an “annual” as opposed to a regular comic book issue (ten extra pages) until the writing deadline is 24 hours away;

4) Wait for him to call you at work and say “Didn’t you say it would be easy to write a comic book story? Do you have some idea that you can throw together by tomorrow? Or should I just let them fire me? I need a five page story by tomorrow morning or I’m Fritos here at Marvel.”

5) Stay up all night discovering that it isn’t quite as easy as you thought it would be, but be determined that a bunch of comic book geeks are not going to get the best of you, and you’d rather your husband not get fired and hang around the house all day.

So despite the fact that I knew very little about comics, I did it with some major help from my then-husband, asking him questions like, “So I need a villain for Iron Man to fight who is lame enough that my heroine can take him, contemporary to the time the story is set, and stupid beyond all reason because I’ve got a great line for him to say.” He was good about giving help like that, but left the story itself to me.

I permanently added to the lore of the Marvel Universe in just five pages, by providing an “origin story” for the secretary to Iron Man’s alter ego, Tony Stark. I called it “The Awesome Origin of Mrs. Arbogast” and didn’t even realize until months later that the artist who created the pictures to go with the story was Steve Ditko, one of the most revered Marvel artists from the “golden age” of comics. He was one of the co-creators of Spiderman and Dr. Strange, for goodness sake…how did that happen that I got that lucky?

I have no idea, but I’ve been able to get instant ’street cred’ from comic book fans ever since.

So in keeping with the theme of the blog, I should complete my “interview” and say that the thing that I loved about the job was getting to work in the Marvel editorial style, which meant that what I first wrote was a “plot” — basically just a description of the action with not too much detail and not too many character speeches. This “plot” was delivered to the artist, who chose how to tell the story visually (and I must admit that Steve Ditko added a great deal and inspired me to make the finished product much better than I’d originally hoped I could accomplish!) The best part was seeing the pencil artwork for the first time, and being inspired to do the rest of my job, which was to write the “script”, adding the word balloons of character dialogue and even the sound effects like “Bam!” and “Thwack!” Two weeks later after inking, lettering and color, my story was a go.

The thing I hated about it was that the entire time I was writing this story and working with the editor and the other creative people involved, I felt guilty. I kept asking my husband, “Am I wrong, or are there about 10,000 more qualified people that would cut off a finger to be able to do what I’m doing right now?” He kept telling me, “Yes, but getting to write comics is a “right place right time” kind of job, even if it’s all you ever wanted to do. Just be glad you were in that place at that time.” I still have a little guilt over it, but it isn’t as though they let me write X-Men for years on the basis of that story; I just got to write little fill-in stories like this once in a while for as long as my marriage lasted.

As for how to get a job writing comics — I can only recommend that you persevere. I did see artists and writers submit their work again and again, and be rejected with some kind criticism, but keep at it and finally get the work that they wanted. Me? I was just in the right place at the right time for the Iron Man Annual - Terminus Factor, 1990.

And yes, I do still have a crapload of copies of that comic book — each one worth about $1.50 apiece at current eBay prices….so at least my retirement is covered, right?

Chief Designer, Dept. of Homeland Security

Good Morning, Sports Racers!

Spoiler Alert! This is NOT a real job, and because of that I probably should have saved it for “Casual Friday”. However, I was reminded of the short film linked below today, and I absolutely had to share it with you.

The creator of the film linked here is Ze Frank. If you don’t know who he is, I strongly suggest that you check out his website. He is revered enough as a true “Internet Celebrity” (in addition to being a speaker, blogger, artist, musician and college teacher) that I don’t need to spend much time talking him up, but I would like to say that he is one of the people who has convinced me that there are a million things left to do with the Internet that no one has figured out yet.

He convinced two different people to lay pieces of bread on the ground exactly opposite each other on the planet to create an Earth sandwich. He discovered Twitter and one week later had 5,000 people playing Twitter Bingo. Two weeks after that he started Color Wars 2008, which is like online summer camp with a counselor every bit as kooky and wonderful as Bill Murray in “Meatballs”.

But before all that, he created this wonderful “interview” with the “Chief Designer, Department of Homeland Security” and I’d like to share it all with you. You’ll need Quicktime, but it is definitely worth it!

Red Alert, a film by Ze Frank’

DISCLAIMER: If you are not familiar with Ze Frank and choose to visit his website, please be prepared to spend a fair amount of time laughing your ass off.

NOTE: I am down to almost nothing in the cool job queue, because I haven’t had too much time to seek out more cool jobsters for the last week or so. If anyone has a request, a friend with a cool job that you’d like to see featured, or has a cool job they’d like to share about…I could use your help!