Temp job

I was buying my afternoon snacks at Duane Reade, and I got in line behind a young woman who was buying a pack of butts. She yawned, and the clerk asked her if she was bored.

"Yeah, I've got a temp job upstairs and it's the most boring thing ever. You know what they've got me doing? All day, I just sit there and check two columns of numbers against each other and hit a button on the computer if they don't line up. They could've hired a chimp to do this work, but at least I'm getting paid better than I was as a camp counselor."

Let's set a couple of things straight here. First of all, no they could not have hired a chimp for the job. There are very strict animal welfare rules that prohibit primates from working at desk jobs. You have to go through this whole risk assessment analysis, do an ergonomics workup, and provide clean diapers and propeller beanies for any chimps in your employ. It's generally not cost-effective to hire a chimp to do key entry work.

Second of all, it is cost-effective to hire a human to do this work. Not only do animal welfare rules not apply, but in today's competitive grunt work market, you'll take what you can get and like it. So shut up, sit down, start typing, and don't run your juice cup against the bars of your cage unless it's your designated break time.

And third, this means that some community summer camp in the Bronx now has a chimp counselor for the next six weeks. Which would be fine--I have no concern for the safety of children for any reason--except that it's a knock-off of my upcoming series on Fox, "Chimp Counselor."