7 Careers You May Aspire To as a Kid, but (Trust Me) You Don't Really Want

Ask any kid what he or she wants to be when they grow up, and you are liable to hear some stupid shit. "I want to be a horsey doctor!" "I want to be a Superman!" "I want to be a riverboat captain!" See. Stupid.

Childhood is a magical time when the possibilities seem endless and your life's path doesn't yet dead-end at a boring data entry position. But c'mon, kids, let's get real. And I mean really real. Realer than cooties. Realer than your parents' inevitable divorce. The careers that look so appealing to you today? Yeah, you'd be lucky if you could rent a one-room hovel in a third world country with the salary you'd be pulling down from one of those. Life is rough and it's about damn time you realize it. It might be super fun to imagine yourself chugging downriver, wearing your boat captain's hat, and whistling a jaunty tune, but that ain't gonna feed your three starving kids and the screeching harpy of a wife you may or may not have knocked up for the fourth time during a mediocre session of birthday sex. That's right: a session!

GEP asked 100 stupid kids the question, "What do you want to be when you grow up and why?"* We then compiled this list of the 7 most common responses and did our best to dash the dreams of every child forced by their parents to participate. The first on our list is very close to my heart, as it was my answer when I was a moronic little ankle-biting peabrain.

1. Toys-R-Us shelf stocker
Why?: "You get to be around toys, like, all the time!"
Why it ain't a great gig:
-You'll mostly be helping fat, 30-year-old dorks find the Transformers they need to finish their collections.
-Most of today's toys kinda suck.
-How many Toys-R-Us stores do you see around your town? Exactly.

2. Shamu trainer
Why?: "Shamu is so cute! Killer whales are the gentle giants of the sea and I want to ride around on 'em and make 'em do flips and feed 'em fishes and stuff!"
Why it ain't a great gig:
- Your hair always stinks of fish.
- You'll have water in your ears, like, all the time.
- Gentle giants of the sea, huh? WRONG! They're killer whales. KILLER whales! They can KILL you!

3. Fireworks operator
Why?: "Fireworks are pretty!"
Why it ain't a great gig:
- You literally work once a year.
- Hope you're not too attached to your hands because, yep, those are gonna be blown right off. You can't put on a kick ass Fourth of July extravaganza with hooks for hands.

4. Pizza delivery guy
Why?: "I get to eat all the pizza I want! And I get to drive around in a car all day listening to music and smelling pizza and stuff."
Why it ain't a great gig:
- More than likely a lonely, big-boobed housewife in her early-40's wearing a barely-there nightgown WILL NOT answer the door and satisfy you sexually with her mouth.
- Shitty tips.
- There is always the possibility you are an unwitting pawn in a prank on some rowdy teenager's elderly neighbors.

5. Guide on the Jungle Cruise attraction at Walt Disney World
Why?: "I love those guides. They are hilarious! I want to get paid to make jokes and shoot blanks at robotic animals all day!"
Why it ain't a great gig:
- They don't shoot blanks at robotic animals anymore!
- Grow up and you realize the guides on this thing aren't actually that funny. They're kind of irritating. They kind of make an already stupid amusement park ride even worse.
- You have to live in Orlando.

6. Hollywood celebrity
Why?: "They're rich and famous and in movies! It's so glamorous!"
Why it ain't a great gig:
- Drugs
- Paparazzi
- Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew

7. Pterodactyl
Why?: "They're scary and they can fly. I would finally be able to beat up my older brother."
Why it ain't a great gig:
- The pay is very low and the health benefits are non-existent.
- No more family dinners at Cici's Pizza. (Pterodactyls are strictly prohibited from most Cici's Pizza locations)
- Pterodactyls are extinct, you dumb kid!

* No we didn't.

GEP Cares: 17 Phrases to Keep Off of Your Resume

Yahoo recently ran an article regarding ten common resume phrases guaranteed to not get you the job, providing gentle suggestions that might serve you better. Because Giant Electric Penguin loves it's filthy jobless readers just as much as it's gainfully-employed, well-adjusted, frequently-showered ones, and respects the task of "job hunting-n-gathering" at least ten times more than the yahoos over at Yahoo, we present 17 more phrases that should not for any reason ever appear on your resume. Notice we did not provide replacement suggestions like our competitors at Yahoo. This is because we respect you as adults. Only a stupid baby would need suggestions as to what he or she should put on a resume. Plus, a baby would just drool all over the resume anyway and no one wants to touch a drooly baby resume.

-RECOVERING WORKAHOLIC

-WILLING TO SPY ON CO-WORKERS AND PROVIDE MANAGEMENT WITH DETAILED REPORTS ON FINDINGS

-HAVE SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETED THREE ANGER MANAGEMENT PROGRAMS IN THE LAST TWO YEARS

-COMMITTED JUGGALO

-DISTRUSTFUL OF NON-ENGLISH SPEAKERS

-MEMBER OF THE NO CAVITY CLUB

-FANATICALLY DEVOTED TO SEVERAL MAJOR WORLD RELIGIONS

-OFTEN WEAR A JUGHEAD-LIKE CROWN

-THREESOME ENTHUSIAST

-PERSONAL HERO: THE GUY WHAT MAKES THEM ED HARDY T-SHIRTS WITH THE SPARKLY TIGERS ON 'EM

-LARGE COLLECTION OF NAZI MEMORABILIA

-NOT AFRAID TO LIE UNDER OATH (OR UNDER YOU IN BED, IF YOU CATCH MY DRIFT)

-SUPERIOR BOMB MAKING SKILLS

-AVN AWARD WINNER: BEST BUKKAKE SCENE ('98)

-HATES/LOVES KIDS-WHICHEVER YOU PREFER

-ENCYCLOPEDIC KNOWLEDGE OF THE GOLDEN GIRLS SITCOM

-MARRIED TO A GOAT

It's A Great Job If You Can Get It presents You Got The Job...Now What?

I've worked in an office environment for over two years now, so I think I know a little something about winning friends and influencing people in the workplace. Today's installment of our popular Great Jobs series is designed to help newly employed schmoes like youself prosper in an office-type setting.  Let's get started.

1. Decorate your work work area with things you like (pictures of babies, well-known quotations, a plush cactus that dances to the radio, etc.)--this will spark conversation with your fellow employees.  For example, a few months ago my wife colored a picture of Hello Kitty and her friends enjoying a traveling circus and presented it to me as a gift.  I took it to the office and hung it in my cubicle.  Now, at least once a week, one of the attorneys at work will stop me in the break room to ask me an awkward Hello Kitty related question that I can't possibly even begin to answer.  

2. Be prepared--memorize some popular office exchanges and use them often.  

Example 1

Employee #1: How was your weekend?

Employee #2: Not long enough!  Sheesh!

Example 2

Employee #3: How's it going?

Supervisor: What day is it?

Employee #3: Wednesday.

Supervisor: Ask me again on Friday.  (I participated in this very conversation on the elevator yesterday!  Fun!)

Example 3

Employee #4: Did you see Cathy's new haircut?

Employee #5: Cathy's a bitch.

Employee #4: I wish it was Friday.

Employee #5: I know, right?

3. Practice and perfect a fake laugh--this is essential for gaining the respect and trust of your immediate supervisor, fellow employees, and that member of the janitorial staff with the porn mustache and the Jheri curl.  You know the one--he's always looking you up and down, smoothing that mustache with his tongue, trying to show you pictures of his godson.
4. Be on everybody's side--don't choose a team, don't share your honest opinion--figure out the opinion of whoever you're talking to and make it your own for at least the duration of the conversation.

5. Don't give out too much information about yourself up front--remain a mystery for as long as you can.  For example, people in my office still aren't aware that I don't care for Hot Pockets or that I have in my possession undeniable proof that the sit-com ALF is based on a true, ongoing story.

6.  Keep detailed records of every single thing you do--someone will try to screw you, so you've got to be protect yourself.  It's a lot easier to shift the blame for a fuck-up to somebody else when you have notarized documents and photographic evidence.

7. Don't trust anyone ever!  They're jackals--all of 'em!  

It's A Great Job If You Can Get It

13. Mall Cop

Description: Our nation's malls need protecting and who better to do it then former police officers considered too old or too obese to walk the beat, high school drop-outs, and you? Stride through your local mall with your head held high--you're a mall cop, buddy, and you're the law in this here shopping establishment.

Skills Needed: rudimentary knowledge of common Segway procedures; ability to grow comical facial hair if required; severe lack of shame.

Availability: Mall coppery is big right now. Movies like Paul Blart: Mall Cop and Observe and Report (along with my forthcoming whodunit Murder in the Food Court: A Marty the Mall Cop Mystery) have made being a mall pig cool again. Expect a line at this interview, folks.

14. Indie Rock Luminary

Description: Do you have something original to say and just enough musical ability to say it in a way hipsters and music snobs can both get into? Does your dad own a cabin? If so, get ready for musical stardom, my friend.

Skills Needed: recent trauma you can turn into mediocre songs; well-established connections in the music biz; a rich father with an awesome cabin.

Availability: The world could always use another troubadour, a man (or woman) who can take society's common problems and put them to music, alleviate our collective suffering with a well-crafted pop song. So, grab a guitar and a four-track and head up to your dad's cabin for a month or two. Oh, your dad doesn't own a cabin? Maybe you should just apply at Whole Foods. 15. Street Preacher

Description: Do you like Jesus, yelling, and making people uncomfortable? If you answered yes to every one of those questions, stop what you're doing, find a street, and starting preaching on it. You don't need any fancypants schooling or even the ability to read. All you need is a basic knowledge of the faith of your choice and a loud speaking voice and you don't even need really need either of those things.

Skills needed: a knack for creative poster design; your own Bible (this could mean a copy you've picked up at a flea market, one that has been handed down from family member to family member, or a written record of what the voices in your head have been whispering to you over the past few months that you refer to as your 'Bible'); a crazy glint in your eye.

Availability: There is an empty corner in an America city right now just aching for a street preacher to set up shop and start angrily screaming about the love of Jesus Christ. Will you heed the call? 16. Child Street Preacher

Description: Who says only adults are to blame for the current economic crisis in America? Kids did some of that shit too. Teach your children a lesson by forcing them to walk the streets for donations, not as child prostitutes like in olden times, but as child street preachers. The word of God has never sounded creepier than when screamed by a toddler in a bow tie.

Skills Needed: a tiny suit; the opposite of an 'inside voice'; outrageous views on the end of the world, abortion, homosexuality, and a million other topics a child could barely understand

Availability: I need a child preacher for a party I'm throwing this weekend, so, there you go.

It's A Great Job If You Can Get It

9. Personal Assistant to a Confused Elderly Woman

Description: Perpetually befuddled old-timers all around this nation are in serious need of youthful, clearheaded assistance in just about every task imaginable.  The need for Personal Assistants to Confused Elderly Women was made crystal clear to me during a recent shopping excursion to Kohls.  A frail old biddy, finding herself bewildered by a price scanning robot in the discount shoe section of the store, asked for my assistance in reviewing the price of a particular item in her cart.  "Do you know how this thing is supposed to work?" she inquired.  I told her I thought I did and scanned the price tag for the novelty t-shirt I had in my hands without incident.  "Well, look at you," she chuckled with senile glee.  I suggested that she try holding the barcode steady under the "squiggly red things" instead of the arm flailing motion she had been using prior.  This yielded positive results.  "Ten dollars!" she exclaimed disgustedly.  I politely fake laughed and joined my wife who was looking at beach towels.

Skills Needed: high tolerance for cheek pinching and repetitive stories about the "good old days"; lots and lots of patience

Availability: There are doddering old ladies all over the place just waiting for help from a strapping young man or woman with a handle on the latest price checking technology.
10. Professional Homeless Person

Description: Being homeless isn't all eating out of trash cans, begging college students for spare change, and having spirited conversations with the imaginary spaceman who lives in your beard anymore.  Today's homeless individual has a well thought out money collection plan and sometimes a Bluetooth earpiece.  It's true.  I've seen them by Crabtree Valley Mall.  There's a couple of them that work in shifts.  Allegedly some of them have trucks parked in the gas station nearby.

Skills Needed: low levels of shame; ability to reconcile begging for spare change while owning a variety of cellphone technology many of your benefactors do not; access to a bindle

Availability: You don't even have to be homeless to be Homeless these days.  Now get out there and start begging it up!
11. Sentinel at the Gates of Hell

Description: The entrance to Hell is in Brooklyn and not in Pat Robertson's backyard underneath a pile of freshly raked leaves like we once thought. Someone's got to watch over the Gates of Hell to make sure Hitler doesn't escape.  Are you up for the task?  If so, pull up a chair and relinquish your eyesight please.

Skills needed: must enjoy sitting for long periods (i.e. decades); must have attempted suicide and failed; willingness to become a priest or nun; willingness to become a blind priest or nun

Availability: Former fashion model and shampoo spokeswoman Alison Parker currently holds the position, but when the Brotherhood who runs the whole operation decides she's had enough the job could be yours.  Prepare yourself by making a half-assed attempt on your own life.  Good luck.
12. Funeral Clown

Description: This one is going to take an entrepreneur who isn't afraid to think outside the box. You've heard of a party clown, right?  Well, people at parties tend to be happy already rendering the services of a clown moot.  Funeral goers, however, are depressed and in need of the hearty laugh only a squirting flower can provide.  Hence, funeral clown.

Skills Needed: basic clowning skills and some experience in the field of grief counseling

Availability: I'm offering you this exciting chance to be your own boss free of charge.  If you have the balls to start your own funeral clowning business, you have the self-confidence needed to survive this economic crisis.  

It's A Great Job If You Can Get It

Job #5: A dog whisperer

Description: Notice that I specifically used "a" and not "the" in the job title. You're not going to have your own reality TV show. And no one is going to buy your book on dog discipline, no matter how many hours you spent on Wikipedia researching everything. And, sure, it may take awhile for anyone in your community to even take you seriously (I mean, c'mon, a guy who "whispers" to dogs? It's preposterous!). But Cesar Millan can't get to every dog you needs him, so what's the harm in doing a little dog whispering of your very own? I don't see any reason not to, I mean, you don't have to be a licensed veterinarian. Right?

Skills Needed: high tolerance for stinky breath; pocket full of dog biscuits; must love dogs

Availability: Hell, you can start right now with my neighbor's dog, you know, the one who barks at the moon all night and recently mauled a toddler. That dog is a jerk.
Job #6: Hollywood Movie Star

Description: You know those people out in California who live in gigantic mansions and have more money than God? Yeah, how'd you like to be one of them? You don't even have to be particularly good at acting.

Skills Needed: willingness to align yourself with one or more of the following: Scientology, Kabbalah, tsunami relief fundraising, the Democratic party, rehab, Judaism, hookers; inflated sense of self; high tolerance for Billy Bush.

Availability: Hundreds of wannabes travel to Los Angeles every day hoping to be the next Dylan Sprouse or Julia Stiles. Prepare yourself for a possible detour into the hardcore porn industry. Or skip gang bangs and testicle punching (it's a thing) altogether, buy yourself a super hero costume, and join the has-beens and never-wases on Hollywood Blvd who pose with Japanese tourists for shitty tips. Keep that acting dream alive though and try not to snort too much meth.
Job #7: Vh1 Reality Game Show Contestant

Description: Humiliate yourself for cash, cultural infamy, and loveless sex with D-list celebrities. I don't know if you've noticed, but the most colorful Vh1 reality contestants end up getting their own shows (I Love New York; the upcoming Daisy of Love), so, you know, skank it up!

Skills Needed: ability to wear less than dental floss while tongue-kissing Bret Michaels on national television and still be able to face your family at the next holiday gathering; overactive salivary glands; a family history of alcoholism; a self-hatred so deep that it only becomes obvious to you after being rejected by Flavor Flav twice; Hello Kitty tattoos.

Availability: Vh1 is always looking for new tramps, skanks, and himbos. Sign up today!
Job #8: Cult leader

Description: Pick a god (or make one up!), type up a list of rules, mating rituals, and crazy predictions, gather a bunch of lonely outsiders together in some kind of compound, and, when the time is exactly right, have everyone ingest poison-laced Girl Scout cookies, for it is only in death that one can gain admittance to the solar-powered space train bound for Peroxi-Quan 9, the Planet of Angels.

Skills Needed: ability to preach insanely fucked-up dogma without cracking a smile; must look dashing in purple gown and shaved head; not being sentimentally attached to your testicles is a plus; access to a copier--you've got a lot of holy scripture to pass out before the Apocalypse comes.

Availability: I started two new cults last week--one of them prays to Riff-Nak, a god-like being with the body of a walrus and Dustin Hoffman's head who lives at the center of the Moon--so, you know, brainstorm some ideas and start throwing stuff out there until something sticks!

It's A Great Job If You Can Get It

Record numbers of Americans are out of work all over this country. In these troubling times, gainful employment is imperative for survival, but many jobless citizens of this great nation find themselves confused, depressed, rendered unmotivated by the soul-crushing devastation they see around them. "How do you expect me to climb out of my lice-infested sleeping bag each morning, bathe myself in the men's room at Hardees, and set off on a job hunt when hopelessness surrounds me like a dense cloud of corpse-hungry flies?" We hear you, America, that is why until the current job situation starts to improve GEP will provide our readers with job ideas which will hopefully jump start your search for employment. It is, quite literally, the very least we can do. Job #1: Food Critic

Description: Who can't criticize food? This ham is too salty; these scrambled eggs are laughably unimaginative; this creme brulee tastes like snot wrapped in a Kleenex brand tissue--see?! Easy. People love to eat and criticize, so why not get paid to do it? Plus, food critics get sent to restaurants by newspapers and magazines, so you know what that means: free grub!

Skills Needed: vast quantities of pretentiousness; must be comfortable eating animal parts most people believe belong in a garbage bin.

Availability: GEP is looking for a qualified food critic. The job doesn't pay well (or at all) and you must purchase your own meals.

Job #2: Chairman of Kitchen Stadium

Description: As chairman of Kitchen Stadium on the popular Food Network program, Iron Chef America, actor Mark Dacascos performs acrobatics, talks funny, and makes whooshing noises with his hands. Then he sits down for an hour. He follows this hour of sitting with several minutes of eating. Sign me up, right?

Skills Needed: ability to perform a variety of flips and tumbles; must look good in suits; ability to say perfectly normal words in a strange, otherwordly fashion; must look Asiany.

Availability: Currently, Dacascos is still holding it down on Iron Chef America, but who knows, one of those flips might end badly one night and the position could open up for you...provided you are Asian. Job #3: IKEA Furniture Breaker-In

Description: You know when you go to IKEA and they have all those rooms set up and you sit down in a room you find particular inviting and the chair or couch is so friggin' comfortable you're fairly certain that despite the shuffling throngs of people surrounding you, you could totally fall asleep for a couple of hours? Someone's got to break that furniture in so that it's ready for public lounging, right? I mean, c'mon!

Skills Needed: high tolerance for sitting, lounging and relaxing; a fat ass.

Availability: I'm pretty sure this position doesn't exist, but perhaps the friendly Swedes at IKEA will stumble upon this post and like the idea. Job #4: Billy Mays

Description: Billy Mays is loud, excitable, and beardy. If these adjectives apply to you, you just might find yourself work as successful pitchman Billy Mays.

Skills Needed: ability to promote the Big City Slider Station with a straight face; must be fluent in yelling, screaming, or bellowing; must be able to grow a creepy beard on short notice; opposable thumbs.

Availability: There can only be one Billy Mays and until another Billy Mays challenges the current Billy Mays to a duel and sucessfully decapitates him, I'm afraid the position is currently filled.