Have you ever had that feeling, when you're waiting for a job interview, shiny new resume in hand, that you're no different from the other 10 folks that have interviewed before you? As I guy who has thumbed through resume's more than once I can tell you that some candidates can be unexpectedly similar. The key is to make yourself memorable. There's any number of ways to do that; humor, charisma, anecdotal recitations of your experience... or a fedora, monocle, giant fake mustache, and a shirt that says "Not Ted!".

Okay so this was not the original direction I was going to go with today's strip, but when Stefan sent the idea in, I couldn't resist it. It's a nice twist on what was expected given yesterday's comic. Thanks Stefan, that was great.

Get this, when I interviewed for my first job out of college, I had my portfolio with me. I didn't have any intention of showing it. But, in the discussion of what I could do the word "illustration" came up. So sure enough, 5 minutes later, there I sat interviewing for a web designer job with AD&D style fantasy illustrations sprawled all over the table between us. It had nothing to do with position... but I did get hired. Remember what I said about making yourself memorable? Yeah. Don't do it that way. There's a big difference between being memorable and being plain damn weird. I got the job because I knew the head of their computer repair department.

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Today's Pimpage: The "real" Ted is wearing a "Ninjas vs Luchadores" shirt from Threadless.Com.

I predict a demand for "not Ted" t-shirts in the near future.

Haha poor guy

When I was working for a customer service job out of Long Island, I was interviewing for a Support tech position. The manager was interviewing me, and to be honest, I didn't think I had a chance at all. During the interview he asked me if offered a chance to do the job, would I be really be interested, considering it was more of a lateral move than an advancement.

The only thing I could think of at that time was that line from Starship Troopers, "I'll take it, till I get killed or you fine someone else better." Naturally I said fired instead of killed.

The guy just started laughing. Unfortunately at the time I didn't get the job, but next time interviews came around, I had the same guy interview me and managed to get it that time.

Oh, also, Not Ted shirt would rock.

I'm going to throw my hat into the "I would love to purchase a Not Ted Shirt" ring.

Awesome comic! Totally not what I was expecting.

I was unemployed for 7 months once, moving from a tech job in a city to a small town. With a baby on the way, no less! Finally got a great job that I love, but I'm totally relating to these recent strips.

Yesterday "firing" stories today interview stories. Fortunately this didn't happen to me, but a coworker of mine was doing group interviews a few years back for a job that needed many recruits because of high turnover. During the in-between time her and her fellow interviewers would crack jokes about various quirks with candidates. One joke struck my coworker's funny bone enough that she peed, not just a little. Her fellow interviewers found this hilarious but with only 2 or 3 minutes between interviews she had to quickly go clean up and come back. She moved the chair away from the interviewer side of the table and called the next person in. The guy came in and instead of sitting on the obvious chair, sat right down in the pee chair...but didn't notice anything. Stifling laughter they all finished the interview and the candidate stood to leave. I guess because it was warm enough when he sat down he didn't notice, but when he stood up he got a really concerned look, felt his britches (light cacky pants) turned and walked out. As he left the interviewers couldn't help but burst into laughter at the giant wet spot covering basically his entire rear end...

On the topic of "Not Ted" t-shirts, have you all seen how seemingly random headlines on CNN.com will have a t-shirt icon next to them? It means you can go order a CNN t-shirt with that headline. And it's not like the headlines chosen are particular good (for example up there now is "$15k found in road, but don't spend it!" can be bought as a t-shirt, but "OJ is going to jail, but for how long" is not) but it's an interesting idea. Let people buy topical quotes from the day's comic as a t-shirt.

Tundar, you're a day late on that prediction I think.

Totally awesome comic... totally unexpected (might be me though) my insides are still shaking with laughter

I made myself well remembered by showing up 2 hours late on my first day of work...

HAHA! I got my first job out of high school by talking to the interviewer about guiding in EverQuest (remember that game?) and it was for a cashier job at Target. I found the best way to get a job is to make friends with the interviewer instead of focusing solely on your job skills.