Small Places : Nick L Belardes [93 of 128]

• Buildicon is compelling me to do more work. Somehow, I’ve earned a raise. I shake hands with the Prez and the interim marketing manager.
• Both say I am doing a good job by tricking me with corporate lingo: "You could do a lot better. We're expecting big things from you..."
• "Team play, team this, team that, team team team..." It never makes much sense other than I know I deserve more money.
• But now I make $36,000 a year to design/copywrite ads about wireless gadgets that look like little metal boxes with holes in them.
• They don’t flash much. They don’t bleep or make R2D2 sounds. They can’t follow you down a corridor or even help pilot an X-Wing.
• They link to robot arms that build, smash, count, squirt, fry, bake—and I think—smash lemons into lemon juice.
• No one really knows all the functionality, especially the sales force. They sit around concocting fancy schematics.
• The sales guys then present customers with the idea they need forty $2,000 gizmos to run their communications network protocol blah blah.
• In other words: they just sell gadgets by the bucket loads. I suppose I do make it all more interesting and marketable. Sex sells.