weird career ideas

My own made-up career test results

I took one of those “answer a bunch of questions and we’ll tell you which careers you are totally suited for” quizzes last week and partway through I suspected they would ask me to pony up a few bucks to see the results. Sure enough, I was asked to fork over $9.99 to learn that I might make a great chicken farmer.

My unpaid conclusion is that I need to get into the job quiz creation business. $10 per result? I could get rich! Slowly, slowly rich.

I may yet be willing to offer money for some of this “career advice” but I’m not convinced the specific site in question is worth the money, meaning I’ll have to do research on these sites first. Once again, looking for work is work, even if I’m not looking for anything specific (yet).

While I contemplate the horror of having to do research (I hate research the same way I hate elevators. Maybe I had a traumatic experience with research when I was a child that I’m blocking now.) I figure I could get the old idea train rolling by just getting out and pushing myself.

Which is to say, I’m going to list a bunch of careers I might (“might”) be suited for that I’m coming up with off the top of my head. Here we go, yay!

Awesome careers for someone
(Possibly me, possibly someone else, possibly no one)

  • Chicken farmer
    • Pros:
      • Chickens are small and sort of cute, maybe?
      • The rich smell of earth, honest and pure
      • Be my own boss
      • Chickens might talk back but it’s all just clucking, so it’s fine
      • Never have to shop for chicken for dinner ever again
      • Not cooped up (lol) in a stuffy office, sitting at a desk and prematurely aging
    • Cons:
      • Chicken poop
      • Probably have to get up early
      • Not a life of fabulous wealth and luxury
      • Rich smell is actually gross, because of the aforementioned poop
  • Singer
    • Pros:
      • Who doesn’t like singing?
      • All you need is your voice
      • Look, “Friday” was a best-selling single. FRIDAY.
      • Creative work nourishes the soul
    • Cons:
      • Earning a living could be challenging, resulting in starvation and death
      • Autotune can only go so far
      • Would need musicians or have to steal music or something

I have run out of time (I am writing this on my lunch break, which may be ironic), so I will add to this post soon(tm).

My new career(s)!

UPDATE, October 27, 2023: I thought it might be fun (?) to update on What Happened Next, as at the time I did this career-searching stuff, I was "between jobs."

2010: I got hired at Shaw, as a tech support person (not on the list, though #18 Computer Trainer could be a very loose fit). After six months, I was ready to look into joining the clergy.

2012: Langara College, working in...tech support! I stayed at this job until August 2021, almost nine years. By the end, I was looking at joining the clergy again.

2021-present: Working on my own as an indie game developer. I love it! I haven't released my first game yet, so I'm not exactly rolling in dough, or even Play-Doh, but if you mash together about six of the career suggestions below, and squint a lot, you might get something resembling programmer or developer.

NOTE: While the Career Cruising link still works, it just redirects to their main page, not a career matchmaker or anything other than BUY OUR SERVICES, OK?

As part of a career exploration program, I recently checked out a site called Career Cruising. The Matchmaker section has you answer 39 questions and then spits out a list of 40 possible careers based on your answers. Here’s my full list:

  1.     Acting Instructor
  2.     Professor
  3.     Clergy
  4.     Bereavement Counsellor
  5.     Addictions Counsellor
  6.     Sport Psychology Consultant
  7.     Developmental Service Worker
  8.     Adult Education Teacher
  9.     Art / Music Therapist
  10.     Website Designer
  11.     Foreign Language Instructor
  12.     ESL Teacher
  13.     Psychologist
  14.     Actor
  15.     Curriculum Specialist
  16.     Desktop Publisher
  17.     Cartoonist
  18.     Computer Trainer
  19.     Gerontologist
  20.     Occupational Therapist
  21.     Animator
  22.     Director of Photography
  23.     Multimedia Developer
  24.     Director
  25.     Social Worker
  26.     Marriage and Family Therapist
  27.     Abuse / Crisis Counsellor
  28.     Religious Worker
  29.     Community Worker
  30.     Psychiatric Aide
  31.     Recreation Therapist
  32.     Set Designer
  33.     Comedian
  34.     Casting Director
  35.     Costume Designer
  36.     Music Teacher / Instructor
  37.     Print Journalist
  38.     Humanitarian Aid Worker
  39.     Critic
  40.     Musician

And here’s my take on the Top 10:

1. Acting Instructor Is this like being a drama teacher, except for adults? I could see myself doing this, as I actually studied acting when I first entered college. Whether I’d want to do it is another matter.
2. Professor A professor presumably needs a field of expertise. Would video games count as a subject matter? I was pretty good at Ms Pac-Man back in the day. Other than that, I got nothin’.
3. Clergy This one is perfect, assuming there is an untapped demand for agnostic gay priests.
4. Bereavement Counsellor For better or for worse, I am the type of person who employs sarcasm on a regular basis. I could be wrong, but I think sarcasm is not often used to comfort people grieving the loss of someone. “To be fair, most people never liked him, anyway, amirite?”
5. Addictions Counsellor See #4. “Man, I remember when I was drinking chocolate milk every day, I couldn’t stop, so I totally understand how it is with you and heroin.”
6. Sport Psychology Consultant I’m not even sure what this career would involve. Telling people to not worry about others laughing at them when they jog? Advising on cycling pants that make you look less fat? Sharing feel-good stories with amateur sports teams for a low, low fee?
7. Developmental Service Worker This is some kind of social worker. I could do this because I’m pretty patient listening to tales of woe. If I then had to do something about the woe, it could get tricky…     
8. Adult Education Teacher I could teach newbies how  to use a computer and navigate the Internet. If I could stop just one person from sending money to a prince in Nigeria, it would be worth it.
9. Art / Music Therapist This stuff is just weird. If I had to create my own art or music I’d probably end up filling mental hospitals as my skills are somewhat underdeveloped when it comes to drawing and playing an instrument. If I had to merely apply art or music to improve the mental or emotional health of people…the result would be the same, most likely.
10. Website Designer This one is plausible as I’ve built and maintained websites before, including several from scratch. Of course, that was mostly back when everything was HTML code written in Notepad and good design meant it didn’t induce seizures or cause your computer to spontaneously reboot, so I’d need to acquaint myself with more modern techniques and that would involve programming and that wouldn’t be pretty because my brain treats programming like a foreign language it doesn’t want to learn, ever.

Overall, a few possibilities and more than a fair share of “39 questions is obviously not enough”. There is an option to answer a total of 100+ questions, so if I run the Matchmaker again, I’ll highlight the new results here.