My second interview was at Northern Illinois University. Northern Illinois was about three hours north of U of I (where I was in grad school) and about an hour west of the city. Far enough from the city to be completely removed from civilization, cold enough to suffer frostbite if you decided to watch “Green Acres” outside in winter. Northern Illinois had a real music program – about 200 students. Each instrument had its own professor and some of them had recorded albums and everything.
One of the committee members contacted me. He was an old classmate of my teacher's. “We’ll put you up in the university hotel,” he said, “ and then you’ll have the job interview the next day.”
After dinner I checked into the “hotel.” I place the word hotel in quotes, not because it wasn’t an actual hotel, but it was a teaching hotel, or a hotel run by students. I wondered about how trustworthy the students were with personal and financial information. A pimply faced eighteen year old who had only just crossed the puberty threshold walked up to the counter asked me for my ID and credit card for incidentals. I peered into his eyes to discern whether or not , it would actually be safe to hand him my information. What was the likelihood that my credit card number would go up on eBay or have three hundred dollars of internet charges for an X-rated porn site? He looked innocent enough, I guessed. Ashamed of my mistrust of possibly one of tomorrow’s great world leaders, I looked at the glass case check counter. The hotel had travel sized toothpaste, toothbrushes, dental floss, shaving kits, Northern Illinois University beer cozies, ad all other ridiculous stuff for sale at twice the cost of a real store. After signing a few forms, I was given a swipe card and sent up to the hotel room.
The hotel room was exceptionally unremarkable. - nothing special, even by hotel room standards. For that night, however, it was mine. Almost Dr. Chronic Nice Guy, paid guest of Northern Illinois University. I called one of my friends. He had a million questions. What was the room like? How was dinner? What kind of town was it? How far away was it from the city really? What is there to do in town? While I was talking to him I glanced down at the Northern Illinois University hotel folder. I wondered if this folder would tell me what type of place DeKalb was.
I glanced through the items. There was actually very little information about the university. There was a campus map, a list of numbers of local pizza places, but what caught my eye was a small color booklet that fell out of the leather folder. It was printed by the federal government and was called “What to do in case of a hotel fire.” I opened it up and read it.
The next morning I started the class by saying, "I wasn't sure what kind of place DeKalb was, so I decided to read your brochures. When I got to the one that said 'What to do in case of a hotel fire,' I figured I had better read it, especially since it was in the what to do folder. I mean, I don't know what kinds of things people in DeKalb like to do for fun. So, the pamphlet said, 'When checking into a hotel room, you should bring the following three items with you: A flashlight, a smoke detector, and a roll of duct tape.' So, I'm really sorry to say this, but I don't think I'm prepared or my class. I own a flashlight, but I didn't bring it with me. My smoke detector is screwed in to my wall and embarrassingly, I don't own a roll of duct tape.' " The students in the class all laughed. I looked at the faculty committee. They were not amused. I would up not getting the job.
So, on that interview I learned two things: one, that you should purchase a roll of duct tape and carry it with you at all times and two, you probably should tell true and hilarious, but insulting stories about the place you want to hire you.
