I applied to donate sperm. I’m running out of money and I keep getting rejected from job offers when they find out I don’t have a car.

My first choice of working at one of the coffee shops or Blockbusters within bus distance is failing because none of them are hiring. My second choice of applying to jobs I find on Craig’s List has gotten me somewhere, but that somewhere is not what I want. I got an offer to work as an office supply salesman where my job would be driving around to small businesses and trying to not get kicked out of the store before I convince them to buy a couple reams of paper. As tempting as the offer was, I don’t have a car, and that makes the job impossible. I realized this halfway through my first day of sitting shotgun with one of the other sales associates.

I thought back to my interview when they had asked if I had reliable transportation. I answered yes. Because I do have reliable transportation. The bus. The bus is very reliable. It runs on a schedule – the definition of reliable. It is more reliable than a car. If they were really asking if I had a car they should have asked if I had flexible transportation. A bus is not flexible. That would have gotten to the point. Better yet, they could have just fucking asked me if I had a car. Then I wouldn’t have had to take an hour long bus ride out to some suburb to spend the entire day with some frat-boy douchenozzle who takes delight in forcing dentist’s offices to buy manila folders that they don’t need.

At first I thought that this job might be possible for me because we were traveling together, and I could ride in someone else’s car, but after a rigorous question and answer session – “Do you guys travel alone or with two to a car?” “Alone” – I realized that there was no way I could perform my required duties. This was halfway through our day, when we were in the midst of driving around some suburb I had never heard of. There was no way I could just tell Fratty McGee that I was done for the day and he was to drive me home, so I persevered. It’s not like I had anything better to do.

Each Orthodontist, Chiropractor, and Fitness Club we stopped in at had a similar reaction to our entrance: disgust. I’m not sure how my Indianaian Co-worker could go on each day after being met with such contempt so often, but he did. He did so while using the same opening line at every single place.

“How can we help you?” The receptionist would ask holding back a frown and a scream.

“How about giving us a space heater…………. Cus it’s cold………..outside.” Indiana would respond hilariously.

“Sorry, we don’t have one.” The unamused receptionist would retort.

Because I was tired of hearing the same joke (Obviously I can’t stand when someone keeps using the same mildly amusing premise over and over – like being lazy), I started taking over introductions. It may not have been appropriate, but it was way more bearable. Indiana Frats started to get annoyed, but I couldn’t have cared less. I was trying to speed this day up so that we could get to the ride home where I would ask him to drop me off so that I could get back to enjoying hulu.com and eating my cereal in bed.

Our last client of the day was easily our funnest. We went into a State Farm Insurance agent’s office. He started talking our ears off about some Australian agent from the same company as us who had come in earlier. To this story I politely laughed and apologized for bothering him. Frats O’Indy doubled over in fake chuckles and asked him if he wanted to buy any paper. The insurance agent who used to be an English teacher looked at him with a quizzical look and said: “Did you listen at all, boy?” Then, because he was annoyed with our desire to waste his time, he decided to repay the favor. This was no skin off my potato. As my partner tried to back out the door, the insurance agent drew us back in with stories about his life. I saw this as an opportunity to not have to go back into the frigid Minnesota winter and instead finish up my day talking to a relatively intelligent person. I asked where his daughter had gone to school as there was a picture of her graduating from college on his desk. He told me Williams which is a pretty prestigious school out on the east coast. He in turn asked where I went, I told him Macalester, which he complimented lavishly. Then he turned to my cohort and asked him the same question. When he responded with Indiana University – head held high, proud of his alma mater – the insurance agent said: “No need to hang your head about that.” “I’m not.” “Just because you didn’t go to as good as school as this young boy, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be proud.” “I am.” “Don’t let this young man make you feel pathetic.” “I don’t.”

The awkward intelligence divide only worsened when the former English teacher asked us for some suggestions for his reading club’s list of the 50 best American Novels. I suggested Catcher in the Rye, Slaughter House Five, and Confederacy of Dunces. The Dummy from Indiana stared blankly and then finally said: “Do biographies count?” Dumbfounded, the possible client responded: “Sure, why not?” and put down his pen knowing he wasn’t going to write anything the man suggested down. A point I should probably have pointed out earlier, is that the man we were selling to was Black. Usually this would be unnecessary to focus on, especially now that racism is dead with our new pressy-poo, but when your co-worker tries to pander to his potential client blatantly by suggesting the auto-biography of Fredrick Douglass for his reading list, it becomes a necessary detail. We snuck out ashamedly from the State Farm office and started to drive home.

After I told my driver that I should just get dropped off since I didn’t think this job was for me considering I didn’t have a car, I had to spend twenty more minutes in the car with him.

Now I have a new plan for money. This plan involves way less pretending to enjoy the company of others and way more pretending to enjoy the company of myself – something I’m much better at. This is the ultimate job for me. This is the job I am most qualified to do based on experience. This is the job I have been training for every day for the past nine years, sometimes more than once a day. Sometimes as much as four times a day. Once, I practiced for this job seven times in a day.

Filling out the application proved a more stressful experience than I expected. I had to add ten pounds to my weight to make myself a somewhat normal size (5’9”, 135 lbs), and I identified as Swedish instead of Jewish because I’m sure there is low demand and high supply of scrawny Jews who have an art streak in the sperm community. After I finished the racist and sizest questionnaire about my life, I received an email telling me that I had passed and could move on to the next section. I’ve now finished the application and should hear back soon as to whether or not I can get a thousand bucks a month to jerk off into a cup and create little Nisses to roam the world.

If I had taken that job selling paper, I wouldn’t have felt comfortable with myself knowing that I am in no way helping society. Now, I can feel very comfortable with the fact that I may help a bunch of barren couples find the joy that comes with taking care of me. I’m a lot of fun.