I had a summer job digging cacti. That’s the plural for cactus. Those are the prickly things that grow in the desert.
This wasn’t the kind of job you would find on Monster.com. More like the kind on Dirty Jobs.
My friend Brian and I spent the ENTIRE summer of 1992 on his uncle’s land digging cacti for minimum wage (which at the time was like $4.25/hour). We spent most of our earnings on breakfast and lunch, and the rest on sunflower seeds and snuff.
I learned quite a few things that summer.
1) I learned the value of a hard days work. $34. Not enough.
2) I learned how to sleep COMPLETELY still. You’d be surprised how hard it is to wash the little cactus needle-hairs off.
3) I learned not to get thrown out of the back of the truck into a pile of cactus. This was learned the HARD way, after a night in the ER getting a thorn removed from my tendon. I have a cool Owen Wilson scar on my right wrist as a memento. It’s funny now, but not at the time. I actually stuck to the ground. I looked like a reverse porcupine.
4) I learned that I needed to work harder in school so as not to have to dig cactus anymore.
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April 1, 2008 at 11:47 am
jamienance
wow! Ouch!
Funny side note: I spent the summer with my granddad and my step-grandmother in 1995 and I saw these cacti on her land and I thought “who would want cacti on their land?” so I stopped them and tried to kill them. To my suprise, the cacti was a gift and she had planted it there on purpose.
oopsy… Yeah and then I got a cacti needle in the bottom of my foot. Those little things hurt, my foot was sore for like a week. I can’t imagine having those things all over. I would need a serious sedative for that. ouch!
But hey, at least now, you’ll never have to do that again! yay!!! and if Josh gives you trouble when he becomes a teenager just make him dig up cacti.
April 1, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Emily
I was 11 years old in 1992, old man.
April 1, 2008 at 8:53 pm
Tammy McCue
Crazy job, hmmm… I had to count rubber fishing worms after they were soaked in motor oil. My hands were really soft though! That was in 1984 and I made like $3.00 an hour. At the time it was a little better than minimum wage! Oh and Emily makes me feel old! Bobby & I were engaged in 1992! Crazy how fast time flies by!
April 2, 2008 at 7:12 am
squincheye
Hey, I was only like 15 or 16. Who’s old, now?