Every year, fires take thousands upon thousands of lives and destroy homes and properties amounting to billions of dollars. By becoming a firefighter, you have the chance to protect the public against such harm by tackling fires and a variety of other emergencies.
Firefighters put out fires in a variety of environments, not limited to metropolitan areas, rural areas, industrial / chemical sites and airports. In addition, they have assumed a range of other responsibilities, such as offering emergency medical aid.
Lots of people are attracted to the firefighting profession as it is challenging and provides the opportunity to genuinely help the members of their local community. As such, prospective firefighters face keen competition for available job openings.
How to become a firefighter varies somewhat from department to department, but general application requirements to enter a training program are to: be at least 18 years old (sometimes 21); be physically fit; not to have previously been in trouble with the police.
Among the personal qualities you need are strength, endurance, self-discipline, courage and mental alertness. Initiative and good judgment are an advantage too.
The majority of firefighters have a high school diploma, and completing a community college course, or even an associate degree, in fire science may improve your job prospects.
There is both a written exam and a physical test to be passed prior to being accepted on to a training program. Around a 100 multiple choice questions make up the written exam, and it covers memory, observation, logic, reasoning and spatial awareness. The primary focus of the physical ability test is agility, upper body strength and endurance.
If accepted on to a training program, you will spend about 600 hours in training, over the course of 12 to 14 weeks, learning how to become a firefighter. A combination of practical training and classroom instruction will see you study how to prevent fires from occurring and spreading and how to rescue people caught up in them. On completion of the training program, you will be undergo a period of probation at an assigned fire company.
Average salaries are around $30,000, but experience and working overtime will see you earning considerably more. You will also receive certain benefits, such as medical and liability insurance, vacation and sick leave, and some paid holidays.
For promotions to higher level positions, you need to acquire expertise in advanced firefighting equipment and techniques, building construction, emergency medical technology, writing, public speaking, management and budgeting procedures, and public relations. Usually, after becoming a firefighter, the first promotion is to engineer, then lieutenant, captain, battalion chief, assistant chief, deputy chief, and, finally, chief.
I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a virgin. If I have walked with falsehood or my foot has hurried after deceit – let God weigh me in honest scales and he will know that I am blameless – if my steps have turned from the path, if my heart has been led by my eyes or if my hands have been defiled, then may others eat what I have sown, and may my crops be uprooted. If my heart has been enticed by a woman, then may my wife grind another man’s grain, and may other men sleep with her. If I have denied justice to any of my servants, what will I do when God confronts me? What will I answer when called to account?
If I have denied the desires of the poor or let the eyes of the widow grow weary, if I have kept my bread to myself, not sharing it with the fatherless, if I have seen anyone perishing for lack of clothing, or the needy without garments, if I have raised my hand against the fatherless, knowing that I had influence in court, then let my arm fall from the shoulder, let it be broken off at the joint.
If I have put my trust in gold or said to pure gold, ‘You are my security,’ if I have rejoiced over my great wealth, the fortune my hands had gained, then these also would be sins to be judged, for I would have been unfaithful to God on high. If I have rejoiced at my enemies’ misfortune or gloated over the trouble that came to them - I have not allowed my mouth to sin by invoking a curse against their life - if I have concealed my sin as people do, by hiding my guilt in my heart because I so feared the crowd and so dreaded the contempt of the clans that I kept silent and would not go outside - I sign now my defense – let the Almighty answer me; let my accuser put his indictment in writing.
Job endured what has to be just about the worst experience in human history. He lost everything important to him – his wife, kids, servants, home, livestock, health, everything – except his God.
At the very darkest moment, he’s sitting on a rock scraping his sores with a piece of broken pottery. His wife (who didn’t die but did wander away from God) is right there giving him great advice… ”Are you still maintaining your integrity? Curse God and die!” But, in everything that happened, Job refused to sin. He refused to turn his back on God. He refused to feel sorry for him. He refused to get angry at God for what had happened.
Toward the end of the ordeal, right before God shows up in a mighty storm, Job takes time to remind himself and his friends that he lives a life of integrity. He lives with righteousness in his sights. Godliness is his goal. He is committed to not sinning with his eyes, his words, his thoughts or his actions.
If your life is anything like mine, you have days where it just seems everyone is against you. There are days when it seems like everything is going wrong. And those few things that are going right just don’t seem quite as nice and neat as they did before. Plans get muddied up and processes get confused. Feelings get hurt and tempers flare. Some people drop the ball and others accuse you of things that aren’t true. Followers and volunteers lose focus and begin to fight and argue. You’ve probably never experienced a day quite like Job’s but you have experienced a day where you regret rolling out of bed. You have gone to bed at night completely freaked out about what the next day will bring. To be completely honest, you’ve led projects while feeling unworthy and unprepared.
So, when that day comes – and it will – what do you do? When you have the perfect opportunity to sit around feeling sorry for yourself, what do you do? When your friends expect you to quit and retreat, do you? When doing the right thing looks so hard and sin looks so, well, inviting and distracting, what do you decide?
Job chose godliness. He chose integrity. He picked purity. And he spent intentional time reminding himself and his friends of just what his choice was.
I wonder if part of the reason we find it so stinkin’ hard to choose integrity over sin is that we forget what’s most important.
Leading a great ministry or playing a great game or looking like a great person isn’t the most important thing in life. Living a life that ends in the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” is a much worthier focus.
So, when life deals you a cruddy hand and it just seems like everyone’s out to get you and everything is rotten around you, try this: Skip depression and anger and embrace joy and integrity. It’ll make a world of difference.
And I believe God will bless your choice – your integrity – just like he blessed Job’s. (check out Job 42:10-17… it’ll blow your mind)
Hey guys! I know, I know. It has been a HOT minute since I’ve last posted. But it is only 1/3 laziness.
Aren’t you relieved?
The other 2/3 is comprised of work getting out of hand (Wait. You guys want me to do something? Because, I was totes ok with sitting on the sidelines…) and general life issues. I guess I can do a little bit of expanding on that vague phrase.
Renovation City
One day, I noticed something dark and spotty in my shower. Me, being the type of person to freak out at everything, did everything but call 911 to report the emergency. My parents rushed downstairs to find out that there is a mold/mildew problem. Most normal human beings would have probably headed to their local Target to by some cleaning supplies, but Momma and Poppa Investing Newbie don’t play that. NOPE. They did an entire overhaul of the bathroom which included it being literally MOVED and expanded.
My new bathroom is PIMP. And when I say, PIMP, I mean 50 Cent P-I-M-P. Everything is just bigger and nicer. And I have a vanity! I almost don’t want to use it. Oh wait, I actually can’t. Why? Well, have you noticed that if you ever want to fix one thing, you have to actually fix 10? My parents discovered that the pipes needed to be redone and they decided to also change from oil to gas (or maybe it’s the other way around…). So it has been Renovation City in my “space” and I haven’t really found the right mood in which to blog.
Identity Crisis
Not me, me. But my blog. I feel like a teenager that is just starting to get my legs and stuff. Maybe even braces. And I don’t know what the ef is going on with my hair. Don’t get me wrong, I love to blog. But I want to do things with this blog. What are those things? Now, you’re asking me too many questions. All I know is that I want to do things with it. Maybe have it look different. Maybe a special effect or two. But mostly, I would like to start having more focused posts.
Think back to the last time you’ve ever talked to a toddler. Don’t you get the sense that they think that you came into the world as an older person? I get the sense that a lot of the blogs that I read have always been AWESOME. I wouldn’t doubt that could very well have been the case, but I’m sure they’ve all experienced hiccups along the way. Maybe in finding the right blogging time (should it be morning, noon, night? Right now, Noon isn’t an option for me…), or finding their voice, or finding inspiration for their posts. I’m dealing with all of those things now. Ok, maybe not code red sort of “dealing,” but those concepts have been swirling in my mind and I’m hoping to feel comfortable with at least the direction and content of my blog by the time this site turns a year old. (in March…mark your calendars)
So that’s pretty much where I’ve been in a nutshell. So where am I going?
So, after MONTHS and MONTHS of searching for a job, you finally land one. All your hard work and persistence has paid off; you sent out a million resumes, went on more job interviews than you care to admit, considered spending the rest of your life playing the lotto and simply crossing your fingers, but it WORKED!…
…Now, you’ve been at this job for about 2-3 months, and you’re thinking, “Ok…maybe unemployment wasn’t SO bad.”
Sound familiar?
My theory is this; a company’s culture is the deciding factor on whether you want to get up in the morning and go to work. Let’s be honest, unless you get paid to lay in the sun all day or watch television for living, your job is still a job. We may like what we do, but we’d all rather be spending our time with family, friends, or doing things that we WANT to do.
However, if you work for a company who’s culture matches your own, you will get up every morning and not dread going. In fact, I’m willing to bet you will want to go.
Wikipedia defines culture as, “the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization or group.” The more I read that, the more it resonates with me how big of a deal it is to be in a culture setting that you FIT in. Think about it in terms of your own family; if your beliefs are drastically different than other members of your clan, I’m willing to be you don’t spend as much time around them, do you? You’ve probably surrounded yourself with people who *gasp* BELIEVE in similar things that you do. This can range from religion to the type of book club you’re in!
A work atmosphere is no different. If you’re not working for a company who embodies the same beliefs as you do, you won’t be at this company for long. My guess is that you’ll either quit, or you’ll do your job so poorly that they’ll fire you.
I believe this because it’s happened to me before. My first job after graduation was working for a music company. After I was hired, I was sent off to Florida to be trained for a whole week with one of the top managers in the company. I learned so much, believed what he told me about how amazing and fair the company was, and how great it was to work for them. I went back to start my job, excited to get going and make a difference in the company…but that didn’t happen.
While I tried hard at first, I just couldn’t get past the fact that what I was told about this company was completely opposite from what the actual truth was. Now, I will say in all fairness that what may have been true at one store wasn’t at another, and so what my trainer told me may have not been a lie in his eyes. But it was clear to me from the beginning that not all the stores or all the people that worked for them were on the same page. My set of beliefs did not match with what I was experiencing at this company, and completely turned me off all together. I HATED going to work, and the hard worker I had been turned into a slacker who simply didn’t care. All I wanted to do was LEAVE, and the sooner the better. I found another job within two months and never looked back.
Now, after another culture clash in between, I’m finally with a company I truly fit into. Our motto is, “Have fun and celebrate life everyday!” And you know what? It’s NOT just something we say but don’t follow through with. Today we just had our Christmas party, and the all day event (close to it) was fantastic. There was plenty of food, friends, and fun! I looked around the room during our lunch, and thought, “Wow. How did I get so lucky?” Because it’s not just the Christmas party that makes me realize how well I fit with this company. It’s all the other ways we strive to better ourselves everyday. I can truly say I LOVE my job, and it’s because of the people I work with and work for.
My advice? Don’t hold yourself back. If you find yourself hating your job but your not sure why, take a look around you and see if you’re just not fitting in with the culture that company has already set for itself. Your relationship with your company is an important one, so if you’re clashing, it may be time to “break up.”
To see my pictures of the company Christmas party, check out this link! Each department had a different Christmas movie to base their theme off of. Recruiting did Christmas Vacation, which explains the “Cousin Eddie” look a like you’ll see lots of! And yes, the can is empty and was a prop! :) http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2375364&id=21706504&l=b28c75746d
An interview gives you the opportunity to showcase your qualifications to an employer, so it pays to be well prepared. The following information provides some helpful hints.
Preparation:
* Learn about the organization.
* Have a specific job or jobs in mind.
* Review your qualifications for the job.
* Be ready to briefly describe your experience, showing how it relates it the job.
* Be ready to answer broad questions, such as “Why should I hire you?” “Why do you want this job?” “What are your strengths and weaknesses?”
* Practice an interview with a friend or relative.
Personal appearance:
* Be well groomed.
* Dress appropriately.
* Do not chew gum or smoke.
The interview:
* Be early.
* Learn the name of your interviewer and greet him or her with a firm handshake.
* Use good manners with everyone you meet.
* Relax and answer each question concisely.
* Use proper English—avoid slang.
* Be cooperative and enthusiastic.
* Use body language to show interest—use eye contact and don’t slouch.
* Ask questions about the position and the organization, but avoid questions whose answers can easily be found on the company Web site.
* Also avoid asking questions about salary and benefits unless a job offer is made.
* Thank the interviewer when you leave and shake hands.
* Send a short thank you note.
Information to bring to an interview:
* Social Security card.
* Government-issued identification (driver’s license).
* Resume or application. Although not all employers require a resume, you should be able to furnish the interviewer information about your education, training, and previous employment.
* References. Employers typically require three references. Get permission before using anyone as a reference. Make sure that they will give you a good reference. Try to avoid using relatives as references.
* Transcripts. Employers may require an official copy of transcripts to verify grades, coursework, dates of attendance, and highest grade completed or degree awarded.
Wow, what a day. In fact, what a trip this has been for nine days, and although still in a bit of shock over things, it hit me that the only rational way for me to deal with the loss is to get out the laptop and write.
After 3 years and 4 months of my life, my career at RazorGator has come to an abrupt end. Well, abrupt in the sense I thought I had more time, but isn’t that always the case?
I have no intent of using this forum for anything negative. I enjoyed my time with the company, met some good people and learned a lot of new skills that will hopefully pay dividends in whatever comes along next. Do I have an opinion in regards to the manner in which this whole situation was played out? You bet, but that is wasted energy.
Sure, I’m bummed today, and it would not surprise me if I am bummed for a few days. Maybe the line of thinking from the employer is correct, lay off or fire an employee close to the weekend to give him a few days to mentally, spiritually and emotionally recuperate. I have a feeling Friday will entail hiding out at home, listening to the iPod and reading a book or two. Saturday is an evening with Big Red, something that always makes me feel good. Sunday is breakfast with a good friend and teacher from my high school days, then a day with the family doing whatever. I like the sounds of all that!
Too often in my life I have to be slapped in the face hard to be reminded I do not have control over what occurs from one day to the next. I can make all the plans I want, but to think I have any part in planning the results has once again proven to be an exercise in futility. That is okay, and the quicker I approve of that being the case, the quicker I get into acceptance, and the quicker I get into action.
Yes my friends, acceptance DOES mean approval. Gary McClure, may he rest in peace, taught me that years ago. Once I am 100% comfortable with the fact that I will no longer have a need to travel to the office everyday, at least for that particular company, I can move on and be happy.
So look out world, Tfronky is coming! And at the age of 40, I have every intention of doing something that makes me happy first.
Long time no see, but I’m back now. Sort of. I don’t know how much I can update this thing currently but some of my life has been worked out enough so I can write on this blog again. I have a longer post today because of the big gap between posts. In my deluded mind I think it might make up for, oh, something.
I seem to be a magnet of sorts for blood makeup. This, to me, is never a bad thing. It can become interesting, however, when other people realize you don’t mind getting covered in gore. Since I like to use gore in projects too I tend to put up with it. I figure if I’m going to subject my actors to this treatment I might as well be willing to go through with it. Plus the pictures that come out of these situations tend to look awesome.
One of my first major film projects was in my third year of college, and it wasn’t very major. It was a comedy skit for a skit show I ended up being in charge of (that’s a long story for another time) involving a guy (played by Chris who was actually not behind the camera this time) killing his roommate and trying to pass it off to the authorities when they investigate. The guy apparently hadn’t killed just one person, but numerous people…with a sword. This encouraged a cartoonish amount of gore and the immortal line from the killer “I cut myself shaving…with my sword” while trying to explain the blood. We thought it was funny as hell, but then again it was 2am when this thing got done so everything was funny.
During this time most the filming took place in my friend’s room. He was the director so it wasn’t any big deal. The bathroom was going to be the big climactic “awesome” moment. It would involve numerous bodies dead all over the bathroom and some blood. The makeup artist was my friend named Wayne, who also happened to be one of the roommates of the director making this his bathroom. The first thing to know about Wayne is that he loves special effects and makeup. The second thing to know about Wayne is that he might be bugfuck crazy.
When he heard “some blood” his brain apparently translated it as “gallons of gore and entrails hanging from the walls and ceiling.” I was set to play a dead body in the bathroom and help some of the effects. The extent of my involvement was to last an our. It lasted six, mainly because I got caught up in Wayne’s craziness. So did another cast member. Eventually the filming out in the room (behind a closed bathroom door) went over an hour long so NO ONE checked on us for over an hour. This was, in retrospect, probably the problem.
By the time the director thought to check his bathroom, the place was absolutely destroyed. We were all soaked in gore from head to toe (my clothes were ruined forever) and there was guts hanging off the mirror. The floor was basically one big inch deep lake of fake blood, and the walls looked like the elevator scene in The Shining. We could only smile and leave.
The director, with a shocked look on his face, simply shut the door.
Soon after that the other roommate got back. He took one look at the bathroom and his jaw hit the floor. He muttered something like “Oh my fucking god” and simply left the apartment, wanting nothing to do with the carnage.
The scene was eventually shot without a hitch. At this point I resembled a car wreck victim; every inch of me was covered in blood or some sort of crusted over thing that made my skin looked cut up. It was glorious. One of the gags was the authority figure poking my body in horror and me rolling off the counter I’m laying on into the lake of blood below. It was fantastic.
The side effect of this was the clean up, and by extension, how I looked while we were cleaning up. I now looked like a standing, walking, talking car wreck victim on a day that wasn’t Halloween. Or as my friend put it, I looked like a zombie.
I had to take advantage of this immediately.
We needed paper towels for the cleanup and I quickly volunteered to go to the store. I called my friend John for help. He met me outside the building and simply stared in shock at my appearance before simply accepting that I was covered in blood. I don’t think he expected any less of me, come to think of it. Then we walked to the store.
We passed some people on the way, who all stared in some mix of shock and humor. One person commented on my appearance and my response was “I can’t remember the last fifteen minutes” which got a decent response, but not exactly what I wanted. Then we reached the store.
The store was small and full of things students need to survive. It was also full of people for some reason at 2am. They all froze and stared as soon as I entered with John. You could hear a pin drop in the store quite suddenly. I froze and smiled back. John looked between the store full of people and me, then turned to the clerk and said loudly…
“Paper towels and band aids are over here, right?!” The clerk could only nodd.
John and I quickly grabbed all the paper towel and napkins the store had to offer with all eyes on us (we forgot about the band aids, since it was a joke anyway) and dumped them in front of the clerk. He asked what the hell I was doing. I responded that I had woken up in South Central like this and couldn’t remember why. THAT got a laugh. It was about damn time.
We carried the paper towels back in a very public way and got two more questions about my appearance. For one I simply said something about a possible murder that I can’t remember (it wasn’t as funny), and for the other person I said in a quiet intense scared voice “THEY’RE HERE!” which got me a frightened look back which still causes a laugh when I remember the story vividly.
With John shanghaied into helping us clean the bathroom (whether he wanted to or not) it still took two hours to make the bathroom goreless. In the end it turned out the “washable” blood had actually been soaked into the bathroom’s plaster walls, turning all the walls a strange shade of pink that wouldn’t come out. Oops. It later turned out that the bathroom repair and repaint due to our skit cost 600 dollars at the end of the school year, making this thing the most expensive skit we ever shot. It turned out okay at least, although it was edited by a sophomore who was apparently influenced by Michael Bay so it ended up looking more like a pot head’s fever dream than a funny gore filled comedy skit. The best thing we ended up getting out of the gory bathroom was funny extra footage that had Wayne sliding across the bathroom floor on his stomach and flopping around like a fish. We ended up using that in some commercials to preview up our skits. I can safely say the advertisements worked.
It took 45 minutes in the God Damn shower to get the blood out and it painted my shower red for a few days, but it gained me a reputation of doing crazy shit on and for film I still have with my friends to this day. It was also one of the more successful things we ever shot that early into our insane “careers” at school. Wayne and his two roommates (especially the one that left the room) still call it “the most expensive skit we ever shot” and with some remorse. I’m just happy nothing that day cost me anything at all except later some skin care products.
Each department had a different Christmas movie to base their theme off of. Recruiting did Christmas Vacation, which explains the “Cousin Eddie” look a like you’ll see lots of! And yes, the can is empty and was a prop! :) http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2375364&id=21706504&l=b28c75746d