Have you ever felt *this* awkward?
Sometimes I can be a fantastic salesperson. Though I’ve certainly never felt like one. If the god of sales is Alec Baldwin’s Glengarry Glen Ross, I oughta be his brother Stephen in a made-for-TV Hallmark film about selling greeting cards.
I can be awkward.
I can be overly direct.
I can be expressionless at the most emotionful of times.
I’m usually honest to the point of wondering why the term TMI isn’t spelled JJP. But for some reason, I can sell. And I have my autopilot to thank for that.
Rubik's Camera
My second sales job was at an odd little startup in Taiwan years ago. They sold these paradoxically cute little home security cameras which looked like something you'd find in a weird crossover between Toys R' US and the NRA's gift shop, sans white supremacism.
The unusual role came with an unusual perk — I got to soar all around the world to tech shows featuring our adorably disturbing merchandise.
The position involved late-night international phone calls, occasional posing as a Dutchman, and knowing every single aspect of the cameras inside and out. Being the awkward individual that I’m wont to be — I completely memorized a 3-minute sales pitch to physically show customers how the funky little devices worked.
I memorized and repeated it so much I could spout it off to anyone at any given time, without deviating from a single point or feature. I was on autopilot mode at the click of an internal key.
I don’t think I had a choice, really. After all, perfected pitches meant no unexpected hitches.
Aloha, U'i
It’s the winter of 2013. We fly in from Taiwan to Honolulu for a 12-hour layover. We take the bus to the beach. A hopeful gruff stranger in a trenchcoat loudly asks my coworker if he’d enjoy some fellatio. He politely declines.
There’s a reason my coworker was nicknamed Handsome Jack.
We later find ourselves on a rich stranger’s yacht drinking beer until the flight to the mainland. Contrarily—and perhaps somewhat rudely—the wealthy stranger does not offer us irrumation. I find Honolulu far friendlier and scarier than expected.
We land in Las Vegas the next morning where I make three discoveries:
A sun-drenched desert can still be freezing cold.
Hotel owners can charge $80 for WiFi and still manage to sleep at night.
Las Vegas is even stranger than random offers of oral fondness.
We scramble to the tech show, already late.
The Capital of Nerdsville
The event is called the Consumer Electronics Show. It’s run by the Consumer Technology Association. It’s billed as the most important, aggrandized annual technology exhibition in the entire world. Creativity is not a requirement for a job in the naming department here.
100,000 gleeful entrepreneurs, salespeople, and fellow awkward nerds descend on a casino-turned-exhibition hall for a week. You can feel the electric excitement in the air. It’s amazing.
And incredibly, unbelievably, dorky AF.
Handsome Jack and I each have at least 10 interviews scheduled for the week. Most are small tech-blogging sites or niche magazines looking for the latest product to proffer up to their readers.
These meetups are always friendly, easy-going, and pain-free. But most shows have one or two big moments. The local news, a Q&A lecture, or an exec from a giant retailer shows up.
The stakes are high. These moments are where the stress rises, the fear creeps up, and the exact reason I love having an autopilot to rely on.
Click.
The first interview’s over. The boss is happy. Perfection.
There was one thing in common no matter what country we’d visit — my coworker would get hit on. Customers loved him. Ladies loved him. Creepy dudes in trenchcoats on busy buses were especially fond of him.
There’s a reason people called him Handsome Jack.
My boss knew this too. He also felt I had a face more suited for radio. For some reason, Handsome Jack did most of the TV interviews.
He has one of these big interviews scheduled for Thursday. The details are slim, but we know the interviewer has a large TV audience where, presumably, many potential US retailers will be watching.
The Big Day
100 hours, 7,000 miles, and approximately 15 gallons of coffee later, the day arrives. The morning goes by without a hitch.
Click.
Click.
Click.
My autopilot is functioning perfectly as designed. No lunch today, the nerves can’t handle it. Too many interviews. Too many coffees. Too many sales pitches.
My boss scurries over to me out of the blue and interrupts a sales pitch. I’d never seen him do this before as his fondness for money was greater than any bus stranger’s desire for a mouthful. The tension rises.
Shit.
“Handsome Jack’s Q&A is going too well. They want him to keep talking. You need to do the TV thing.”
Shit.
“They called me this morning. It’s actually many interviewers. Like 50 or something. Okay, good luck. Bye.”
Get it together. Calm down. You got this. You got this. For the love of God and all that is holy in this sea of nerds, you got this.
Shit.
A mob of 50 techno-reporters turn the corner and approach. They’re wearing bulky earpieces, holding stick microphones, and look less amused than my cat when I practice my hilarious stand-up routines.
But this was no time to be kitten around, I had to stay pawsitive.
The mob leader approaches me as one does an alien ambassador upon their first visit to Earth— proud, confident, and full of hopeful grandiose reciprocation.
She will be disappointed today.
Her: “We have about 30 seconds.”
Me: “For what, exactly?”
Her: “Until we go live on radio to all of Nevada with at least 70,000 listeners!”
Me: “Radio?! I thought this was a…”
Her: “10 seconds.”
The Pit of My Stomach: “…video recording…”
She impatiently motions to the microphone.
I shrink.
I'm back in grade school being asked to spell “apprehension” in front of the class.
Click.
“Hi, there! My name is JJ and I’m from Uncomfortably Cute Security Cameras Incorporated. Today I’ll be talking about a brand new home security camera, called the ‘Your Wife Will Hate This.’ It’s quite possibly the best home security product to hit the shelves in 2013! And to top it off, just look at its creepy cute cuddly design.”
Unclick.
Angry waves and arms snap me out of autopilot. I see mouthed whispers of “There is no fucking camera, man!”
This is not the way to greet an alien ambassador. Rude.
Click?
“Umm, yea, so, uhh. The camera looks like a popular toy you probably grew up with. It’s umm, blue, and well there’s different models, uhh, colors, like you can see here— you can, uh check the website to see it!”
Such an exquisite mixture of disappointment and anger has never concurrently appeared on 50 faces until this precise moment in history. I am an apprehensive alien child being scolded in a classroom of critical dorks.
Click?
“So anyway, this camera is simply jam-packed with features. Firstly, watch how it rotates.”
“THERE IS NO FUCKING CAMERA!” she whisper-yells while frantically waving a single-fingered form of Earth sign language I have yet to learn.
Click?
“Uhh, okay well then let’s just flip it over and, uhh, look at the back of the camera…Oh. Right.”
The thunderous roar of 50 palms simultaneously slapping foreheads interrupts my trainwreck of thought.
“Umm, yea it has, uh, ports and stuff. Uhh. Let’s go over here to see the real working models in live action!”
This continues for the longest 3 minutes of my life.
Earth’s leader is not amused. She slices her neck in the universal hand sign of “We’re done here.” I suspect her motion has multiple meanings today.
“Oh, thanks Las Vegas, uhh Nevada, come check out our website at…just search for our company on Google. Thanks!”
Unclick.
I die a little inside.
For the first time in my life, footsteps can ridicule me. The reporter mob’s collective disappanger will send the alien back off-planet in slope-shouldered shame.
The mission failed.
First contact was to be the last.
“What the hell just happened?”
I look to my left.
My boss is busy talking to another client. I breathe a sigh of relief. My job is safe for another day.
I look to my right.
Handsome Jack is keeled over rolling on the floor, tears flowing from his face in a fit of uncontrolled laughter that doesn’t stop for 5 minutes.
I die a little more.
But I survive.
Years later, after countless random embarrassment-shivers recollecting the experience, I realize the slogan was wrong.
“What Happens in Vegas, Stays on to Plague Us.”
Unclick.
This message has been brought to you by a non-lizard-king named J.J. Pryor.
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Well, Faulkner and Hemingway were wordy and self-absorbed, but neither one ever used "irrumation" in a sentence.