Page 53 - Like No Business I Know

Get in the POOL!

FRED: Whoa! Hold on, Sis. No guarantees. I can get him in the
door, but he’ll still have to pass the tests and the interviews.
RALPH: What tests? Don’t I have to know what the job is, first?

FRED: Nope. That’s the beauty of it. All I can tell you is that you’ll
be in the POOL with a bunch of other workers.

RALPH: Pool? You mean a motor pool? A typing pool?
FRED (laughing): No, no. I’m sorry: another acronym. POOL stands
for Personnel Omnibus Operations Location.

RALPH: That means nothing to me. And I thought you did away
with “personnel” as inappropriate terminology.

FRED: It’s not inappropriate in this case. Listen, Ralph: I know you
value your independence and all that, but good-paying jobs are
getting hard to find. You want to keep my sister in the style to which
she’s accustomed, don’t you?
FRANCINE: Well, Ralph?

RALPH (sighs): All right. I’ve got no other prospects at present—
might as well try to get in the POOL. I’ll be at your office in the
morning, in my best suit. Who does the interviewing, one person or a
committee?
FRED: Neither.

SOUND EFFECT: (electronic “boing”)
(Atomic Cleanser commercial AC-384A)
SOUND EFFECT: (Beyond Tomorrow theme 2: theremin riffs)

ANNOUNCER: We return to “Get in the POOL.” It is the
following afternoon, and Ralph is just getting home from his first day
on the job at Cheerful Robots.

RALPH: Honey, I’m home!
FRANCINE: Yes, I know. The Servotech told me when you were
half a block away.
RALPH: What? How can it do that?

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