About a year ago, I lamented my timing as I managed to catch a cold exactly one day before starting a new job. At the time, I thought having a cold on your first day of work was probably the worst timing for a cold, at least when we’re talking about employment related things. I have discovered this was wrong, there is a worse time to get a cold. How about getting a cold while you’re actually doing job interviews? Yes, that’s right. I’ve been free from employment since December and I haven’t really been sick the entire time. I make the decision to start my job search last week and guess what happens? I come down with a nasty cold. I’ve had four job interviews since last Wednesday. The first two I escaped fine but by Thursday evening, I was feeling pretty ill. That made my Friday morning interview a challenge. I felt like crap the entire time but I tried my best to not look like I was gonna keel over. I had more one interview today and I think I must have looked pretty pale to everyone.
I now realize it doesn’t really matter if you’re sick on the first day of work. You already have the job, the decisions have already been made, so who cares if you show up and look like death on the first day? It’s being sick while doing the interviews that sucks worse. Maybe the interviewer asks you a question that you can normally answer fine but since now your sinuses are all clogged up and your head aches, you can’t even figure out how magnets work. Yes, I’ve learned my lesson, they are indeed worse times to be sick.