As most of you are aware this whole Top 5 thing we do is a complete rip off of High Fidelity. Rather than deny that I say we embrace it. Since we’ve been doing a bunch of Top 5 stuff and since many posts on this part of the site have focused on being in our 20s and having jobs that don’t make us happy I figure we should blatantly copy High Fidelity by having a Top 5 Ideal Jobs.

In the movie, Rob, portrayed by John Cusack, is depressed about his life’s direction, or lack thereof, so makes a list of his top 5 jobs. In doing so, he allows for the possibility of time travel, but I think we should stick to the present. So no ‘I would be a music producer for Motown in the 1960s.’ I’d also say that you can’t make professional athlete one of your top 5 because I think every man everywhere would put that in their top 5 and it is therefore unoriginal. With those two rules in effect, I now present my best effort at making a list of my Top 5 Ideal Jobs with comments about why they would be awesome and some potential negatives.

5. Smoke Jumper/Fire Crew Firefighter – talk about Billy Bad Ass; the only thing cooler than fighting raging wild fires is parachuting into raging wildfires. (Negative: work is seasonal and burned alive is not a good way to go)

4. Secretary of State – who wants to go through all the bullshit you have to go through to be President. This position lets you do all the cool political stuff without having to pander to jackasses. And isn’t foreign policy the best part of politics after all? (Negative: if you go to war you are responsible for all the people that die in it)

3. Speech Writer for a Good Politician – basically I’d want to be the Sam Seaborne to Jed Bartlett. Again, who wants to go through all the crap that the President goes through? As a speech writer you are an advisor and get to shape the person you are writing for, but you get to keep your anonymity unlike the public figure whose policy you are shaping. So newsmen don’t go through your trash to find a scoop, but really you are as important the public figures that draw that sort of intense media scrutiny and have to create a fake public persona and have to constantly ask people for money. (Negative: someone else gets the credit for all your work)

2. Professional Adventurer – ok, so this probably isn’t a job but just imagine scratching out a living doing Indiana Jones stuff. Or if someone needs a guide through the Democratic Republic of the Congo they call you because you are a world renowned professional adventurer. How great would that be? (No foreseeable negative)

1. Writer – this is pretty wide open for interpretation. You could be an adventure writer to satisfy the otherwise imaginary nature of Professional Adventurer. Or you could write political philosophy books and get interviewed on PBS and whatnot. Or you could be a sports writer and possibly end up with a show like PTI or a website like The Sports Guy has. Any way you look at it you get to set your own work schedule because you are your own boss, which is pretty boss. And, theoretically at least, you get to write whatever you want so you get to decide the nature of your work. I really can’t think of any other job where you get to do that, so I’ve ranked writer as number one due to the creative and lifestyle freedom it offers. (Negative: no one reads anymore and the bulk of writers of all ilk seem like self important snoody assholes [especially in academia])

You know that was actually somewhat cathartic. Perhaps now I can develop a life plan that will allow me to succeed in life. But probably not.

Anyway, I encourage all my fellow malcontents fighting an internal spiritual war for personal purpose in a world devoid of substance or meaning to create your own list in the comment section. Then we’ll either become music producers for the punk kids that hang out outside our music store to win our girlfriend’s love back or just start a fight club or something.