Me, a ChaCha Guide?

For a footnote of this post...please see the bottom!

Well, now that I'm home, I'm giving a lot of thought to finding ways to enrich myself, and earn some money in the process. Last week, I thought I found one little solution to my little puzzle.

I was listening to National Public Radio (doesn't that make me sound "high-brow"), and heard a story about "ChaCha", and information service that applies the human touch to our insatiable quest for information. Perhaps you are in a situation where you cannot access the internet, but you have a burning question. How long is an elephant pregnant? Who won the 1991 World Series? What does the word "Blog" mean?

The answer is ChaCha. You simply text your question to: 242242 and within minutes, a human being reviews your question and supplies you with an accurate, and sometimes cheeky answer.

Cool, right?

The service is free. Super cool.

Wait, it gets better. They always need ChaCha "Guides". This is the human being that will obtain your answer for you. Natural curiosity, good writing skills, and an ability to troll the internet seem to be the main job qualifications. THIS is the job for me!!!

So, I filled out a simple application, and within 24 hours, I received a welcome e-mail, with directions to take a simple three part test that will cement my newfound ChaCha Information Gatherer status.

Yippee!
Part one: Answer 15 mulitple choice questions about the history of ChaCha. I was perfect! I'm pretty sure.

Part two: Typing. Okay, not my strongest, but I feel I was certainly adequate. I proofread my work, and not a single error.

Part three: General Knowledge. I was doing okay. There were fifteen questions. A couple of questions were challenging, such as:

If a customer asked this question: How do I get from EWR to Philly, how would you answer?
A. Give directions for Newark to Philadelphia
B. Ask for more specific information
C. Give street by street directions
D. I don't remember what the other one was.

Okay, I don't remember how I answered this for sure, but I think I said "A", but honestly, I wasn't sure what company policy was regarding more specific information.

So I click "NEXT" to go to the next page of questions. And it didn't load. I waited. And waited. and waited. So. Hmmm. I clicked NEXT again.

OOOPS.

The next thing I know, I'm directed to a page that says, your application has been rejected. And, "don't call us, we'll call you".Dang, I didn't get to answer a whole page of questions.

So...I figured, I'll just start from the beginning. I log in once more, and this message comes up:
"Your account has been suspended".

Ouch.

So I'm a Cha Cha reject. I wrote them a quick e-mail, but I guess they are really not interested. Can you believe that? Don't they know who they've turned down?

Oh well. Maybe the twenty cents per answer salary was beneath me anyhow.

Back to the ol' drawing board!


GUESS WHAT! I JUST GOT ANOTHER CHACHA E-MAIL! THEY WANT ME TO APPLY TO BE AN "EXPEDITER". I'M NOT SURE IF THIS IS BETTER THAN A GUIDE OR BELOW A GUIDE, BUT THEY WANT ME TO TRY SOMETHING ELSE. HOW ABOUT THAT???

I'LL KEEP YOU POSTED!