I was called by the regional manager and invited to come to a store 35 minutes away from where I live for an interview. Over the phone, he asked two preliminary questions: (1) what sports I played in college and (2) what military experience I had, if any. (He might as well have asked me what my favorite boy band was; it would have been just as relevant.) On the evening of the interview, I waited, seated on a scratched ("certified pre-leased") leather love seat, for forty minutes while the regional manager talked with someone else. Once it was my turn, I was ushered into a small, bizarre office (the "closing room") and asked the same questions he had asked me over the phone and very little else. I was offered a job on the spot--and I really don't think it was because I had an especially outstanding resume or qualifications. I think he looked at me and saw a doughy, malleable little twenty-something who would do anything to get paid more than $9 per hour--and that was mostly true.