going for the Frosty look
updated 7/20/23 with seo, formatting, and some additional tweaks
answering ice sculpting questions on jobstr.com
I’ve been meaning to post for some time about an interesting website that I’ve been answering ice sculpting questions on for a little while now, via my rarely seen alter-ego, “Dr. Ice.” (That’s so nobody can figure out who I am 🤣) The site is called Jobstr and it’s basically a collection of Q&As, each headed by someone with a certain kind of job. People will post questions asking each person about their job. One thing that makes the site interesting is the wide assortment of jobs. It goes all the way from forensic scientist to Chik-Fil-A general manager.
The site changes regularly as questions are asked and answered and as the administrators tweak the site format. Currently, you can get an idea of how popular each thread is by clicking a “view all popular” link. You would think, of course, that ice sculptor would be the most popular thread. Alas, it is not. You’ll never guess who is though…
far from just ice sculpting questions
As I write this, the most popular job thread, with a crazy 545 questions asked and answered is…“Mailman.” I’m pretty sure that’s not what you guessed. Perhaps everybody has been meaning to ask their mailman a question or two, but they keep missing him? So they ask on Jobstr? I didn’t get it. And I really can’t think of a single question that I want to ask my mailman right now, except:
“Why do you keep delivering mail to me that’s clearly addressed to previous residents? I know you know that Robert Smith doesn’t live here anymore!”
I doubt the Jobstr mailman could help. Looking through some of the questions didn’t shed much light on the thread’s popularity either, but there are 545 of them you know, so I think I missed about 500 of them. I did notice that he was really patient in how he answered the questions.
The questions on the site are all over the place. Rosie the Birthday Party Clown gets:
OK seriously, how DOES the clown car thing work? I literally saw 17 clowns get out of an old VW bug once. For the life of me I couldn’t figure out how they do this.
I’m not sure how a birthday party clown should know how the clown car works; I think she’s probably kind of a one-clown-show. Maybe she doesn’t even have a car. This contrasts with serious questions like the one a fireman got:
When you show up to a burning house, how do you decide whether priority #1 will be putting out the fire, or going into the house to rescue people?
The answer is pretty interesting, but I’ll let you see for yourself.
coffee girl sucks, lol!
I started answering questions on the site back in 2012 and I’ve answered 30 of them now. (Actually, as I update, I’m now up to 47! Woo hoo 🤣) Some of the answers take much more than just a sentence or two, so there’s quite a bit there. A Starbuck barista started answering questions about the same time that I did and I occasionally used to check and see if my thread was more or less popular than the barista’s.
I know it’s not a popularity contest, especially since the contest is now WAY over. I used to track neck and neck with said barista, but now coffee girl is on the first page with 113 questions answered and I’m on page five, just ahead of “Former IRS Revenue Officer.” Major buzz kill. Somewhere along the line, I didn’t get many new questions. I was at 20+ questions and holding for a very long time. I’m going with the rationalization that ice sculpting is less popular in the summer and that it’s been a REALLY long summer. That, and global warming.
Sadly, losing to coffee girl has dealt my ego a bit of a blow. I mean, really? Coffee is more popular than ice sculptures? I don’t see it. But the guy that invited me to host the Q&A on the site, Dan Corbin (one of the site founders), did throw me a bone in an email a while back. He said that my thread was a consistent favorite, “likely a combination of an off-the-beaten-path profession and really good writing.” So all is not lost.
Check out my thread and the rest of the site. (I am a little concerned though, since the site hasn’t been upgraded to https. I try not to link to unsecured sites.) You might learn something weird about a job you never knew existed. And if you want, swing by and ask me a question. But stay away from coffee girl!
more perhaps?
Of course, you don’t have to go elsewhere to ask ice sculpting questions. And many of your ice sculpting questions might well be answered already on the faqs page. If the comments below are closed, then please ask away on the ice sculpting secrets Instagram account or the facebook page!
