TKOG Who pays you to do her bidding

NTKOG #243: The kind of diligent delegator who dispatches dull chores to a full-on life coordinating team so she can get back to her grueling schedule of gin baths and composing sonnets about Hugh Laurie’s calves.

I am: probably the least important person in the world. How many admin-chattel do you know who command full domestic staffs?!

I am not: financially flush enough to pay for convenience, even if my time were worth it. Paying my laundromat twenty bucks to fold my delicates? Um, yeah, if I want to go without lunch for a week.

The Scene: The glory of the mo-friggin’ internet, loves. A few weeks ago, I received an email about a site called TaskRabbit. Basic gist: the service is offered in Boston and San Francisco, and hooks up people who need to get stuff done with Runners who bid to win the assignment.

Kind of like Craigslist, but all of the Runners are background-checked and the tasks tend to run more toward “pick up my dry-cleaning” or “help me pack to move,” rather than “let me clean your apartment while you blow cigarette smoke on my face and denigrate my sexuality.” Which is a slight bummer, only because my apartment’s kind of a mess.

Considering my former-socialist self had a nervous breakdown just getting a $30 pedicure, what could be more anathema to my soul than making dudes fight over how little they’ll let me pay them to perform menial activities for me?

Just the same, I don’t have the kind of scratch to justify asking people to swing by CVS or spring my clothes from the dry-cleaner for real actual money. Instead, I tried to come up with three tasks based on simple criteria: 1) they had to be things I actually need done, but 2) can’t do for myself and 3) might make a good story.

After ten minutes of brain-storming, I had come up with my first two assignments: “Accompany me on my morning jog! Say encouraging things!” and “Role-play an old flame during a completely platonic, non-embarrassing role-played closure talk!”

I assumed I’d get one or two half-hearted answers over the next few days and started to go to bed, when my phone lit up and skittered a few inches across the floor — and then didn’t stop. Turns out half the men in the Greater Boston Area want to pretend to break up with me on the benches in front of the Boston Public Library. (Ouch, Boston, I thought you’d have to at least date me first.)

Not five minutes after posting the two most bizarre requests in the world, my phone was deluged with response after response — dudes willing to cater my heart’s strangest desires for practically no money.

After assigning the first two challenges within minutes, I got a little cocky and assumed I could sneak any tasks past the crack Runner crew. In my hubris, wrote a post requesting someone to give me a lesson in rapping and/or beatboxing. Not quite as successful as the others. I got a few offers, but wasn’t happy with the credentials-to-dollar-per-minute ratio. For $80 an hour, I’m more than happy to keep rhyming “hater” with “AC Slater” when I’m drunk, thanks.

Instead, paid a MFA student $5 to make me a kickass jogging playlist. And scoff all you want at the other two tasks — replacing my daily mix of showtunes and decade-old ganster rap was a straight-up necessity.

The Verdict: When I first told The Ex about this, he pointed out the types of tasks I was assigning were a little “dance, monkey, dance!” and after he said that, I was concerned I’d feel guilty asking people to do menial thing for me. But I was pleasantly surprised to find all of my interactions perfectly guilt-free — primarily because the Runners know exactly what they’re getting into from the gate, and are allowed to set a price on their own time.

The tasks I ended up choosing were, uh, on the silly side, but let me vow right now: next year, when the time comes to pack up my apartment and lug furniture down three flights of stairs, dude, TaskRabbit, I’ll be calling you. Plus, in defense of the tasks I chose, until I have the capital together to open my Friendly Jogging Buddy And Break-Up-A-Torium, there aren’t all that many credible resources for lots of the strange, useful things that we need done on a daily basis.

Okay, okay, so I didn’t exactly need those things, but, look, having your most esoteric whims catered to is the very essence of luxury. And given how cheaply my tasks were done, this might just be the only luxury I can afford. Plus, hands-down the most fun $25 I’ve ever spent. I only regret I couldn’t come up with more brilliant tasks. What bizarre, hilarious but still semi-useful tasks would you assign?

Note: I received a $25 gift certificate from TaskRabbit with the understanding that I’d write about my experiences, which is pretty sweet of them, ’cause I’m pretty sure they assumed I’d use the gift certificate in a normal way instead of paying strangers to break up with me in libraries.

Tagged as: can a broadway psychologist please explain why i've listened to "my unfortunate erection" from 25th annual putnam county spelling bee for over FOUR HOURS out of the past twenty-four?!, guilt, in retrospect i kind of -- i kind of paid people to pretend to be my friends (not that i don't have friends but my own friends don't OBEY MY WILL -- bastards), tales of a recovering former socialist, TaskRabbit, tasks, yeah if you look on the task rabbit site you can see who i am but i used a fake name so don't get so excited nancy drew