What we won't do for a dollar? Not much ...

We hope our readers enjoyed the Labor Day holiday, and perhaps took a little time on the extra day off to think about work -- the blessing and the curse, the trivial irritations and the weighty responsibilities.

Mike Finders, a musician who has made several appearances in McCook with the Finders & Youngberg folk group, posed the question to his Facebook friends: "Hardest work you ever did?"

There were the predictable answers from his fans, such as "attempt at professional musician" or putting away sound gear in a storm, but the rest were a fascinating sampling of American occupations:

"Forming, pouring and finishing concrete."

"Running an air hammer drilling rock for dynamite. And maybe boot camp."

"Painting vats of chemicals on the early shift at a chemical factory."

"Harvesting tobacco."

"Working the assembly line in a licorice factory - we'd get licorice splinters in our hands!."

"Assembling outdoor antennas in a factory. Most disgusting -- cleaning college apartments."

"Plow a field of rye. And the easiest work that I ever done, Honey, was eat a little chicken pie."

"Baling hay."

"Line clearance for the electric company = climbing 80 ft. Ponderosas with a chainsaw to take out growth around transmission lines. Did it for two years, only got shocked once -- that was once too many."

"Mining at 30' below zero at 13,000 feet in the Climax mine above Leadville."

"Unloading train cars of charcoal briquettes!"

"Working on a fruit and vegetable farm. Weeding, pruning, harvesting, assembling 16-foot irrigation pipes, digging smelly run-off mud out of a holding pond, clearing brush to create new fields, etc."

"Carry 2-3 ft diameter cedar logs out of the woods without the help of any motorized machinery."

But not all the work was hard, disgusting and / or dangerous:

"Three months as a trainee staff-member at a busy humane society, hard work, and a sharp mix of rewarding and very depressing."

"Parenting."

"Bearing and raising children. Then I would say roofing."

"First year of teaching at a big, traditional high school ... with class sizes of upwards to forty kids. I had 186 across five periods after student teaching at a small, progressive school ... with class sizes between twelve and twenty-four."

"Court Advocate for battered women (and imagine the worst-case-scenario judge)."

Polling the Gazette yielded similar results.

"Dietary manager in a nursing home. Never been lied to so much in my life."

"Fire restoration cleaning, or working in a bakery."

"Cocktail waitress. I lasted one night."

"Egg house -- moving chickens."

"Building steel buildings. It was freezing in winter and so hot in summer you couldn't touch your tools."

"Started a newspaper. Hardest work ever, but it was fun. It's still going."

"Worked in a liquor store for two weeks, they told me I just wasn't tough enough."

"The breakfast rush at McDonald's in high school. Wendy's was a piece of cake after that."

"Working on a harvest crew. Ridiculous hours for crap pay, but it was a good experience at age 16."

"Outbound telemarketing."

What was your hardest job? What did you learn?

Send your answers to editor@mccookgazette.com and let us know if we can use your name.