I had three interviews last week. All for the same position. One over the phone; one with the contracting agency; one with the client. For a Web Producer role in which I’d be publishing web pages all day long.

It was, in a word, my very vision of perfection. No sooner than I got off the phone with the recruiter than I began dreaming about a clean, quiet cubicle space in Kirkland – one with a little sunshine, a spot for a plant and a photo of my husband.

Finally, another interview! For a job I wanted, not just one I could do. After months of deafening silence, one phone call had blown a gale of confidence through the halls of my mind – cleaning away all the self-doubting clutter that had collected there like grime.

It was a second wind, an instant high. As he scheduled our in-person interview, the recruiter mentioned his client had already been through an interviewing round – but wasn’t convinced by their initial pick. Instantly, my life-long instinct to compete kicked into high gear.

By god, I was going to GET. THAT. JOB.

The first thing I did was go out and buy a box of home hair color, and then proceeded to lose a quarter of hair down the drain. Home hair color is cheap, and therefore harsh. But nothing screams ‘shab’ like salt & pepper roots.

I selected an outfit with care – particularly because I just had surgery. With a tender belly that could not tolerate pants, and a need for confidence that could not show discomfort, I settled on a hip-level grey skirt, black blouse, silver accessories and my favorite black heels.

The evening before and the day of the interview, I researched the client. Pages and pages streamed out of my printer as I devoured information about their customers, their goals, their needs – quickly painting a picture in streaked orange highlighter of their public commitments and internal demands. Armed with a list of informed questions, extra resumes and my portfolio, I drove Northward on I-405, rehearsing responses to a galaxy of possible questions.

When I met with the rep, I beamed self-assurance as he fired question after question. “Do you know HMTL/CSS, XML?” he asked. “I learned those by hand, actually.” “What programs have you used to create and manage websites? Are you comfortable using new platforms?” I answered, “Yes – FrontPage, Dreamweaver, SharePoint – you name it. If you know the code, you can work in any platform. The tools might be different, but the logic’s the same.”

“What about pay range? This is lower than your last position.” I wanted to say, “It beats the hell out of zero, which is the range I’ve got now.”

Instead I said, “I’m ok with that.” And it wasn’t a lie.

I drove home aching and sore for an hour and a half, thinking of bed and relief every second of the way as I navigated the evening commute through the side streets of Bellevue to Issaquah-Hobart Road, avoiding I-405 at whatever cost.

Returning the next day to meet with the client, I waited in the lobby, silently reviewing my research and interview questions in my head. “Out of all the candidates for this position, why should we hire YOU?” was the one I asked myself over and over – and the one I worked hardest for a convincing answer.

Of course, they never asked that one. For the next forty-five minutes, we reviewed the company, the department, their responsibilities and goals; moving on then to my goals and my skills. Asking about the variety of my experience, my projects and the direction of my career path, how did I come to be here, and why did I want THIS job? Do I enjoy graphic design more than coding? And since you mentioned your love of debugging, would you mind looking through this screwed up page of code and telling us what’s wrong?

I admit I did not do as well as I would have liked. But only because I tried to physically FIX the code. The client passed me his laptop; I scanned the web page, then the code page, and immediately started overwriting his file with corrections. “No, no. I want that to be wrong. I still have to use that for the next candidate.”

Admittedly thrown, I then proceeded to verbally identify all the errors in general terms – instead of specifically in HTML/XML. (Side note: It’s a pretty good guess that A) you know things went wrong or B) you’re over-obsessing when C) you wake yourself up later that night because you’re dreaming the answers in code AND YOU KNOW THAT THEY’RE RIGHT.)

Even considering the code test, I thought the interview went really well. I think it was one of my best. But even so, I walked out the building with an ambiguous feeling hanging over my head. They seemed extremely concerned I would be bored combing through thousands of lines of code every week.

And even as I explained that I really am freakishly entertained by thousands of lines of code, what I really wanted to say was, “Would you like to know what’s mind-numbingly boring? LAUNDRY. DISHES. DAYTIME TV. Give me something to do before my brain melts, PLEASE.”