Donald Trump collected cans and bottles on his old man’s job sites. Warren Buffett was a paper boy. Dell founder Michael Dell washed dishes at a Chinese restaurant. The rich and famous and have to start somewhere.

Given this stereotype, it’s tough to imagine people like Warren Buffett ever working “regular jobs” like the rest of us. However, you may be surprised to learn that many titans of industry got their start in very pedestrian positions that you wouldn’t suspect. Today, we look back on the first jobs of 10 wealthy CEOs and entrepreneurs.

My first job was in 1989 picking weeds and planting flowers for five bucks an hour. I’m so broke I’m actually reconsidering doing it again. I’ve got to think it pays at least $5.50 now.

What was your first job?

The First Jobs of 10 Wealthy Entrepreneurs (Mint Life)

Something at work really pisses you off. You don’t say anything, just waddle around with pent up aggravation over situations that might easily be resolved if you just mentioned the issues to management. You will say something tomorrow. Opps, too late, you’re dead.

The study by the Stress Research Institute of Stockholm University followed 2,755 employed men who had not suffered any heart attacks from 1992 to 2003. At the end of the study, 47 participants had either suffered an attack, or died from heart disease, and many of those had been found to be “covertly coping” with unfair treatment at work.

If you do complain you might get fired. Leading to more stress and Opps, you’re dead again.

Complain=fired. Keep it bottled up and you’re dead.

What’s the best option? Do you complain at work or keep it all inside?

Study: Stifling anger at work can be dangerous (MSNBC)

Man’s Best Friend. Bull. He’ll stab you in the back the moment something better comes along. Perhaps something like a sweet job at BP gas.

It all started one day five months ago when Mansour decided to bring his dog to work. He didn’t think much of it at the time — he just wanted to have his best friend with him while he worked the sometimes slow, and occasionally, dangerous, early morning shift. The dog was given free rein of the store, and as a joke, Mansour put a shirt with a BP logo on.

Next he is going to want to sleep in this dude’s bed and hump his wife. She is also a dog. Figuratively.

Dog in a BP shirt greets customers at Clearwater store (Tampabay.com)

Some people want you to be as lazy as possible at work. I’m all for it.

Layoffs and budget cuts may make you anxious, but that’s no reason to triple your workload. In fact, there are many ways to look as though you’re working hard when you’re hardly working, says business humorist Stanley Bing.

The article is a cheap plug for a book titled How to Relax Without Getting the Axe: A Survival Guide to the New Workplace which at one point I believe was under the working title of “This blogger’s life, stolen for print and profit”. Fine, the new title is catchier.

Here is a suggestion from Mr. Bing:

Look into corporate programs involving mentoring, philanthropy, community-based activity and social activism. It can be a pleasant alternative to actual work.

So instead of doing actual work that pays a salary, find ADDITIONAL WORK that doesn’t pay squat?

Can anyone can get a book deal these day?

Click here to get a copy of How to Relax Without Getting the Axe: A Survival Guide to the New Workplace.

Relax Without Getting the Ax; Fewer Turkey Naps (New York Times)

Everyone has to make money in the off season. Yankee Stadium organist is trading House that A-Roid Built for the House that Jesus and second collections built.

For six years, Ed Alstrom has performed regularly for 50,000-plus as organist in one of the nation’s highest-profile venues — Yankee Stadium, during weekend baseball games. Now, he’s got a second gig where the crowds usually top out at about 200: the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer in Morristown.

NOW I’ll got to church. Give me a CHARGE going up to communion and that dancy chicken song before mass and I’ll show up every Sunday so long as I’m sober and alone when I wake up.

Just more proof God is a Yankees fan.

Yankee Stadium organist from Montville starts second gig at Morristown church (NJ.com)

Solid list of some bad choices by major corporations. Sure, hindsight is 20/20 and these looked like decent ideas on the drawing board but what I love most is one or two people probably shouldered the entire blame.

Think about your office and the amount of people involved just to decide on the proper setting for the thermostat. Now imagine how many brains got involved on New Coke. Guesstimate how many got fired. Exactly.

Got any suggestions for the list? Leave them in comments.

Top 10 Bad Corporate Decisions (Top Tenz)

What happens when the most powerful Union in the area gets pissed off at the local Eagle Scouts? Things.

Nick Balzano, president of the local Service Employees International Union, told Allentown City Council Tuesday that the union is considering filing a grievance against the city for allowing Anderson to clear a 1,000-foot walking and biking path at Kimmets Lock Park. In pursuit of an Eagle Scout badge, Kevin Anderson, 17, has toiled for more than 200 hours hours over several weeks to clear a walking path in an east Allentown park.

You remember Steven Miller. Kept walking old ladies across the street. Of course you don’t remember him. He never existed. Got it? We clear?

Union troubled by Eagle Scout project in Allentown (The Morning Call)

Again. Walmart. Terrible place to work. New evidence.

Two women trying to avoid arrest after allegedly stealing goods from a local Wal-Mart store head-butted, urinated on and drove off with a security guard in the getaway car on Halloween night, police said.

Headbutted and urinated on. It’s almost like that Chappelle skit “When Keeping It Real Goes Wrong”. I KEEP IT REAL!

Think he went back to work after getting pissed on? Me either.

Police: Security guard head-butted, sat on, driven away at Wal-Mart (Muskegon News)

Walmart Security Guard Gets Head-butted, Sat On, Peed On (Consumerist)

The high unemployment rate and recession has claimed another victim. Those poor, poor burglars.

With a lot more unemployed people, a lot more people are staying home, and they see more in their neighborhood,” said Sgt. Thomas Lasater, who supervises the burglary unit of the police department in St. Louis County, Mo., where authorities recorded a whopping 35 percent drop in burglaries during the first six months of 2009. The trend is showing up in communities big and small.

I’ll tell you what industry is thriving though; shady motels. You can’t just head home for some afternoon delight or even to cheat on a spouse. People are all up underneath your window shades. You gotta visit the hotel on the corner and get a room by the hour.

Half hour.

Ten minutes if I think about baseball.

Recession’s good news: Cities see burglaries fall (MSNBC)

This scenario plays out every time the wife and I go food shopping. For this example, we’ll use peanut butter. Delicious, chunky peanut butter. Note the word chunky.

Wife: Get a jar of peanut butter
Rager: Fine (reaches for a jar of Skippy Chunky)
Wife: Not that.
Rager: Why?
Wife: I don’t buy Skippy, I like Jiff. And not chunky, I don’t like chunky.
Rager: I do like chunky and I’ve always had Skippy.
Wife: Well I’ve always had Jiff.

And scene. Thank you. Thank you. Bows all around. Hand for the wife.

Ignoring the chunky option, if someone handed me a PB&J that wasn’t made with Skippy could I tell the difference? Probably not. Then why does it matter if it’s Skippy or Jiff?

Easy. That’s what I’ve always bought. It’s what my mom always bought. We were a Skippy family. I want my family to be a Skippy family. My wife wants a brood of Jiffs. You could label it a simple case of brand loyalty but is it really that black and white?

It’s called Stickiness (not a pun in this case) and it’s one of the core traits of decision making described in the new book You Are What You Choose: The Habits of Mind that Really Determine How We Make Decisions.

Scott de Marchi and James T. Hamilton present a new theory about how we decide, based on an extensive survey of more than thirty thousand subjects. They explain that people exhibit six core traits that shape every decision they make. From huge life changing decisions to something as simple as what to have for lunch.

People tend to go with “the usual” way of deciding whenever there’s a trade-off between current and future happiness. For me, the usual is Skippy. For the wife it’s Jiff.

I wasn’t aware of all the intangibles that went into something as simple as picking a peanut butter until I read the book. Sure I’ve read books and studies about how we make choices but this is the first that explains the why.

Here is a decision that doesn’t need a how or why; all this yapping about peanut butter is making me hungry and I’m going to make a PB&J sandwich.

We use Jiff. I wonder where angry wives fall into the decision making process?

Click here to check out You Are What You Choose: The Habits of Mind that Really Determine How We Make Decisions