How I got my job: Dan Nalepka

Age: 53

Home: Fridley

Education: B.A. in sociology, University of Minnesota

Title: FMO (Fire motor operator); Nalepka drives a 25-foot-long fire engine for the Minneapolis Fire Department, where he's worked for 23 years.

Salary: $60,000 to $70,000

How did you get the job? I applied for the job in the early '80s, and there was a hiring freeze from '80 to '86. Thousands of people applied, so they had a random drawing. They took 600 to 800 applicants, and they ran us through a hands-on agility test, where you would carry bundles up stairs, raise a ladder, hook up hoses to a fire hydrant -- all different things where they could test your agility and how you move. ... I was a firefighter when I first came on in '86, [and] I've been driving for about the last 15 years or so.

What is a typical day like? The shift I'm on is 24 hours. In the morning, you clean the station and go out and do your inspection, Fire Department-related duties, [then] stop at the store, get groceries for lunch, supper ... that's how the day goes. You're on call all the time, no matter where you are.

What is the hardest thing about being a firefighter? Dealing with some of the tragedies that you go to. People that lose everything in a fire, or death.

What is the most common call you get? Maybe 70 percent of the time they're medical-related, a heart attack [or] auto accident. Maybe 30 percent are fire-related, an alarm or an actual structural fire at a house or building, a car fire or a trash fire.

Funniest call? There are millions of strange calls. ... Funny, though, that's hard. ... We responded on a medical call where a lady thought she was sick, and she came to the conclusion that it was all a dream. So she called us out on what ended up to be a dream.

Closing thoughts? It's the greatest job in the world. I think some people see us as just sitting around the fire station, maybe like in the old days, playing ping-pong and doing stuff like that. But actually, the day is pretty structured.