D.D.D.

If you have come to see a twenty-something nobody spiral into a Deep Dark Depression, you have come to the right place. The last job I wrote about, the closest job I've gotten to in fourteen months of looking, went to "an old family friend." I can't decide if her admitting that makes me feel better because, hey, at least I didn't just plain suck (probably), or worse because... ugh. Really? Ugh. But at least I now know I "seem like a very capable and warm-hearted woman"!


I'll show you "warm-hearted." Show you it right in the face.


So, I am now right back to where I was on 13 June 2009. Nowhere. Except now I have discovered Bertolli Skillet Meals for Two, which are only $6.50 and take ten minutes to cook, so now I have more time and money on my hands. And sodium.


Oh, and I have a new basket for my bike.

That's right, the basket has a handle because it clips off for maximum glory.

So... I think I'm stumped. There's only so much craigslist one person can stand!

All is Fair in Post-Graduate Bad Economy Hell

I feel like I've done something bad. Don't tell me I didn't! I know the reasons! It won't make me feel any less guilty or any more justified, for I am capable of harboring both feelings at once. Kind of.

Lately my job search has been mostly focused on craigslist. A lot of the listings are shady, but they have some good stuff too. I can generally find a nice handful of listings every day for which to send my resume to.

Also, by the way, I totally changed my reason for leaving my last job from budget cuts, woe is me to omg my husband got a super good job offer so we had to move, which means I now have this cute I am new to the area, tee hee thing going on.

So, yes, anyway, looking through craigslist I found this totally fun-sounding job and got all excited. At the same time I'm also checking Facebook because my attention span is like that--must be doing three things at once and focusing on one thing for more than thirty seconds causes me to start drooling--and a friend of mine has posted as her status that she's totally applied for the aforementioned fun job. And she probably needs a job more than I do.

No, she definitely needs a job more than I do. But probably not emotionally, which is how I justify it to myself that I applied anyway.

Now she posts about how she's in talks with the employer about the job and how excited she is, and I totally am in the same boat but just not saying anything, which makes me feel like an ass, but at least maybe soon I'll be a gainfully employed ass for the first time in fourteen months.

Or maybe neither of us will get the job anyway and I'll be right back to where I was. Again.

Update: After emailing back and forth for a couple of weeks, she gave the job to her friend's daughter. I refuse to even process this.

Deep Breath, Positive Thoughts

There is a job coming my way. This week. I can just feel it. The universe of the employed is calling to me. It's speaking to me through my dreams.

I know that 'cause I totally Googled it. I'm not usually a "dreams have meanings" kind of person, but DreamMoods.com says "To dream that you are urinating, symbolizes a cleansing and a release of negative or repressed emotions. Depending on your dream context, urination is symbolic of having or lacking basic control of your life. You are literally 'pissed off' and not expressing yourself in a positive or constructive manner."

Yeah, 'cause my dream was that I was, like, peeing everywhere. Also, there were eggs in the toilet, which means "something new is about to happen."

And you can't argue with that. It's science!

Except that when I woke up I really did have to pee really kind of a lot. But the eggs!

Also, there comes a certain point in a reject's life where you just kind of stop caring. And isn't that when things are supposed to happen? I mean, I've put out quite possibly a bijillion (big number) job applications, so I am due, dammit.

P.S. "Kicking your urine at people who get too close to your egg-filled toilet and bug you" is not in the dream dictionary.

I Graduated College and All I Got was this Lousy Sense of Entitlement

I have my sulky face on. In fact, it's been showing up more and more often. Today I slept in, rode my bike, practiced Japanese, swam in my pool, and sulked through every moment of all of it. It's the grown-ups again. They promised me that, if I went to college, I'd be rewarded at the end with a lucrative career. Instead I spend my days murdering dust bunnies and cursing the man who, in that smooth voice of his, claimed that the Dyson "doesn't eva lose suction." There's a reason that guy is completely bald. Damn him and damn them all!

It's all very conflicting. On the one hand, damn them all... but, on the other hand, I did just spend my day sleeping in, riding my bike, practicing a foreign language for fun, and swimming in my pool. And housewife cleaning-type things of course. The dust bunnies.

I try to enjoy my current situation, but then I feel guilty for feeling happy while other people, like Poncho, have to wake up early every morning and spend entirely too many of their precious hours working. And then I feel guilty again for not appreciating my abundance of leisure time while other people, like Poncho, have to wake up early every morning and spend entirely too many of their precious hours working.

It's a vicious cycle of shame and guilt. And it's all the grown-ups' fault.

I've been unemployed for thirteen months now. I've applied for many, many jobs.

As I see it, the following things are preventing me from joining the ranks of the employed:

1. If I'm being honest, I could have a job by now if I were willing to take one that paid me less that I'm receiving on unemployment. It's the sense of entitlement. I graduated college. I'm qualified to teach in any one of the fifty states. And, for a couple of years, I did, and they paid me well. Now the only jobs I seem to be able to get near are barely willing to pay me more than minimum wage; significantly less than I made working day care in college. At times I feel bad about taking money for doing nothing, while at other times I'm too miffed about being laid off from a government job that was supposed to be stable enough to carry me through the next forty years of my life. I could, when it comes down to it, spend all day working to get less money per week than the government will give me for doing nothing. But I'm not a moron.
2. Many, many jobs I've applied for, when I've followed-up, have given me responses which boil down to, "Just kidding! We weren't really looking to fill a position; we just like to leave job openings all over the place to taunt people like you. Isn't that funny? Ha!" And then I call my psychic friends to put a curse on them.
3. In this economy, many employers are more interested in your work experience than your education. Which is the exact opposite of what my high school counselor promised me when she convinced me to delay entering the job market to further my education. At least that's who I'm putting the blame on today; tomorrow it'll probably go back to my mother.
4. The job market is flooded with desperate people, and, as such, I am often told that a potential employer chose someone cheaper or more qualified than me. Which is the real suck part of the whole thing, because what that means is I really am worth barely more than minimum wage.

Or maybe I just plain suck and never realized it before. It's possible.

But the real tragedy in this whole thing is that I have nothing more interesting to write about in my blog. It's Nook, manga, Sims, and whining on the menu until something happens. I miss Japan.

When you came in the air went out

I'm losing my mind.Well, kind of. More than a little. Why am I looking at Gaston fanart?! I don't even like Gaston. He was a jerk, you know?

I can't decide if I need a job or not. I had a job. I taught math. Poncho (my husband) had a job too--he made... the Internet. Something like that. Computer stuff, very complicated. Both of those are gone. Have been for awhile.

Now we don't do anything. No, we do a lot of things. We look for jobs. All the jobs that seem to be available are the ones we already did... when we were in community college.

Not that we don't do other stuff. I need my play time.

So, taking inventory that's: unemployed, married, no kids. My initial feelings about item one (and three?) weren't so great. Dread, apprehension, and general fretting. Now, not so much.

That's supposed to be Opportunity knocking. Get it? I feel like I can do anything. Not like fly or be President, but cool stuff. Like I discovered I like baking cakes and sewing, as you can see on my deviantART page. It's also time to travel.

So I'm thinking here are our options:

1. Travel to Europe and/or Japan.
2. Move to Europe, Japan, Alaska or New Zealand for a few months.
   
3. Shut up and get back to work.

Yes, our choices for places to travel to are very limited. We have our priorities, and places that are not those do not currently make the list. As for the third option, I'm not the biggest fan. I did the whole finish high school, finish college, get married, start career thing and kind of got hosed. Trying something new now.

Gotta go over these options with Poncho, hopefully tomorrow. Our current lease is up at the end of September so I'd say we need a pretty solid plan by the end of the month. We at least narrowed it down to a few countries (and a state).

I can't decide if it's all these options before me that are causing my insanity, or the wanderlust. I'm sure it's both.