Friday, April 29, 2011

Shifts

I got the job that I interviewed for last Friday. My status has been upgraded from unemployed* to underemployed. I was going for full time, but got part time instead, part time in this case meaning four 8-hour days, adding up to 32-hour weeks. That would be cool if I was making at least one and a half times what I'm actually making. I've been working from 8:30 or 9 to 5 the past few days, but I'll actually be working on second shift starting next week.

*While I literally was unemployed, I wasn't among the statistically unemployed. To be statistically unemployed in the U.S., I think you have to be drawing uneployment income and be actively looking for work. But there are many more people out there who aren't counted because their benefits ran out, or they've given up looking for work because it's so hard to get a job.

One thing that I envy about some of Europe is that they seem to work fewer hours during the week than the U.S., but still make decent money. They also get a few weeks worth of vacation time, but I'm just going to concentrate on talking about shifts. As long as work shifts in the U.S. are eight hours or longer, I can't say there is such a thing as "The Perfect Shift". I kind of dig Second Shift because it fits what I feel is my natural sleep schedule, which means going to bed late, and not getting out of bed until early in the afternoon. Going to bed before midnight just feels wrong to me. But at the same time, it kind of sucks because it means I have to miss out on a lot of fun stuff that happens in the evening. On First Shift, I could hypothetically do that fun stuff in the evening. That is, if I'm not too wore out, and actually feel like making the drive to Louisville since that's where most of the fun stuff happens around here. But first shift tends to start way too early, usually 7:00 a.m., sometimes earlier! I've had a hard enough time these past few days just getting up at 7 or 7:15 so I can get to work at 8:30 or 9. I probably wouldn't mind First Shift as much if I lived in Louisville, since I wouldn't have to drive so damn far to do that fun evening stuff.

I don't like third shift at all.

My favorite shift ever was when I worked 10:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.. It wasn't too early, and I could go do the evening stuff. The best thing was that since I was able to go out at night during the week, there was less pressure to make every weekend "The Best Weekend EVER!" One of the only bad things about that shift was that if I had to make an appointment for something AND go to work, I'd have to make the appointment early, meaning that I had to get up early. But anyway, I was so depressed when that shift was eliminated, and I had to go to First Shift.

In other news, I'm just about out of money, and I don't get paid until May 12th. Grrr.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

The week in Overwhelmed-ness

I was either so overwhelmed or busy this week that I didn't have much time to write. I was a nervous wreck due to my dad's pestering about finding a job. I felt kind of like Bruce Banner, just looking for some peace and quiet, but unable to get it because General Ross and his "Hulkbusters" won't leave him alone, leading him to Hulk out and smash shit up.

Tuesday morning, I went to a well publicized hiring event at a fast food restaurant. I filled out an application, took a little test, and had a mini-interview.

Wednesday morning, I got a call from the restaurant asking if I could come in that afternoon to do an interview. I got there a couple of minutes early and told somebody at the register that I was there for an interview, then she said that she'd let the manager know that I was there, and to have a seat. A half hour passes, and I go back up to the register to let them know that I had been waiting a half hour, and after a couple of minutes I finally get to do the interview. The manager told me that nobody told her that I was there. I can't say that I did all that great on the interview. The manager said that they still needed to grade the test and check my references, and said that if I didn't hear from them next week to assume that I didn't get the job.

Thursday, I went to see my psychiatrist. While I was waiting, a guy came in who just would not stop talking, and the echo in the room made it worse. He didn't talk to me a whole lot, but I was already on edge, and it made trying to stay calm and reading my magazine a challenge. Somewhere deep down, I felt bad for the guy, but I really felt like ripping his throat out. As if I weren't agitated enough, my phone starts buzzing, I see that the call is from home, and I couldn't help but wonder what the fuck they wanted. My mom told me that the place I applied for last Saturday called, and she gave me the phone number that they supposedly gave her. After I saw my shrink, I called the number and got a message saying that the number was no longer in service. WTF? So I called mom back and told her that she must have read the number wrong or something. The exchange went something like this:

Me: When they called, did you actually talk to whoever called, or did the answering machine pick it up?

Mom: They called about the application.

Me: That's not what I'm asking! Did you talk to the person who called, or did they leave a message and did you get the info off the message?

Mom: I talked to them.

Me: Can you just give me the number that appeared on the Caller I.D.?

Mom: How do you do that?

Me: Do you see the arrows on the answering machine? You just push one of the arrows, and the phone numbers should come up!

So, she gave me the number, I called it after I got off the phone with her, and was eventually able to get a hold of somebody. They asked me if I could come in for an interview on Friday morning, and told them yes. I was really hoping to chill out on Friday, but this was something that had to be done.

My original plan for Friday was to do the interview, then go home and take a nap, and maybe go to a friend's place in Jeffersontown if the weather didn't suck too bad. What ended up happening instead was that I actually had to go through three interviews, and when all that was done I had to go take a drug test at an Immediate Care Center in Fern Creek. I was told that they were going to wait on the results of the background check and drug test and then decide if I was going to be hired. Fern Creek isn't very far from Jeffersontown, and way too far out to bother going home and all the way back out to J-town again, so I decided to stay in town. While I was in town, I went and got my oil changed, and browsed Barnes & Noble for a couple of hours until it was time to go to my friend's place. Since I originally figured that I was only going to Hillview and back home, I only brought one CD with me. I was determined not to listen to the radio all the way home, so I browsed Barnes & Noble in hopes that they might have a better selection than Target or Wal-Mart. While they seemed to carry more CDs from a lot of artists, I was really underwhelmed by B&N's selection. However, it was probably the first place I've been to that has had the "Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist" soundtrack since I started looking for it last year, and so I bought it. Yes, I could have gotten it on Amazon, but I actually enjoy physically searching for music sometimes. I stayed at my friend's place for a while, and got home before the weather got really bad.

Today, I finally got caught up on sleep. It's been nice to just chill out. Tonight's midnight movie is "O Brother, Where Art Thou?". I'd go, but the weather has been really awful. I think the worst of the storms might be over with, but my area still has flooding to contend with. Besides, I've already seen it once on the big screen, and I own it on DVD, so while it would be nice to see it on the big screen again, I don't think it's worth the trip in this weather.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Overwhelmedness (Might finish it some other time)

If you pay attention to the labels I use to describe my posts, you'll see "Overwhelmed-ness" a lot. I tend to get overwhelmed pretty easily. I also use the term "makes me want to curl up into a fetal position" a lot because that's how I feel when trying to deal with some things. Hell, I'm overwhelmed right now about trying to describe my overwhelmedness. What I really feel like doing is laying down, partially because I'm tired, but also because the job search is stressing me out. But I'm afraid that my dad will get after me if I do that. Whether I'm working or not, work-related stuff tends to overwhelm me the most. Friday, I intended to go into a few restaurants and ask if they needed dishwashers and/or if I could fill out applications, but I only managed to ask at one place, and they seemed to advise against dish washing because they've got a bunch of Mexicans* working the dish room. Whenever I thought about going some place to ask about applications, I had this weird feeling of dread come over me.

(I ended up going to lay down anyway. Took a 4.5 hour break before attempting to start up again. But I'm having trouble finishing it. Instead of saving it to post for later, I'm going to go ahead and post it as is, possibly updating it later. )

*For the record, I don't really have a problem with Mexicans. Immigration isn't a big issue to me.

Saturday, April 16, 2011

Gloom

It's kind of a yucky weekend here in the area surrounding Louisville. It's grey, windy, and has been raining off an on. And I have no Midnight Movie to look forward to. Tonight is the night for Thunder Over Louisville, a big ass fireworks show over the Ohio River that kicks off the Kentucky Derby Festival. I don't really care for Thunder or the Derby.

Today is also Record Store Day. Unfortunately, I don't have the money to go support my local record stores today.

I just put in an application for a place that I never thought I'd apply at, mostly at the request of my dad. I know that a job is a job, and a paycheck is a paycheck, but it seems like a line has to be drawn somewhere. Speaking of the job search, I read this in this week's LEO (Louisville Eccentric Observer):

"New data from the U.S. Bereau of Labor & Statistics released last week suggests the same old, same old when it comes to Louisville's economic woes: Currently in the region (that means you, too, Southern Indiana), 69,751 people cannot find a job, and that's using a standard definition of unemployment, meaning that the number is likely much higher in reality." (Emphasis theirs.) The LEO also has a good article on America's tax system.

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Eat The Rich

I'm pretty fucking fed up with a lot of shit.

My dad told me, again, that he wants me to get a job, he doesn't care what it is. I told him that I applied for three jobs this week. He told me to keep applying, and if all else fails, go out and look for work. I covered a lot of this shit in Work vs School. If getting a job these days was as easy as a snap, I'd be working right now. I don't know, maybe I'm not looking hard enough, but I don't see the point in applying for jobs that I know I'm not qualified for, or would probably end up sending me to the proverbial loony bin. At least I hope it would be proverbial. A long time ago in France, the "idle" were put in asylums. They might as well put me in one.

Note to readers outside the U.S.: Most companies here expect one person to do the job of two or three, maybe even four people. In some cases, positions really have been consolidated. One example is that my ex-brother-in-law used to just be a trainer, but now he's a trainer AND a safety person. What ends up happening in the job search is that one job applicant might be experienced in all but one or two of the listed qualifications for the job they're applying for, and get passed over because they don't meet all the requirements. This fantasy person who can fulfill all the requirements is referred to as the purple squirrel. I suspect this might be one reason why Main ex-Employer won't hire me back for jobs that I used to do, or would be capable of doing in my old department. So one solution to employing more people might be to split up positions, or in some cases hire more people and lower quotas.

I'm sick of all these teabaggers who have been brainwashed by Fox News and the Koch brothers. I think a lot of Democrats are full of shit, but I have absolutely no use for the Republican party in its current incarnation. Until they rediscover Keynes and move back towards the center, I will not vote Republican. Face it people, Trickle Down Economics is a fucking failure. The wealthy are doing better than ever, and their taxes are the lowest they've been in the past 50 years. If they're not creating jobs now, cutting their taxes even further isn't going to help either. I think what President Obama said about limiting their itemized deductions is a good start, but it's not enough. Taxing the shit out of the ultra-wealthy would bring in a lot of revenue, but I don't think that's going to happen while the Republicans rule the House.

And good god, somebody needs to fix Wall Street! Somebody actually earning their wealth through hard work and creating something is one thing. Do I think they deserve to make hundreds or thousands of times more than their employees at the bottom? No, but at least they actually MADE something! Too many people in the financial sector are basically making money out of nothing at all. The movie Inside Job is essential viewing on this subject, but good luck on trying to make any sense of it. The only reason it made any sense to me is because I've read so many articles on what led to the big crash of 2008.

Monday, April 11, 2011

What's up?

I've been going through another bout of Writer's Block. It's not that I don't have anything to say, I've just been having trouble trying to figure out how to say it. It makes me wonder how the people who write for a living can do it so often. In fact, one thing I've been wanting to talk about is having Auditory Processing Disorder, and some of the challenges I have with communicating, especially verbally. I can come up with a line or two, so I know how to start it, and I think I know how to finish it, but coming up with the stuff that goes in between has been a challenge.

One thing that's been on my mind is how cool it is that I have readers from all over the world, but at the same time I feel kind of bad sometimes about bitching and moaning about stuff that's relatively trivial in the grand scheme of things, since the United States is like the Spoiled Brat of the world. Granted, most of these people seem more interested in what I have to say about music than what goes on in my personal life, but I still don't want to come off as spoiled. So, what I've been wanting to do is give those from outside the U.S. my perspective of what life is currently like to live here. But I've been having trouble getting started on it.

I'm running low on money again. Had I known that I'd be unemployed for this long, I probably would've signed up for Unemployment. If you haven't read it already, you can read about my problems with Kentucky's Unemployment system in The Saga Of The Past Three Years. I sometimes feel like I was born a couple of decades too late. I feel like I should be working at a record store or something, but record stores are going the way of the Dodo.

I hear that Vermont is trying to pass Single Payer health care. I also hear that  Burlington, VT, has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country. They have Bernie Sanders for a Senator. I'd rather not move to the northeast because I think I'd hate their Winters, but moving to Vermont is sounding like a good idea at this point.

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Back to (high) school.

I had a really weird dream this morning. In it, I was going to college, but instead of actually going to college, I was going back to my high school. One thing that was funny was that one of the teachers was actually my First Grade teacher, and she was teaching something that was beyond my comprehension. I felt like a total dumbass. I also felt really old, not because of the age difference so much as that some of the kids I was talking to were so into newer Metal/Hardcore bands. That was probably inspired by a combination of reading an article about James Murphy from LCD Soundsystem and watching VH1 Classic's one hour version of the Big 4 (Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth, and Anthrax) show from last summer. Things seemed to get easier later on, probably because I ceased to give a fuck, and I seemed to actually gain the respect of the kids. Another funny thing in this dream was that Sean Garrison (formerly of the band Kinghorse) was also going to this school. What made it really funny was that while the guy in the dream was actually supposed to be Sean Garrison, he looked more like Keith Flint from the Prodigy. The most recent photos/video footage I've seen of SG were from the late '80s and early '90s, so I have no idea what he looks like now, and wouldn't recognize him if I saw him out somewhere, so I guess my brain filled it in for me.

When I woke up, I had the same feeling that Val Kilmer's character in "Top Secret!" had.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

The first weekend of April, 2011

I started this month off in style, namely watching one of my favorite bad movies, "The Room", on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. I was mostly curious to see if they were going to cut or censor it. The first thing I noticed was that they rated it TV-MA. They showed it uncut, but not uncensored, covering up the naughty bits with black boxes and bleeping out some of the dirtier words. The blocking out of naughty bits actually isn't a bad thing since the naughty bits in this movie are likely to traumatize you. The black boxes were used to hilarious effect at times, sometimes covering the entire screen. There were a couple of times where I felt that the black boxes weren't needed, like when Michelle goes down on that one dude (I don't remember even seeing her head bob up and down or anything), and when (SPOILER ALERT, not like you really need it) Johnny puts the gun in his mouth.(END SPOILER ALERT) After all, this is being shown after midnight on cable, why even bother giving it a TV-MA if you're going to censor it so hard? You might as well have given it a TV-14.

My one April Fool's Day prank was the same one I pulled last year, changing my relationship status on Facebook from Single to In a relationship. The people at Facebook evidently aren't believers in the philosophy of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!", because among many things that they've fucked up, they made the relationship status change thing harder to find. Anyway, at least one guy called my bluff, while six of my female friends seemed convinced that I really was hooked up, and "Liked" the change. (Sorry Natalie!)

Saturday, I went to a cook out in Floyd's Knobs, Indiana, which is quite a drive for me. I mostly went for the chocolate/peanut butter cupcakes, which were scrumptious.  I watched the Kentucky game while I was there. I eventually made it to Third Street Dive, but missed the band I came there to see. I thought they were going to play last, but they actually played first. I think I had too many hot dogs because I was still burping up the hot dog taste when I went to bed.

Sunday was a warm and sunny yet WINDY day. I figured I had made enough trips to Louisville in the past few days, but also figured that it was too nice a day to stay home, especially since there were supposed to be some bad storms on Monday. I didn't bother to invite anybody out since my plans are so spur of the moment, and therefore I can't give much notice, so I mostly just sat outside a coffee shop patio and did some reading. Some company would have been nice, but I did see some amusing things, like dudes in muscle cars look and sound like they were trying to race each other on a street that's not conducive to racing. In fact, it was probably more like a game of Chicken.

One thing I observed while at the cook out on Saturday is how amazed I am that people can just talk, and talk, and talk. Most of the subjects had to do with kids, neighbors, neighbor kids, schools, etc. I have no kids, and could give two shits about anybody else in the neighborhood, therefore I don't have much to talk about, except for music, movies, and various personal anecdotes that their conversations remind me of.

The NCAA tournament is almost over. I was bummed that Louisville lost, but happy that Morehead went on to the second round. I was disappointed that neither Morehead nor Texas made it far. I'm proud of Kentucky for making it to the Final Four. It will be nice if this year's Freshmen decide to stick around another year or two instead of bolting to the NBA, then Kentucky really will be a force to be reckoned with. I was glad to see Duke and Kansas get knocked out. I think I dislike Kansas mostly because I think "Rock Chalk Jayhawk" sounds lame, plus I have a Facebook friend who kept saying that, but also because they're a conference rival of Texas. I don't know why I dislike Duke, since I'm not one of those UK fans who are still bitter over something that happened 19 years ago. I can say that seeing them beat Butler for the championship last year felt anticlimactic. Some of the hardcore Louisville fans who were happy to see Kentucky lose crack me up, because they don't really have a leg to stand on. Sure, Kentucky didn't win it all, and they got beat by a team in Louisville's conference who UL beat twice, but UK did hand UL their ass to them earlier in the season at the YUM Center when they were a poor Away team, and UK didn't get beat in the first round by a #8 seed who got beat in the next round. Face it UL fans, I don't really like the "shit talking" portion of UK fans any more than you do, but they did earn the bragging rights for this season. So who am I rooting for in the final game? I tend to root for the underdog, so I'm rooting for Butler. I tend to like teams for their mascots sometimes, and since I like Huskies, I really can't hate on UCONN too much.