Thursday, April 26, 2007

Feeling a bit beaten and defeated, but there is still hope. Right?

This is a post where I mostly complain, wildly, about being unemployed. Consider yourself warned.

As you may have deduced, my fair reader, though I plug away and even get interviews there has not been an offer of a job no matter how mundane or measly. Where did we last leave off.... There was the two part interview for Casa de Vida in Oakland, a transitional program for folks with a lot of time in the mental health maze. Received my "thank you but no and by the way if you want relief work" letter while Sunny was here.

Then there was the absolutely lovely interview at Title Nine. No really, it was great. I really thought I had a solid chance there and beside they have a gym on site, she says longingly. Not even a quick email from Anne. I finally wrote her a witty one where I said it was lovely to meet her and blah, blah, blah.

Last Monday I had an interview with Family Stress. It seems like a fabulous agency and I really enjoyed the woman who interviewed me. I can't say it was a fun interview but I appreciated her quick and discerning manner. The entire time I was thinking, "She'd be a hard but fantastic supervisor." I interviewed for two positions, the one I said would kill me but pay my bills that I knew about, plus another one with few hours and thus doable but bills would still be a problem. The upside to few hours one would be the ability to plug in other work. In today's mail came a letter {sigh} however she did say that she was sending my resume onto human resources as she thinks I have a lot to offer the agency. The job on Treasure Island (no useful public transportation) with Swords to Plowshares was a job I could do in my sleep. Seriously. Not one word since last Tuesday. The silence is deafening, you know?

Monday I interviewed at This Little Piggy Wears Cotton. Adorable clothing. Lousy pay. Close enough I could walk. All doable. But the stuff there? Really, shop there even if they don't have the sense to hire me.

This morning TGF forwards me a listing from craigslist that was under Gigs/Computer, a place I never look and she for obvious reasons does. One day a week, data entry. I whip off a clever little email joking about needing some funds while racking up scads of loan debt but forget to attach a resume. For some reason I thought they didn't want one. Luckily immediately after sending the email I check the ad again. In a classic V-8 le duh moment, I shoot off another email with a resume. Within 30 minutes they call! So I am marching down for another interview at 2:00 today.

Almost everyday I send at least one application somewhere in the vast universe of employment. Hell I sent one to a job in Palo Alto (about 35 miles which means an hour of driving)- talk about inconvenient location! But at this point I figure the net has to be the size of a small nation to land a job.

Can I just say it burns my butt big time to see the House o' Sperm advertising for the position I interviewed for back in November? Seriously they have been running the ad for awhile now. They coulda had me! I have some background in the position, personal as well as professional, but nooooooo. Apparently no one wants to, or can make HoS believe they will commit to two years - for a freaking part-time job in an unstable market.

Okay, enough ranting because seriously I could go on about the places I see advertising that either never called me or didn't hire me. Alright there really are very few, but any at all make steam come out of my ears.

The positives right now are TGF and I are talking about hard stuff without fighting about it. What hard stuff you ask, you nosy bumpkin you? Money, or rather the alarming lack of it with little prospect of getting any. About that we are a bit of out of sync. Hm, could the aforementioned mind numbing job searches and bill pile have anything to that? Naw.

This week I have worked out , albeit briefly, every morning. I have a bit of a routine going. And school? I turned in one of the six overdue papers on Sunday. It's a piece of rot gut and I sort of warned the professor so I won't be surprised if he sends it back for more work but I hit the freaking send button. The last three days I have actually spent 2-3 hours each day on school work. Actually reading chapters, organizing my work, reading my online discussions, piping in here and there.

Twice in the last 5 days or so I actually cooked. I mean something other than making boxed mac & cheese, or throwing a frozen pizza in the oven. Really chopping veggies and everything. Two dishes from Moosewood Cooks at Home, one of my favorite cookbooks, ever. Cauliflower Paprikash one night, and Fragrant Noodles (with my own crispy tofu) the other. The first dish I've made before and TGF likes this one so that was easy. The other, let's just say I'm enjoying the leftovers.

Oh and I've been trying to knit, at least a little at night. One of these years I will finish the secret project. It's lovely, easy and not that huge but it's a bit endless at least for me right now. After a lot of fidgeting I have T'Mane's Swing Top started and it's looking decent so far but I only done about 2 inches of it.

So that's most of the news from Casa de Cedar where all the animals are good looking and above average.

2 comments:

heather said...

hah nice closing. well it's small but i think good step that you got the data entry job. you never know, could lead to other work. i've gotten a lot of my jobs through people i know.

wen said...

hey, it's me with more potential assvice.

persistance (in a non-stalker kind of way--lol) can pay off.

i'd pick up the phone and call the house of sperm, and say "hey, i couldn't help but noticing you still have that job available"

downside: it might make you look like you really NEED it, which isn't great.

one way to get into places like that is to write a quick analysis of something (figure out one of their needs, write a page or two on how to solve it or how you solved this problem elsewhere). call them up, say you really enjoyed the interview with them and thought they were a great org, so when you were working on something similar you thought of them and you'd like to get together and give them a copy of some of your work. blah blah.

sounds crazy but it works. i've known people to parlay this into a friggin' CHEF job, a manager position and more. :)

good luck!! sending good job vibes.