A final depressing note for November...

I was in Target and heard a Gang of Four song playing...turns out it was an ad for some video game. Oh well, at least it was for one of those Wii fitness type games, and not one of those "beat a hooker with a lead pipe" type of games.

Guess even 80s lefty rock bands need a little Christmas cash....

End of the month blues...

I think I'm posting just to beat last month's post count.

I forgot to mention that I am also reading a book called THE VAULTS by Toby Ball which is, as Jess Walter [another favorite author of mine] put it, is a Kafkaesque noir set in an alternate 1930s America. Although in reality, there is nothing that really identifies its place or time. Terrific read, a nice short book that is good as far as being able to put it down and get right back into it. Brevity is a good thing sometimes.

We're trying to plan our next move, and I think things may be very different by this time next year.

It's time for the unemployment extension debate again, and I'm more or less planning on being without benefits in a little over a month. I'm hoping to get some temp or contract work at that point. I'm working a lot more with recruiters than I used to.

Turkey Time

Actually, we're having Chinese food for Thanksgiving.

The interview yesterday was a lot of the same old thing--the usual "What have you been doing for the last year and a half?" questions...[Um, trying to find a job in a job market that has 17% unemployment if you're being charitable in your estimates.]

They think I should specify on my resume that in addition to my master's degree that I've taken several undergraduate accounting courses [I think having a CPA license pretty much shows that I have a sufficient background...however, I'm game to try this in case that has been the one thing that has been holding me back this entire time.]

Also, they say that most places don't have people doing both tax and audit [This is absolutely untrue for this local market, and the fact that they don't know that is cause for concern.]

The one weird thing is that for this client [btw one thing in this recruiter's favor is that they are legitimately trying to fill specific jobs instead of just playing a numbers game and signing up everyone] is that they want everyone to take personality tests including the Wunderlich which I believe is the same test they give to future NFL players at the combine each year. One thing I'm good at---standardized intelligence tests. Although I didn't finish all the questions in the alloted twelve minutes, I finished at least 80% of them and hopefully got most of the ones right that I answered. Maybe that will help. You never know what these people want.

Reading SPARTINA, a former National Book Award winner. Mainly about an middle aged crab fisherman trying to make it.

Also MATERHORN, a novel about Vietnam. Everyone is going nuts over it and I can see why. Will give my thoughts at a later date.

Forgot to mention

One good way to pick yourself up when getting disappointing job news is to go give blood. Not just because it makes you feel good to do something for others, but because if your blood center is anything like mine, they give you lots of tasty treats afterward.

I have weird blood [it's negative for some kind of antibody that most of the population tests positive for--one of those weird conditions that most people have and never realize it] that is good to use for people with compromised immune systems, so generally the blood bank is always calling and pestering me to come in as soon as I'm eligible to donate.

Another benefit, I can take it more or less easy today without guilt.

Actually, I have yet another interview with a recruiter today. Doubt it will amount to much, but of course, it's something to put on the UE form, and it's usually hard to find stuff to apply to during holiday weeks.

The verdict...

I got the rejection letter today from my November job interview. Nothing to do but move on--I suspect my lack of experience is what did me in as usual.

Saw a Craigslist ad I am considering responding to, although it is one of those "unconventional" ads and people who place those are usually a big pain in the ass to deal with. The pay is also very low [much less than unemployment] so I am going to wait and consult with my wife. Since the debacle of the Big Firm, I've given her veto power on all job applications and similar decisions. I wish I had done so a few years back, we would be in much better shape now.

I have a lot of books to read, and that is what is getting me through. Well, that and the new bed we just bought. I didn't realize how poor sleep I was getting until we got our new bed. Nope, it's not a Tempurpedic, just a good quality bed we got at Costco.

A placeholder post.

I don't have much to talk about. Had another "interview" with a recruiter. I don't really expect it to develop into much. I talked with another one over the phone this morning, and she basically said she didn't think I had enough experience for what apparently is now considered "entry level." Since when did entry level jobs require 2-3 years of experience? I guess it's this "new normal" everyone talks about.

One positive thing...I can allegedly access free training courses and free Continuing Professional Education credits through this agency, so maybe I can at least get something from it.

The Father-in-Law has been elsewhere for nearly a week. It's nice to have the house to ourselves, but of course, it won't last. We'd like to get him to make the transition to living elsewhere, but I have to get a job first. It just doesn't work well for parents and adult children to live together.

"My own personal pants..."

This looks like the worst month ever as far as blogging. BTW, remember that stupid car ad back in 2008 when one of the car companies advertised that they would take their car back if you bought it and then lost your job? This ad was in response to that ad, where the spokesperson joked "That sounds like the worst day ever..." to lose your job, then come home and tell your spouse that you've got to go turn the car in to the dealership. I can't remember what their solution was for the newly-jobless car buyer. Anyway, for months afterward my wife and I would joke about something sounding "like the worst day ever..." And we had a lot of things that we could talk about being "the worst ever", since that was my year at The Big Firm. Man, what a crappy year that was, each day I face consequences of it.

Whoa. Didn't mean to do that. All I meant to say that I haven't been blogging much this month.

I had to go to the Christian mechanic today because I was getting gas last night at Costco and some moron said it looked like the car was leaking coolant [turned out it was not, costing me a little over $20 extra because people can't mind their own business while pumping gas.] I needed to get an oil change anyway. He's this Italian-American sounding guy who has religious tracts all over his shop. Apparently, though, he's Adventist, not Catholic--we got into a short discussion about the End Times this morning. Which is funny because I first heard about him from a devoutly Catholic friend of my father-in-law. Anyway, apparently he was all bent out of shape because he hadn't been getting clean work pants from whatever company it is mechanics use to obtain their work clothes, and he kept telling the person on the phone that he was "tired of having to wear my own personal pants to work...." Some guy came over from the company and he gave him an earful over it too, about his "personal pants."

That's all I really have. I am really hitting a slump in my life these days. I'm even having trouble enjoying reading. I feel like something needs to happen soon.

I am hoping to get a call from the last people to interview me sometime this week, I'm assuming if I don't hear anything it's another "no."

"Reimaging" this blog.

Goodbye spontaneity, hello more consistent and perhaps better posts. I’ve decided to start writing things offline and then posting later on. I think it will help keep this from becoming a zombie blog [not in the cool flesheating way] and also help me to avoid the “can’t get a job” broken record type of posts.

So…I’m reading Chuck Klostermann. I have a complicated relationship with his work. I love reading it….he writes funny, smart, cultural analysis that doesn’t take itself too seriously and he always knows when to slam on the brakes before it becomes dry and academic. My problem is that I am jealous, because in some ways, we are similar. He is the me that might have been. Okay, that sounds crazy. But we have similarities that cause me to dislike myself [but not him…I realize this is how homicidal stalkers sound, and once again I am glad that this blog is more or less anonymous, at least on a casual basis.]

In reality, we have no similarities other than growing up in isolated small towns, and even then we grew up in totally different regions. He was genuinely isolated, growing up in North Dakota. I was more culturally isolated, growing up in rural Oklahoma. There were plenty of other people around, I just didn’t have much in common with most of them [or at least I thought so at the time. I’m starting to believe that you can take the boy out of the rural area where most people are content to just get by, but you can’t take the…well, you know.] I suppose that when I was a teenager and imagined myself as an adult, I saw myself as a writer living in some big city someplace, spending my nights having dinner with smart, funny people, and this is how I imagine life for Chuck Klostermann. He would probably be amused by that, because it’s similar [in a writerly, geeky way] to his [and my] imagining the lifestyles of Motley Crue, etc., during the Eighties. He’d be amused, and then he would probably see about getting a restraining order.

Of course, during my late teenage years my image of “real city life” was influenced by the old intro for SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE back in the late 1980s.

Anyway, read some Chuck Klostermann. Read FARGO ROCK CITY, SEX DRUGS AND COCOA PUFFS, or whatever else you can find. Ttwo amusing thoughts from his most recent collection EATING THE DINOSAUR: 1. It’s interesting how ABBA was basically Swedish women having to sing songs in English that many times contained Latin themes. 2. Football [the American kind] is the only sport that undergoes radical changes in how it is played on a regular basis. He says it would be like if the rules of golf suddenly allowed people to tackle their opponents when on the green. Every decade some coach gets a crazy new idea about how to do things, and eventually some aspect of that crazy idea is adopted by everyone [even when almost everyone disparages the crazy new idea at first] or at the very least, everyone has to prepare for the fact that the crazy new idea is now common practice. And I find myself going on and on about football again, so I will stop.

The streak continues.

Managed to get an interview yesterday---they called me the day before and I was so busy preparing for it that I didn't have time to post about it until now. Small firm about an hour south of me. The manager was nice, but it'll be a couple of weeks before there's any further movement--like most accounting firms, they need one of the partners to do an interview, and he is on vacation. I thought we had a good rapport so it's really all down to my competitors, and of course there are many. I *think* I will probably at least get to the second interview, the manager seemed to like me.

The distance will be a little tiring to drive, but it is along a highway and the time should go pretty fast. My main worry will be the fog that we have during the winter and early spring. It also won't be much fun getting home at 7 each night since we go to bed so early, but it's an income and a good opportunity to get established.

Almost finished with EXLEY, and learned about a bio of Exley called MISFIT. The library allegedly has a copy but when I request it they give me an error message.

Books about losers.

I like books about "losers" and other fringe types [wonder why?] I'm currently reading EXLEY which is actually about another book I'm reading called A FAN'S NOTES by Frederick Exley. It's not a biography, in a way it is a YA novel about a troubled, bright kid with a missing father who may or may not be a Gulf War vet [joining the Army might have been his way of going out for a pack of smokes.] Said dad was obsessed with the book A FAN'S NOTES and the kid is trying to find the author of the book, Frederick Exley [it's set in Exley's town, in which A FAN'S NOTES is also set.] A FAN'S NOTES is about a troubled man who teaches English and lives for booze and New York Giants football games. I'm about halfway through both of them. I've been trying to read A FAN'S NOTES for years--just one of those books I've always ended up not finishing. Probably going to do it this time, though.

Wonder how many other novels are out there that are about other novels?

Plenty of stuff to apply to on the job front, although no real guarantee of anything.
My unemployment is good until late January, which isn't really that far away. No idea if I'll be able to get the last extension of benefits...a lot of it depends on what happens in the elections today, and it probably won't be good.