Been a while....

Been reading a lot, not looking for work as much [have hopes for a seasonal job now with the Agency Everybody Hates that might start in a couple of months.]

Finished ONCE UPON A RIVER by Bonnie Jo Campbell. I was turned off at first because she adapted two of her short stories as part of this novel, and one was right at the beginning so I got this feeling of "Is this some kind of retread?" but it ended up being pretty good. It must have been, I ended up reading almost the entire thing yesterday morning. Still, her two novels have basically dealt with the same type of story, and I'd like to see a branching out of some kind. Some people do end up telling the same story, though. I guess it's what they call an idea fixee.

THE LAST WEREWOLF by Glen Duncan is probably the best horror novel I've read in a long time. People love vampires, but werewolves are more interesting thematically, yet no one really writes much about them. Until now. Best line ever: "Reader, I ate him."

THE LEFTOVERS by Tom Perotta. This hatched from his research for THE ABSTINENCE TEACHER, which involved him hanging around Christian groups. Those groups have a big thing about The Rapture [and I will talk about my own history with that at some future date] and I guess that piqued his interest enough to write this. But unfortunately like THE ABSTINENCE TEACHER, this book gave me the "Is that it?" reaction, although I'd say it was a little better than the aforementioned book in that some fairly big stuff happens here, but the book is slow to develop. The Rapture hits and the country is still confused about what exactly happened a year or so later. It's a national trauma and the whole country has a bad case of survivor's guilt, although they aren't sure how and why exactly they survived and what happened to those who left. There are traumatized parents who've lost kids, traumatized kids who've lost parents, and a number of cults that spring up among those who remain. There's no apocalyptic chaos to speak of, just a lot of sad people trying to carry on. In the end, though, it's about people trying to form relationships among fellow "survivors" and the whole Rapture setting is just a device to explore those relationships. I wouldn't say it was a bad book, but it's another one of those where I get over 200 pages into it and still don't really know where it's heading storywise...I don't feel like the story is really unfolding as it should. Maybe I should just stick to fantasy and werewolves, I don't know.

Showing some balls....and then regretting it.

The county called *again* today and it was the same frickin' Auditor/Tax Collector office where I've interviewed three times now with the same people [and five times with the county overall.] I decided I was tired of going through all of this so I explained to the lady that I had interviewed there five times and it was obvious I didn't have the experience they were looking for, so I was going to pass. I think she was a little surprised.

It felt good, but now I'm starting to wonder if I should have gone ahead and interviewed. Maybe if it had been one of the other county offices, but this one has turned into a farce due to my interviewing there so many times.

Also have a paranoid thought that maybe they were offering me a job out of the blue, but why would they do that without interviewing again....I don't remember that they actually said interview, but I'm sure they did.

Really don't want to be here anymore, but in a difficult situation as far as preparing to leave....

Interview...

...actually went okay. Can't really think of any moments where I should have said something else. The interviewers were nice and didn't really "attack" or challenge the way a lot of other interviewers have, questioning my experience etc.

Guess we will see. I'm not betting on it, but will just consider it a happy surprise if the say yes. Should know in a couple of weeks.

200.

Maybe that is a good place to stop. Well, not stop, but be on hiatus for a while, to figure out what the ultimate purpose of this should be. Writing about my job seeking woes is incredibly demoralizing.

Speaking of which, I have an interview tomorrow, I have a fatalistic attitude at this point. I cannot snow these people, I am just some phony accountant who only has one year of experience on paper, which consisted of maybe two months of working and ten months of screwing around on the internet. Just going to try and put it all out there and see what happens.

What's changed?

Nothing.

I'm close to my birthday again, I'm depressed again, I have zero work prospects, the only thing different is that I'm on my last week of unemployment benefits, so things are going to be very tight from here on out. Only good part is I have more options. I can go part time and I can temp without worrying about having my benefits messed up. Going to try HR Block, it won't pay anything but I can at least stay sort of in my field. I hate my field, but it is the only area where I am nominally employable.

Going to force myself to do all the crap I hate doing, just to have something to put on the resume [joining a networking group of other unemployed people--not sure how good that is going to be.]

In years past, there used to be more career options for people with different personality types. Now it seems like you have to be a Type A or you don't work. You have to have a certain skill set or you don't work. No wonder everyone overeats, drinks, gambles, etc. It is a one size fits one world, and we're all trying to force a fit.

Reading Jo Nesbo and Henning Mankell, and a few other things. Hard to focus on things I enjoy these days.

What

I guess this was some kind of mispost, but I'm keeping it anyway.

"What" is as good a thing to say as any.

Funny stuff.

A while back I read NOTHING HAPPENS UNTIL IT HAPPENS TO YOU by T.M. Shine. It's about a newly unemployed journalist and his adventures. I liked it a lot, I could relate to some of it [mainly that he had an employed spouse.] Of course, the only part I didn't like was the "adventure" part. Unemployed people generally don't have adventures, or at least not the fun exciting kind. But nobody would want to read about that, so I don't blame him.

Anyway, he had a website going for a while [that I read about in Readers' Digest of all places, which was funny because the URL had the word "ass" in it.] I posted a comment once.

Today I decided to see what was going on there. I knew he hadn't updated anything on his twitter feed in a while, but I thought I'd see if it had more comments or something. It's now an abandoned URL, with links to various porn sites. Sure hope someone doesn't check out an old issue of Readers' Digest and try to visit it, or else they'll learn about how to find hot man on man ass action!