Christmas goodness, Oakland style

I got a welcome phone call from my pal Matty Boy the other day, during which he informed me that there were some Christmas goodies coming my way. What a mensch he is: He told me he was giving gifts to those less fortunate than himself; sadly, I qualified.

Gift #1 was something I've wanted forever: the entire catalog of recordings of Matty Boy's and Padre Mickey's band The Wonders of Science! I'm completely bowled over by this tune, and the rest of the songs on the CD are just as good. Every time I listen, I feel like I'm back in college in my old dorm room, not-reading a bunch of literature for my English classes and wondering what it would be like to be an out lesbian. Sigh. Those were the days.

Gift #2 was something Matty Boy has been touting forever: a copy of the Dr. Horrible's Sing-along Blog DVD! I had planned to watch it tonight (I've never seen even a second of it), but I ended up spending hours creating a new logo and header for my birdy blog... in Microsoft Paint. Do you know how hard it is to create graphics in Paint? Like trying to perform calculus with Sarah Palin's brain, my friends. Just like that. Someday, I hope to have PhotoShop and Illustrator again... someday. (Did you know I was a graphic designer from 1997-2002?)

Now it's well past midnight, nigh on one in the a.m., and I've got to wake up at six. Shit.

Just what I've been hoping for

Please offer any "moodlifting messages" in comments.

more Seen at Work

So many things, so little time....

There's something not quite right here... I just can't put my finger on it... something... Let's see: the good old traditional Candy J's are there, and the upside-down gay triangles are there... That's Christmas-y, right? What? What's wrong? What?
I would be happy to definitely use all the certainly wonderful ways we're supposed to gladly "please" our fabulous customers when we're on the phone; it's My Pleasure! So I just need to ask you some fantastic questions to verify your excellent identity...

Finally, I ask you:
What the hell?

Oh wait--of course! I forgot to orient it correctly--it's a vertical: Oh yeah!

Wait...

Seen at work

I call it "Cloud Shitty."

Someone-dammit.

I'm in and out of consciousness right now, as I am on some painkillers for my tooth extraction earlier today, but I think I just heard President Obama say he's sending 30K more troops to Viet[Afghanistan]nam.

But then he's pulling everybody outta there in 2011.

Because that makes as much sense as the "surge" and Mission Accomplished.

Shit.

Seen at work

There must've been some kind of Starving Artists Art Show in the area when they purchased the art for my work building. Little wonder these artists were starving.

Seen at work

I've decided to start a new series here on the bloggy: "Seen at Work." The place where I work is filled with strange artwork, odd decorations, inane instructional postings, and other such noteworthy items, and I wouldn't want to be selfish and keep all these sights (and sounds) to myself. Besides, there's no one at my work who would appreciate these things like you would; everyone else just seems to ignore these things. I've decided that Texans, at least the San Antonio variety, are weird and not very observant.

I'm dying to hear your comments, if only to help me decide whether I'm the only one who thinks this shit is strange.

I'll kick the new series off with a double feature.

First, I present this item (rather a common one down here in San Antonio, I've noticed), found in the restrooms:I've seen these before from time to time in other cities in which I've lived, but it seems like every public restroom in San Antonio has these. Do they really protect you from anything, besides the knowledge that unless you use them, you're placing your bare buttocks on the exact same surface that lots of other people do? (If you think about that for even a second, you just might start carrying a box of these around with you.)

I keep wondering if they protect one from the errant herpes sore or something. Maybe I'm just being obtuse; any public health officials want to share? My mom always told us to lay triple thicknesses of TP on the seat before using a public toilet, but these things are really thin!

Now, OF COURSE I use them whenever I use the restroom, though I always rip the inner circle loose so I don't make splashy sounds.... You know what I'm talking about. But really--do they protect you from anything?

Next, in the "Art" category:I posted this horror on my birdy blog yesterday and so far, all the commenters have ignored it. I trust you guys will find the words that must've escaped my bird-loving pals. I call this one "My child has terrifying hallucinations, and sometimes he commits them to paper."

In the coming days, you'll see more photos of the "art" from my building; there must've been a sale at the local sanitarium or detox ward.

Sick of swine flu

It's a bit late in the game to be bitching about the media furor over the H1N1 (or Hee-nee, as my mom calls it, as though the 1s are really Is) flu, but I've been out of blogulation for a while, and I saw something today that just stuck in my craw. Picture a giant electronic-lighted billboard flashing the following:

TOWN HALL MEETING: H1N1 VIRUS AND VACCINE INFORMATION!

Because that's what we need a town hall meeting on: the effing H1N1 virus. Yeah. Not any of those other things like that bid for the nuke facility here in town, the bid that's increased by millions of dollars lately, and that got a couple of board members canned for influence peddling. Not that. And not the fact that healthcare's in the toilet and Congress is screwing us over even more about it. Nope. Not even the dearth of jobs vs. the ridiculously high number of people applying for each and every one of them. Why's that important?

Nope, we're having a town hall meeting about that dumb flu vaccine. Even though regular flu viruses kill more people each year than H1N1. And even though the vaccine probably doesn't even work.

Sheesh.

I was at Tengrain's blog a little while ago and started laughing my ass off while watching A Flock of Seagulls' "Wishing," which I thought was an AMAZING song when I was in high school/early college. The lyrics are awful, but the music is okay; the video is probably in the same league as other 80s high-larious classics like Asia's "Heat of the Moment" and Scandal's "The Warrior."

While I was hunting down those gems on the yootoobs, I came across one of my all-time favorite songs, The Specials' "A Message to You, Rudy." Go forth and enjoy!

Hey folks!

I've now been in San Antonio for a month. I'm enjoying my temp job; it's interesting and the people are nice--not to mention the fact that it's nice to have an income again. Still looking for a real permanent job too.

I haven't had a whole lot of time to access all your blogs lately; I have to use my dad's computer for my online fun, and I can only get online after work--in between helping my mom cook dinner, giving Niblet some lovin', and talking to AB back in Pennsylvania. Oh, how I miss being able to blog at work!

So don't take my absence personally. I still love and miss you all, in case you were wondering.

I haven't been keeping up with the news either. I keep hearing about how the economy's improving and San Antonio's the third-most recession-proof job market in the country, but I'm still looking for mine. The dearth of posts will likely continue until I figure out where I'm going and how I'll get there.

Hello, I'm alive, and I'm employed...

...at least temporarily!

Sorry for the long vacation away from the blog, but I've been trying to find work, focus on the birds, and learn how to live with my parents again after 27 years out of their house. Thank you all so much for your kind comments and for coming back to the old bloggy. I don't know how much I'll be doing on this blog; politics has just become incredibly frustrating and joy-sucking.

The cool thing is living with two hard-core democrats like my Mom and Pop. We now take turns yelling at the TV talking heads; it's so cool to hear them say a lot of what all of us have been saying all these years! Who knew there were still a few hardy dems in Texas, other than those Texans on my blogroll!?

I've been here about two weeks now. I've applied for a bunch of interesting jobs--marketing, sales, administrative assistant, etc.--but I finally got a hit when I went to (of all places) the same temp agency I registered with in California. I'll be working in a call center resolving something or other at a certain huge national/world banking center. It's outbound calls, but at least I won't be selling anything. And at least I'll be making some money for a while; it's a temp appointment that'll last until sometime before Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, I'll keep plugging away, trying to get a "real" job, hoping someone likes my resume enough to give me a call.

Again, thanks so much for your support during my "migration" around the country.

Plans

And so it has come to this: if I can't get a job (or at least a promising interview) before the end of the month, I have to leave California.

It's not the ideal plan, I'll admit. Many people tell me that it often takes months to find work, especially out here in budget-wrecked California, but any fool could see that staying out here much longer is financially unwise. I've never been without work for so long at one stretch, at least not while trying to find work. It seems that things here in the Golden State are tougher than I imagined and while, as they say, "hindsight's 20/20," I am beginning to think that my desire for new lifebirds and greener pastures blinded me to just how easy I had it in PA and how long my savings (and loans) would last.

Yes, I was tired of the Pennsylvania snow.

And yes, I wanted to go someplace I'd always dreamed of living.

And oh sure, I felt like I didn't really "belong" in a state like Pennsylvania, where I was perhaps one of maybe ten hispanics in Centre County (I'm being generous; I only knew of me and my friend Ignacio) and where I'd only gone because of a now-defunct relationship.


AB keeps telling me that I can't look back now and judge my decisionmaking after it's turned out to be a total dud; if that were possible (or wise), no one would ever take a chance on anything. Or even get out of bed. But it's hard not to think about the fact that if I'd stayed, I'd still have a good job and I'd be with my girlfriend.

Must. Not. Think. About. That.


So where will I go, you ask? One of two places: Texas or Pennsylvania. BUT... the only way I can go back to PA is if I already have a job waiting for me.
...What, you think I didn't learn a lesson from this whole "Hey, I'm sure I'll find a job in a state where everyone's being laid off! Great idea!" fiasco?


I am furiously looking for work now through the same crap job-seeker engines (Monster, CareerBuilder, SnagAJob, etc.) that have failed to net me more than one interview out here in sunny NoCal. Don't think I've missed the irony of such a situation. At least The University has its own job Web site, though there's no telling the snail's pace at which The University might travel.
(Okay, okay, Mr. Unnecessary-capital-letter-policeman, I'm only capping "the university" out of respect! ...well, and a little karmic finger-crossing. Shhh.)

I know two weeks isn't a lot of time to find work anywhere, but this is the plan I worked out with my sainted father and brother, who are loaning me yet more money to pay the really late bills and buy food and stuff.

Yes, I'm 45 and still getting bailed out by my father. Perhaps I should run for president. I hear this kind of thing worked out great for the last guy.

I'm still trying to follow up on my California applications and apply for other positions, but at this point it's almost stupid to keep trying. I lost count after 60 of how many jobs I'd applied for, but I did get one interview (on my birthday, no less) that was going really well until they told me that although they loved my skills and experience, they didn't know when they'd be able to make an offer, much less hire me. Budget problems. Low sales. Downward trends. You get the picture. (I should've remembered that the last time I had a good birthday, I was in 9th grade and my dad was picking up all my little geeky friends and taking us to SkateLand for a big night of rollerskating to "Dancing Queen." It's like a curse, my birthday. Every stinkin' year.)

At any rate, AB is being really supportive, and we're both hoping that I can at least go back to PA and be with her. But again, I can't go there without a job, so I'll continue to hit the Interwebs super hard over the next week or so. This whole job-search is like a job in itself, a really boring one where I'm forced to write cover letter after cover letter, tailored to the specific job duties and my overwhelming ambition to work at Company X!, and fill out endless job-search-engine registration forms. I've gotten it down to a science, copying and pasting stuff into the blanks, but it's still mind-numbingly boring and soul-crushing.

The other night I couldn't sleep and decided to read a book I hadn't read before (those who know me know that I LOVE to re-read my favorite books, especially when I can't sleep). I noticed a book I'd gotten at a recent book sale, Barbara Ehrenreich's Bait and Switch, in which she "goes undercover" again, this time not as a minimum-wage worker (Nickel and Dimed) but as a middle-management-type white-collar jobseeker, applying for hundreds of jobs over the course of six months, paying for an image consultant, enduring life-coaching from several rather life-challenged individuals, attending endless "networking events," and ending up with nothing -- not even one interview.

Given my circumstances and my now quite fragile job-seeker self-esteem, reading this particular book might, just might!, have been a bad idea.

Table for Sisyphus, party of one! Table for Sisyphus!

I've really enjoyed California. It's beautiful, for one thing--you should check out the pics on my birdy blog--and I've gotten lots of new birds for my lifelist. (If you know what that is, you might be a geek.) The weather is lovely. But it's hard to enjoy the beauty when you know you have no job, no income, and not much hope.

- - - - - - -
On a lighter note, I'm excited to report that I'll be driving into Oakland on Sunday to visit Matty Boy. We're planning to bird at Lake Merritt and then go watch the Cowboys game. I'm totally pumped!

Eat your hearts out, bloggy gals!

Oh, I just thought of something: I haven't told him this bit of news yet, so if you're reading this post, Matty Boy, I'll give you more details on Sunday.

Meanwhile, if anyone knows of a job in the Rohnert Park area... anyone? anyone?

"No matter how bad it gets, it can always get worse."

Those were some sage words of advice from my dad one time when things weren't looking so good for me. I'm sure he meant them in the most positive and encouraging way possible, but they always just made me sad.

So you know I'm not having much luck with the job search, thanks to that whiny post from earlier today, but Matty Boy just called (which did cheer me quite a bit) and after we'd discussed how much I LOVED Joss Whedon's Dollhouse, he gave me some bad news: Princess Sparkle Pony has stopped blogging.

I remember finding the Princess through a googles search for god-only-knows-what, probably something on Condi, and I just about burst my liver open, laughing. The Ex didn't much appreciate the Princess' wry humor, but I thought it was quite possibly the funniest thing I'd ever seen -- a whole blog devoted to that crazy Condi's hairdo and such. Brilliant.

I was then introduced to the hilariously smart comments of such future bloggy pals as Matty Boy, FranIAm, and KarenZipdrive, all giants in the field who've gone on to make their own great bloggy contributions. Even I started blogging, and not just about birds!

I could go on, but it's just too sad. Suffice it to say that Princess, you will be missed.

God, how I hate looking for a job

I've been out here in the Golden State for almost a month now, and I'm still looking for a job. The longest it's ever taken me to find a job in my whole life (and I've had lots!) is two weeks, but we're coming on a month here.

I still say California is beautiful. I've enjoyed seeing new birds and new places, drinking new wines and decent tapwater. But this endless job-searching is making me hate life.

I started out applying to editorial positions -- there were a few, actually! -- then I went to the administrative assistant jobs. Now I'm filling out apps to be a assistant manager at "THE HUT" (Pizza Hut, for all us non-hip people) and completing questionnaires with questions like "When I go into a restaurant, right away I begin thinking about ways they could do things better." Fortunately, I could answer "DEFINITELY" on that one, as it's rare that a restaurant doesn't piss me off in some way. When asked about why I like coffee (on the Starbuck's app), I talked about how it brings people together and you can learn about it, like wines, only without the big wine price tag. I also added that even people who don't drink coffee know why others do. (I just left it at that -- mysterious, no?)

I'm exhausted by all this filling out of online apps and paper apps and stuff. And nary a word from any of the places yet. AB told me that most places work on a different time scale than I do; they take a couple of weeks or whatever, and then they get around to calling for interviews. But I'm broke, people! Hurry up! I can do your job, trust me!

So that's what's going on in my real life. In my birdy life, I'm having a blast. My life list is up to 212, and I've got all sorts of great pictures and stuff. The other day, I even went to one of those "gravity hill" type places near here and I swear to you, it looked like the car was rolling UP the hill backwards! So that's all cool.

What's not cool is paying $212 to register my vehicle. TWO HUNDRED TWELVE DOLLARS? I asked the DMV lady if that was for the lifetime of the car, but she said no, it's every year. In Texas, it was like 60 bucks. PA, about the same. What the hell is it about this place? How can the state be broke if they're charging each of the kabillion cars out here 212 bucks each year? That's messed up, man.

I'm trying to figure out how I'll know when/if it's time to just pack it in and go back to PA or something. I mean, what's the cut-off? I could borrow more money, though I don't want to. But I don't want to give up and start driving back, only to get a bunch of callbacks for interviews when I'm hitting Nebraska or someplace. But what's the cut-off?

a random thought

I once heard, "the rulers are not of the ruled." Truer words were never spoken; this truism explains so much about why our government is screwing us daily.

But today I started to wonder: just where DO the rulers come from? Old-money families? If that were true, Tom "Hot Tub Tom" DeLay wouldn't have had to make a living killing bugs. Power cabals? Please--like Darling Lindsey was ever part of anything powered besides a Folsom Street Fair Fucking Machine. (and no, I'm not inserting links--my Mac is old and I have to type out the HTML, and I'm too lazy and tired to do that right now)

So just where DO these sorry excuses for people come from? Ted Kennedy came from a rich powerful family, but he NEVER abandoned his liberal leanings or turned his back on the poor and powerless who believed in him. So where did these republicans come from?

Gone to Texas, baby

Photo credit, even though I believe it's real and not an urban myth!

...for my sister's wedding. Be back next Wednesday!

(I tried to find a YouSeriesofTubes version of the Texas classic "Gone to Texas, Baby" by Terry Allen, but I couldn't. Sorry!)

Note: Crossposted at the birdy blog.

East meets West at the East West

Well, Matty Boy and Karlacita! had lovely lunch today at Santa Rosa's kick-ass East West Restaurant. I had the Falafel Wrap which was HUGE, Karlacita! had the Falafel Plate, and Matty Boy split some Pumpkin Soup with his sis and ate a Denver Omelette. A great time was had by all, and we have pictures to prove it!

Note the lack of a picture with Matty Boy and me in it; I was temporarily sillified and just forgot. The poses were based on the "Grecian urns" routine in one of my favorite musicals (and obviously one of Karlacita!'s as well because the poses were her idea), The Music Man.

Special bonuses: intelligent conversation! scary squash that's like a foot and a half long and tomatoes from Karlacita!'s garden! The first season of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse, on loan from Matty Boy! Pretty cool!

Matty's done his own post, complete with a picture of me and him tagethah, bruthah, and much better text!

P.S.--got carried away with all the !!! -- thanks, Karlacita!.

Breaking Texan news!

Along with such big names as Melissa Joan Hart (Sabrina the Teenage Witch), Macy Gray (that singer with the raspy voice), Kathy Ireland (model), Ashley Hamilton (multi-untalented Shannon Doherty cast-off), Donny Osmond (professional has-been), and Michael Irvin (Super Bowl-winning former Dallas Cowboys wide receiver and cokehead-turned-preacher/lecturer), former effing Speaker of the effing House Tom DeLay (crook) will be tripping the lights fantastic on ABC's Dancing with the Stars.

So to all of you who thought his career was washed up after all those inconvenient little legal troubles and stuff: look who's laughing now!

Today, Dancing with the Stars; tomorrow, the world! Dignity, people! Dignity!

Blogger Meet-up preview!

Tomorrow, I'm meeting the expert 'splainer of all things, Matty Boy of Lotsa 'Splainin' to Do, AND his sister, hilarious commenter Karlacita! in Santa Rosa! We'll be lunching at the East West Restaurant, which looks like a lovely place.

Pics and dish tomorrow after the meet-up!

Overwhelmed

driving over the Golden Gate Bridge yesterday

I've been too overwhelmed by this "moving to California" thing to even catch up on my politics, but I will say that, as Princess SparklePony's latest posts prove, there is no longer any such thing as sensible discourse or political debate in this country. If I hear one more goddamned word about "death panels" or "Palin plots divorce" or "freak takes gun to Obama healthcare town meeting and can't fucking figure out why the cops went nuts on his ass," I'm just going to tune out all together.

Come to my other blog and look at some pretty pictures. We just spent two days in San Francisco, and boy howdy--it was nice to see so many different characters and assorted kooks in one place. Toto, we're not in Central PA anymore.

Cross-postin' fer jesus**

Check out the latest California news at my other other blog.

**- I know the title makes no sense. It just sounded funny.