8/27/14
I’m calling it ‘The Failure World Tour’. The vast majority of my time working in my
chosen field I have had very little difficulty finding employment. In fact most of the time I’ve had options and
been forced to choose where I want to work.
How will did that work out for me 8 years ago in hindsight? But I digress; I generally have had my
pick. There is a reason for that; I’m
exceptional at what I do.
It isn’t bragging it is simply a fact. I know I’m good at what I do, and I have no
difficulties getting that across to people.
That is why this ‘Failure World Tour’ has been so damn vexing. I go to interview after interview and am told
that I’m good, but for whatever reason they are going in a different direction,
or I’m not ‘exactly’ what they are looking for right now, or in the case of
last Friday they hired someone before they interviewed me.
Yeah, you read that right.
A reputable organization had me take off time, drive to St. Paul, take a
test, and sit in a lobby for 35 minutes only to tell me they filled the
position. Then they tried to sell me on
doing a job I did about 17 years ago. I
was gracious in the face of this humiliation and held my composure till I got
in the car and left. This has been the
story of me trying to find something and somewhere better to ply my trade.
This whole ‘Tour’ has really given my confidence a hit. It has also made me think very long and hard
about whether I want to stay in an industry that seems to thrive on an
environment so pseudo-professionalism as a veneer to hide the failings of
people in positions of leadership that either don’t know what they are doing or
just don’t care all that much. I wasn’t
sure I could be treated with less respect than I am Mon. through Fri., hence
the desire to leave, but during this process I have found that it isn’t just
‘here’, it is everywhere.
This makes me think that it is an industry standard, and
that just maybe everywhere I’d been previously was the exception. That thought terrifies me. What frightens me even more is that maybe it
isn’t just the industry I am in. What if
I stretch my wings and move out of Human Services into another area and find
that it is the same Junior High popularity contest, back biting, gossiping, and
incompetence? Is this what ‘work’
is? A place where the least common
denominator has failed upwards to perch upon its throne of ineptitude and
arbitrarily casts its judgments down upon the sycophant masses? Do we have to suffer this shit with a smile,
chomp it down, force that grin out, and ask for another?
Gawds, I hope not.
I’m struggling to find the motivation to go out and continue to pound
the pavement, put myself out there, and go through this. Is the Devil I know better than continuing to
explore all these new fresh Hells? I’m
just not sure. I wish I was, but the
constant disrespect and rejection has been hard for me to swallow down. I am having a problem deciding whether or not
I’ve had my ‘fill’, and does it even matter if I have? Something has got to give at some point.
Perhaps the head down, move forward, and keep swinging will
be the approach that eventually gets me what I want, but currently…Currently
I’m taking it on the chin, and I have found I don’t particularly like it…
How about we fire up some…
RANDOM CRAP!
- All those things I said above are true. Not only that but they give me terrible
anxiety, nightmares, stress poops, affect my confidence, and are hard for me to
deal with. For 40 hours a week. You see my personal life has never, EVER,
been better. I am blessed with amazing
people in my world, an amazing wife who supports me no matter what, and
Friends, Friends that have re-affirmed my faith in humanity in a lot of
ways. SO while I vent and am frustrated
by that part of my life, it is only a small part and one that I’m gladly
willing to suffer through as long as the payoff is that I have the people in my
life outside of that 40 hour bubble that I currently do. Just thought I should clarify.
- If you are in the market for an amazing custom Action Figure
contact Dave Wheeler of Mindwave Studios.
He will hook you up!
- I had to mow last night.
It was miserable. What was worse
was the drainage hose from the furnace somehow got clogged sometime over the
weekend and then overflowed all over the basement. So our carpet was soaked in some spots,
smelled awful, and we’ve been running fans on that area now for about 24 hours
to dry it out. I didn’t even know that
hose could get clogged as I understood it only took on condensation. Turns out that calcium builds up in there and
it can indeed get clogged and you need to flush it. There are so many things that a guy like me
just doesn’t either know or understand about what you need to do with your
house. Times like last night make me
feel like I am SO far out of my depth as an adult. We had to move everything, clean the tube
thoroughly, which was pretty friggin’ gnarly, and then dry the carpet as much
as possible with towels. It was the
drizzlin’ poos. As for the mowing the
problem becomes that the lawn is so flippin’ full of holes that my right ankle
gives up and turns in, so I end up doing the last third walking on the side of
my foot or turning it all the way out.
My left ankle has the surgery supports in it, the right one has broken a
few times, but no screws or plates are in there so it just gets wobbly. Then my calves start to feel like they are
going to tear off the bone. I remember
being in high school and Dr. Matt had horrible shin splints and we’d give him a
LOT of grief about it, well that and his ‘Barrel Chest’. If it felt like this Dr. Matt, then I am
sorry for being an unrepentant dick back then.
Suffice to say I’m worn out.
- I really need to grill this weekend.
- Holy crap, THANK YOU to THE Karl, La Randita Rojo, ‘Casual’
Doug, & Master Kedrin 4.0 for the computer upgrade, the Doug Craft invite,
the Mead and potential Gluten Free beer, and this strange mystery project that
I’m being taunted with. I look forward
to Friday night’s Movie-A-Thon where we can all kick back, have a beverage or
ten, watch bad flicks, and laugh. Steel
thyselves because Friday night will be a SOMBRERO NIGHT!
- I can’t wait for fall so we can fire pit it up every damn
weekend.
- Last Thursday was 3rd Group D&D and it was
shit. I have had some time to mentally
digest it and overall it boils down to 4 points; 1) I was fried, 2) The room
wasn’t that in to it that night, 3) We were missing the sessions Co-DM &
one of the players, & 4) The expectations were skewed. The players wanted to kill Uwain. They were completely focused on this idea of
getting to this character they have grown to despise and slitting his throat in
the most humiliating way possible. While
Zack and I were building a death trap out of 4 Encounters made to challenge
with a story telling finale. When
reality and expectation crash into each other at full speed without passion you
have a shit session. The Monks and the
radiating columns were diabolical in nature and the PC’s just were not feeling
it. I didn’t have the energy level to
wring the fun out of it, and in the end I think it just left all of us
frustrated. I hate, H-A-T-E-, sessions
like that. It makes me question why I
run. At the same time, there was a
strange desire by the group at large to come back and finish the ‘Quest’, and
even some bizarre admiration of the nastiness of that room so that gives me a
desire to see this through. So in a few
weeks we are going to pick up where we left off and play through to the bitter
end. I am putting the pressure squarely
on my shoulders to make it something special.
- We missed the first episode of Doctor Who, I am sad.
- Last weekend we had the Niece and Nephew for their Summer
Slumber Party ’14. We built D&D
Kre-O’s, Hasbro’s answer to LEGO’s, on Friday night. Couple that with a slew of the Chinese LEGO
super hero knock-offs I’d been hoarding just for this and you had a building
extravaganza. I have to say that if you
like LEGO’s and D&D then go to your local Toys R’ Us and get some of these
Kre-O’s as they are currently like 50% off.
In fact if you buy one of their ‘blind’ figure packs, where you get one
mini-figure for like $1.50, there is a coupon for $3 off any other Kre-O
D&D product over $15! And with the
clearance on these items the most expensive set is like $16. We spent like $30 and got the three box
builds and one ‘blind’ mini-figure. It
was a steal. I plan on going back and
getting more next month which is how impressed I was. As for the Chinese mini-figures, if you are
on Ebay they are a great deal as well, but then again I am a miser and like my
LEGO’s on the cheap. They aren’t
perfect, but they’ll do. Saturday we had
a delicious brunch of crepes, watched the LEGO Movie (***** out of 5), and then
adjourned to the basement for a four hour EPIC NAVAL War! I made up some rules loosely based on the
dice comparison rules from the upcoming Dungeon Saga game, ON KICKSTARTER
NOW! We picked our ships, made up our
crews, and then rolled for stats.
Madeline was Captain Lady Orange of the Skull Girl flotilla, Sean was
Captain Sea Dragon of the Empire-X fleet, and I was Captain Curly Jones of the
Scurvy Dawgs. We had islands to explore,
some random monsters to fight, and fact that we all three wanted to sink each
other’s boats. In the end Madeline sunk
Sean, and she and I engaged in a really nasty battle that came down to just who
could roll better, and I came out JUST ahead.
It was a great time. We laughed,
we yelled, we danced, and we had a blast.
Then after a great dinner, Maddy & Cassandra made a delicious Gluten
Free cake while Sean and I busted out LEGO Marvel Super Heroes on Xbox
360. What a phenomenal game, wow! In fact we played till like 11:30pm at night
because we just HAD to beat Venom. Sunday
we got up and had a light breakfast, fixed our Kre-O castle set-up which had
gotten dropped and fell apart, while Maddy and Cassandra made necklaces. Eventually, Ant came and retrieved his brood
and Cassandra and I could finally relax.
I was a great time, and I hope we made some memories. I might post the pictures at some point if
anyone who I don’t interact with on ‘Teh Fazebookz’ wants to see them.
- Nothing makes my day like hearing my lovely wife giggling
from the next office over about something I said in an e-mail. THAT is something I will miss when I leave
the place that currently pays me.
- Saturday is a Board Game Day. That means that I will finally be playing Lords Of Waterdeep. Now I know The Geneious and Sassie Cassie aren’t going to be able to make it, but ‘Casual’ Doug IS going to be there, as is Electric Elyssa, Magic Mike, THE Karl, Master Kedrin 4.0, and numerous others. SO I will be able to bust that bad boy out and FINALLY play it and the expansion. I’m excited to try Elder Sign and possibly the expansion to City Of Thieves. That doesn’t even take into account getting to play Kings Of Tokyo, Super Fight, Settlers, and maybe if we have enough people Werewolves Of Millers Hollow!
- I want to Podcast next week, anyone in?
- Dungeon Saga on Kickstarter is down to under 5 days to go
and well over $530,000.00 in ‘the bank’.
A second expansion is being filled out with each stretch goal met. In all honestly if you go look and see the
amount of stuff you get for $100 it is ridiculous. So again I’m imploring all of you love Dungeon
Crawl Board Games to go throw your cash in and get aboard for the final stretch
run.
- THE Karl hooked me up with this swanky exercise bike. Next week I start to use it.
- I have a hard time letting people go. It is a strange thing. I have people who move to the peripheral of
my existence and yet I struggle to close that chapter with them. Whether it is because I can’t ask for stuff
back or just have this strange fear of cutting the cord with them because I’m
afraid of how it will end I struggle with that.
It isn’t like in some cases where things come to a head, confrontation
occurs, and then it becomes adversarial.
This is that lingering relationship that has ceased to mean what it did,
but still clings. I feel like I have to
get better at that.
- For those who know…”Ditto”.
- We watched the latest episode of The Chris Gethard Show the
other day and it was the panel taking calls on whether or not they should keep
doing the show. Gethard seems to feel
trapped and burned out by this beast he’s created. It felt like he’d already made up his mind to
end the show, with the exception of now wanting to do two more episodes based
upon two of the calls/callers. I can
understand that. I sometimes find that
some of my endeavors can feel like I am obligated to them more than enjoying
them, and I’m NO where near as successful or as talented as Chris Gethard. So I can understand his desire or even need
to move away from his show and do something he finds himself more inspired
by. That being said, I have NO desire for
this show to EVER end. When you find
something that just speaks to you in a strange way, you never want it to go
away. It is a strange show; you get to
feel like you know the people on it and in a way since you enjoy it you feel
like they ‘get’ you. To have that go
away so quickly after finding it would suck.
If it does I plan on writing a letter to Chris Gethard just to thank
him. It is rare to find something that
inspires thought; laughs, empathy, and self-reflection while watching someone
get pummeled by a double ended dildo or have people make burritos on their
belly.
I think that is all I have today.
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