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I didn’t quite finish the big project I started working on Friday, but I have made progress.

I went for the interview today and it did not go well.  Did you ever go to an interview where no matter how you answer the question, your answer will be wrong?  Questions like “So, have you stopped torturing kittens yet?”  Where, even if you’ve never in your life laid a hand on a kitten in anger, no matter how you answer you’re going to end up looking like a sociopath.  Well, that’s what this was like except for they were job related questions…. So, I guess they were more along the lines of “So, have you stopped robbing the company yet?”  Where, even if you’ve never so much as pilfered a pen, there is no answer that will put you in a favorable light.  Such was my interview today.

I guess I can take some consolation in the fact that I looked ok.  I had a nice outfit and my hair was actually fairly cooperative.

So, now I am back to looking for jobs since this interview was really the last thing I had “on deck”.  I am trying to not feel too down about it and I am trying to stop myself from replaying it all in my head and picking apart every question and every answer.

Onwards to something bigger and better, right?

Well, I’ve crossed the 30-day threshold and there are really no strong prospects in sight.  Everything that is on deck has a pretty heavy element of doubt…

I was never able to get any sort of response from the agency that sent me on the interview last Thursday.  I’ve called and I’ve e-mailed and have been met with resounding silence.  I’m honestly not really sure what to make of it.

I’m not expecting to hear anything in what remains of this week so I am, again, getting ready to start from Square One again on Monday.  Well, that’s not QUITE true.  Earlier this week I was contacted about a position that I hadn’t heard anything about for over 2 weeks.  I had a phone interview and they wanted someone to start on Monday. And then everything changed and they will be spending the next couple of weeks doing face-to-face interviews.  Of course, it’s a job where the commute is an hour, one way.  And I am relatively ok with that but it is not optimal.  Still, it would be a good job.  So, we’ll see if it ends up working out.

I fired off more applications today, so in 2-3 weeks should start hearing about those. (That seems to be the standard delay time).

I’ve got a big project I want to get done tomorrow.  And I have some other things that are overdue, so that will probably keep me busy for the weekend (along with the usual weekend tasks).  Guess I’d better get some sleep!

I had an interview yesterday and the interviewer had said he expected to make a decision by the end of the day and I should hear something early today.  Well, it’s almost the close of the business day and not a peep.  I was pretty sure I was going to get an offer so I am pretty humbled that I’m not going to be offered the opportunity.

The job I really want hasn’t contacted me, either and it’s already been a month going through their process, so I am not really holding out much hope of things moving along (and me getting back to work) too quickly.

There were a couple of prospects that were “hot” a week/week and a half ago that just totally went cold/dead.  I’d be lying if I said I was taking it well.  I am starting to panic. Because if I don’t get something soon, I am going to have to start looking at taking jobs that don’t pay as well and will need to get a second job in order to pay the bills.

I am trying to maintain confidence and a positive attitude, but really feel like I have gotten a hard reality slap this week and am feeling very rejected and humbled and my spirit is breaking.

I will start anew on Monday.  I’m going to try to not think too much about it this weekend.  But I am pretty heartbroken right now.

I hope you all have a fabulous weekend!

I had an interview today for a job that I really, really want.  I interviewed with two people. The first just wasn’t impressed by anything I said and I kept getting the feeling that he was waiting for me to apologize for/explain the fact that I’ve had a number of short-term jobs and I just didn’t address the issue at all because of the jobs on my resume, there is one that I left after having three bosses in less than a year and I was going to get my hours cut and all of the best parts of the job taken away and one where they decided they wanted someone bilingual in a language I did not know how to speak.  They decided after hiring (and letting go) 6 people in an 18 month span that this skill was absolutely essential.  All the rest of my jobs, I’ve been downsized or they have been contract positions with a set end (ok, so one of them, the person I worked for retired) but the point is, I am NOT someone who quits or job-hops.  I have the Resume of Career Catastrophes… a series of events which I did not create or control.

The second person I interviewed with, I really “clicked” with and I would pretty much sell my soul to work with.  There are very few people I meet that I feel a fairly instantaneous connection with, but this was one of those times.

And so, I have written my thank-you letters and now I wait.

In the meantime, I got a call about a contract job and they want me to interview tomorrow (which messes up my plans for the afternoon… I have a standing appointment on Thursdays) but the person who had called me could not even give me an address.  So, hopefully tomorrow morning I will get an address and can figure out the best way to accomplish getting to the interview, rushing home to change and then get to my appointment (because interview clothes are absolutely not appropriate for the appointment).

Wish me luck on getting the job I interviewed for today.

It was not the most productive weekend, therefore, I am putting in a little “overtime” tonight in an effort to get things done.  The nice part about being up late is that it is quiet and there is less of a chance of being interrupted in the middle of whatever you choose to work on.  The down side, of course, is that noise must be kept to a minimum because the rest of the world is sleeping. 

I was contacted about a job last week that was the 3PM-11PM shift.  Second shift is a tough one because you completely lose touch with the rest of the world  You are working when people are home and relaxing and you are sleeping through a majority of normal business hours.  It makes it challenging to have any sort of life outside of work (not that I have a really busy life outside of work, but 2nd shift would essentially rob me of having ANY real social life possibilities).  The pay for the position was well below what it is really viable for me to take, so I decided to pass on the opportunity.

Still… there is something to be said for peace and quiet (another reason that 2nd shift would be hard… apparently no one else where I live works for a living and it is NOISY here during the day, even when the kids are supposed to be in school).

I’ve got an interview lined up for this week.  I am trying to not get TOO excited but it is a job that I think I’d really like.  And maybe I will hear about the other opportunity that is allegedly “moving forward”.  (There’s a third possibility, but honestly, it’s not very attractive so if it stalls out, I’m fine with that).

Hope everyone has a fantastic week!

Honestly, you probably don’t want to read this. But I need to write it to get it out of my head.

Every day I feel worse.  Not like I’m coming down with a cold or something like that. I feel worse about myself on an emotional level. I feel less and less valuable every day. I keep waiting for things, bad things, to happen because I just can’t see how they AREN’T going to happen.  Pretty much every day I burst into tears at some point.

I don’t have friends I can talk to about it and I wouldn’t want to burden anyone with it if I did have friends to talk to about it. I feel like Cinderella, knowing that there is a magnificent ball happening at the palace and knowing that I am not invited.  But I don’t have helpful mice or a pumpkin coach and I sure as heck don’t have a fairy godmother and even typing about this now, my chest is tightening and I feel vaguely nauseous and overwhelmingly sad.  I want to be invited to the Ball. To at least be able to stand at a window of the palace and see the finery within. But I’m not invited & know I am unwelcome.

I’ve never been part of the “in crowd”.  The last few years I haven’t owned a TV and so when office talk would turn to the latest episode of American Idol I had nothing to add to the conversation. It was very isolating (even though, frankly, I have ZERO interest in American Idol).

I remember that the last time I felt like this was March 2010. There seemed to be only one way to make things any better.  If I get the news I am expecting, I know what the best option will be.  I suppose that, once upon a time in my youth I was resilient.  Not so much anymore.  Small things cut much more deeply than they should and the comforting words that were present when I was younger are fewer and farther between these days. It has become more difficult for me to believe everything will be ok.

Off now to do some research… Errands to run tomorrow, want to make sure I get everything I need. Won’t be time to do extra running around on the weekend and the clock is ticking!

So, my little unemployed clock ticks on….

I have sent Company X about a dozen resumes since I moved to my current location. I’ve never gotten a call from them… until today.  And they called me about a job that would, quite frankly, bore me to death.  AND would be a step back in pay.  Every time I manage to make a wage I can live with, I lose the job and then end up having no choice but to take a job that pays less and then I inch my way back up to a good wage, the company goes bankrupt/downsizes/decides to cut all persons with my job title and I take a step back again. (No, I am not quitting or being fired for doing something wrong)

In the past decade, my earnings have spanned a range of $15,000. (Low being $… high being $+15,000).  And it has not been consistent… it’s been low paying job, high paying job, low paying job, high paying job, low paying job, high paying job so when someone demands your salary history, they have no real way of pinpointing your actual value.  What they are used to seeing is that say, in 2000 you made $10 an hour. You worked for that company for 3 years and left when you were making $13 an hour.  Then you got a job that paid $13.50 an hour, where you worked for 5 years and when you left that job it was for a job paying $20 an hour and so on.

In my case (this is an example, not at all my real earnings) it’s been more like  in 2000 I was making $10 an hour. I got laid off, took a job making $9.50 an hour (and worked a second, sometimes a third job). Worked there for almost 2 years then that company went out of business and I got a job making $15 an hour…got downsized after 6 months and took a job that paid $11.50 an hour, that was a contract position that lasted 8 months and then the contract ended and I got a job making $20, which lasted for 6 months before I got downsized and because of circumstances took a job for $12 an hour… and had a second job.  The point being there has been no steady progression but I have a threshold of “this is what I NEED to make in order to not have to work two (or more) jobs”.  I live in a very inexpensive apartment in a not so good part of town.  I ended up shouldering all of the marital debt in my divorce, so I have to keep making payments or my credit gets trashed and nearly every employer these days runs a credit check so defaulting is NOT AN OPTION.  The internet is pretty much my one luxury.  The rest of my money pays the bills and keeps a roof over my head. I haven’t got a dime saved for retirement.  I (thankfully) do not have student loans (of course, I am being hurt by not having a degree, but the crippling debt I would have had to shoulder would be worse than trying to convince employers that real world experience is just as valuable as being able to quote something you learned in a textbook).

And so, the clock ticks on… And only time will tell what happens next…

I wish I could tell you that the interview the other day went fabulously and that I am once again gainfully employed. Alas, such is not the case (as you might have figured out from the county clock on the sidebar).

I’m not sure what went wrong. I really thought that things, while a tad weird, went ok.  I met with someone who works in the office but not really for the company I’d be working for. The interviewer was an outside consultant who had no HR experience and seemingly no interview experience.  I did the best I could given the situation to try and sell myself as an excellent candidate for the position but have heard nothing which I am guessing means that they are no longer interested in me. I was told by the interviewer that I should hear, likely that day, from my initial contact person.  Well, it’s the end of the week and… nothing.

Ok, so… gotta move on.  But really, how hard would it have been for the initial contact to shoot me an email saying “you know, we’ve decided to go a different direction”.  So, yes, I am disappointed and feel confused about what went wrong.

I have also found a trend on applications that I am not enjoying.  Applications asking for graduation dates which makes it pretty easy for them to decide that you are too old for them to consider hiring. Not impressed, folks.  Age discrimination is allegedly illegal. And yet, they find “weasel” ways around it.. like asking the year you graduated from high school.

Also, I was contacted by an agency that said they were going to send me an email and then I heard NOTHING from them. Again, just tell me you aren’t interested so we can both move on. Hrumph.

I should get to bed now, it’s going on 2:30AM and I think my insomnia is considering giving me a break and letting me sleep…

I have an interview tomorrow. I had a phone interview with this company last week and tomorrow will be Round One of the face-to-face interviews.  Other than a couple of rejections and a couple of dead ends, there hasn’t been much forward progress, so I am looking forward to this but, of course, have some trepidation, as I always do, going into a situation where I am uncertain of the outcome.

I am thinking a great deal about appearance related things. I have put a clear coat of polish on my nails and I am agonizing over what to wear, what do do about makeup and the like.  I am just not very good at the feminine arts as I have generally regarded them as a waste of time over the years.  I know that not being the pretty one has cost me a job more than once. And I got one job because the boss’s wife was a jealous woman and the boss wanted to “hire someone so unattractive that (my wife) could not complain about her”.

So, think good thoughts in my direction as I head off to the interview tomorrow!  I’ll let you know if I make it to Round 2 or if this will be “Game Over”… at least for this position.

When I am not working, I try to manage my time well. I know that I must devote time to the job search but I also know that sitting in front of a computer 10+ hours a day with no break will do me no favors physically.

I try to do my hardcore search activities Monday, Wednesday and Friday and then Tuesday and Thursday I use to do errands, work on housework and attempt to keep myself from becoming a completely worthless lump.  That doesn’t mean I don’t do any searching on Tuesday & Thursday, just that I diversify my activities more on those days.

I’ve already reached the point that I have no idea what day it is. I try to mostly take weekends off from the search only because getting burned out and being “at work” all of the time is not healthy.  It’s not healthy when you are working for an employer and it’s not healthy when you are “freelancing” (or searching for a new job).

So, I am keeping quite busy. I have an errand to run outside of the house tomorrow, not far from home.  I think I will try to get in a workout tomorrow, as well.  I’ve gone from walking 5000+ steps a day to around a  thousand and feel like I need to be more active.  And I have a bunch of shredding I need to do (I save it for “down time” and haven’t gotten to it for quite some time…. way past due!)