My Unemployed Schedule
7:45am Wake up to a terrible need to use the bathroom. Do so. Go back to sleep on the futon mattress which now sits directly on the bedroom floor.
8:00am Wake up to idiot Christians on the radio talking about how one TV show is more righteous than another. Continue lying on the bed until I can stand it no longer.
8:05am Stand up. Stretch. Exclaim "No, they're all crap. Try reading a book instead." Get a strange look from the cat, and realize these people have banned all books except Left Behind, so bad television is all they've got left.
8:10am Sign onto AIM. Read email. Click "Send & Receive" about four more times thinking maybe that'll make more email show up.
8:25am Say "Hi" to a sleepy-seeming Bergmann online, since the first time in a while, I'm consistently online before he is. Read some online news. Confirm my feelings that the entire US has just gone stupid.
8:40am Get in the shower. Resume my daily contemplation of whether the Herbal Essences shampoo will be empty enough by the time I move that I can just throw it out, thereby saving about 96 cubic inches of packing space. Wonder once more whether thinking this makes me obsessive-compulsive. Remember all the other bottles of various personal hygiene products I don't really care about but can't bear to throw away, even though the "Bathroom" box is already full. Remember that my purpose here was actually to get clean, and resume washing hair and shaving.
9:10am Go back to computer. Talk to friends some more. Clarify that my move date has been altered again, but I don't know when it will now occur. Write a website post (usually the first of two, it seems, lately). Hit "Send & Receive" on my email program three or four more times.
10:15am Start talking to an old coworker who has decided to send me an instant message to see what I'm up to. Get a call from Kelley asking if she can come by to check her email, since her apartment is doomed to never have internet access. Realize that I'm still naked, because I neglected to get dressed after my shower. Put on one of my two favorite pairs of REI shorts, and one of my T-shirts which hasn't been packed.
10:30am Let Kelley in. Talk to Kelley a while about her challenges in job-hunting, and my challenges in job-starting. Confirm that the refrigerator is still being cranky. Debate whether to badger the repairman into doing the job right the second time, call the better business bureau on him, just call someone else who'll actually return our calls to get the issue over with, or some combination of the three.
11:15am Realize that I haven't had breakfast and that I'm starving. Contemplate whether any of the frozen, dried, or canned food I have remaining sounds like a reasonable lunch, since I need to ultimately be rid of it all before I move. Fight the urge to meet a friend for lunch. Lose the fight against the urge to meet a friend for lunch.
11:30am Meet Bergmann for lunch somewhere. Feel guilty about spending $8 on food, when I had free food at home. Justifying this by telling myself these are friends I won't be able to have lunch with anymore in a few weeks, and that once I get my first paycheck and signing bonus, it will seem like nothing in comparison. Wonder how much I have left in my checking account. Remember how much I have in my checking account. Freak out about whether that amount will be enough to get me to my new job. Realize that I have some other savings I can "borrow" against if I have to, and set my mind at ease. Realize that Bergmann has been talking to me for about five minutes, and I had no idea what he was saying.
12:40pm Mail a letter at the post office, sell books at Half-Price Books, donate clothes to Goodwill, take recycling to recycling containers, or some other As Soon As I'm Out of the House activity.
12:50pm Stop back by the apartment. Talk to Kelley while absentmindedly glancing around for orphan items on shelves, tables, or the floor, and putting them into a box. Spotting crates without a lid and putting a lid on them, or full boxes without tape and taping them.
1:15pm Get a call from the recruiter with an update about the job in Vancouver. Ask when my revised start date is, and hearing that she'll see what she can find out and email or call me back. Make a note in my Employment Log on Palm Desktop, in case I need to justify what kind of "job hunting" I've been doing for the past three weeks.
1:45pm Feel some cabin fever, and decide to go to a computer store to price up a new motherboard and processor to replace the one that keeps failing. Settle on putting up with further computer crashes until I'm getting a paycheck again (ironically, just now retyped, since a computer crash just made me lose the last two paragraphs). Play a couple of the games on display and marvel at how there are no new computer games. Chuckle at the thought of releasing a series of black and white labelled generic games: Realtime Strategy Game III. First Person Shooter 2. Massive Multiplayer Role-Playing Game Expansion: The Parts the People Who Don't Buy the Expansion Don't Get to See. Leave the store empty-handed. Get paranoid whether the store clerks are going to think I'm stealing something because I'm squeezing through the checkout counters to get to the door because that's the only route to the exit. Decide that having them frisk me, only to find a set of keys and a wallet would only embarrass them, and might entitle me to some kind of reward.
2:30pm Come home. Check email. Click "Send & Receive" four or five more times. Remember that snail mail is probably here. Ask Ivan the cat if he wants to check the mail. Open the front door accompanied by a 16lb blur of black that goes sailing through my legs. Walk down the stairs in the front entryway (I hate the word foyer — pronounced "FOY-err" it sounds like a braindead midwesterner in a burning building, and pronounced "foy-YAY" it sounds like some pretentious person who without exception says "apropos" instead of appropriate, "blasé" instead of blah, "au contraire" instead of on the contrary, and always does so with a bizarre raise in voice pitch and tango-like turn of the hand near his/her right ear — so I boycott them both these days), open the mailbox, sort through the following:
a bank statement, which I stick under my arm a "Have you seen this child?" slip, which I glance at briefly out of a sense of social obligation, even though I haven't seen any kids in weeks, and drop into the trash a promotional CD from an agent publicizing her band. I wonder if this copy will be broken just like the previous one I'd asked for a replacement for. It is. Cracked all the way in half. I toss it in the trash, mumbling that any people who pays this little respect to their media probably don't care much about their music either. a political flyer for a state legislative office. Trash. a coupon for Bed Bath & Beyond. I decide possession of it could be dangerous. Trash.
Climb back up the stairs. Ivan, who has just now started down them sighs, turns around, walks up to within about 8 inches of the doorway, and then starts growling loudly as I try to nudge him the rest of the way inside.
2:45pm More undirected packing.
3:15pm Read a book.
5:10pm Look up from my book at the sound of a friend saying he's signing off AIM for the day. I rub my eyes, which are now tremendously nearsighted from having stared at a book for nearly two hours.
5:20pm Heat up something to eat from the pantry. Admit that canned soup tastes better than it looks, but is still no gourmet meal. After I've eaten my soup, decide that I could use some green vegetables. Check the bag of spinach in the refrigerator, which now more closely resembles algae after the last couple of days of refrigerator issues. Trash.
6:15pm Call my mom since I feel like I haven't talked to her in a while. Find out that nothing has changed since yesterday. Hang up.
6:30pm Turn down an invitation to meet some friends for a drink, because I'm trying to save money. Take a book to a coffee shop. Read some more.
8:05pm Watch part of a movie. Make some coffee. Return to computer desk. Answer some emails to friends. Write. Listen to music.
11:30pm Notice that the cat is already asleep on the bed. Turn off the desk light. Crawl onto the bed.
4:00am Dream that the unresponsive refrigerator repair guy has shown up to kill me.
8:00am Wake up to idiot Christians on the radio talking about how one TV show is more righteous than another. Continue lying on the bed until I can stand it no longer.
8:05am Stand up. Stretch. Exclaim "No, they're all crap. Try reading a book instead." Get a strange look from the cat, and realize these people have banned all books except Left Behind, so bad television is all they've got left.
8:10am Sign onto AIM. Read email. Click "Send & Receive" about four more times thinking maybe that'll make more email show up.
8:25am Say "Hi" to a sleepy-seeming Bergmann online, since the first time in a while, I'm consistently online before he is. Read some online news. Confirm my feelings that the entire US has just gone stupid.
8:40am Get in the shower. Resume my daily contemplation of whether the Herbal Essences shampoo will be empty enough by the time I move that I can just throw it out, thereby saving about 96 cubic inches of packing space. Wonder once more whether thinking this makes me obsessive-compulsive. Remember all the other bottles of various personal hygiene products I don't really care about but can't bear to throw away, even though the "Bathroom" box is already full. Remember that my purpose here was actually to get clean, and resume washing hair and shaving.
9:10am Go back to computer. Talk to friends some more. Clarify that my move date has been altered again, but I don't know when it will now occur. Write a website post (usually the first of two, it seems, lately). Hit "Send & Receive" on my email program three or four more times.
10:15am Start talking to an old coworker who has decided to send me an instant message to see what I'm up to. Get a call from Kelley asking if she can come by to check her email, since her apartment is doomed to never have internet access. Realize that I'm still naked, because I neglected to get dressed after my shower. Put on one of my two favorite pairs of REI shorts, and one of my T-shirts which hasn't been packed.
10:30am Let Kelley in. Talk to Kelley a while about her challenges in job-hunting, and my challenges in job-starting. Confirm that the refrigerator is still being cranky. Debate whether to badger the repairman into doing the job right the second time, call the better business bureau on him, just call someone else who'll actually return our calls to get the issue over with, or some combination of the three.
11:15am Realize that I haven't had breakfast and that I'm starving. Contemplate whether any of the frozen, dried, or canned food I have remaining sounds like a reasonable lunch, since I need to ultimately be rid of it all before I move. Fight the urge to meet a friend for lunch. Lose the fight against the urge to meet a friend for lunch.
11:30am Meet Bergmann for lunch somewhere. Feel guilty about spending $8 on food, when I had free food at home. Justifying this by telling myself these are friends I won't be able to have lunch with anymore in a few weeks, and that once I get my first paycheck and signing bonus, it will seem like nothing in comparison. Wonder how much I have left in my checking account. Remember how much I have in my checking account. Freak out about whether that amount will be enough to get me to my new job. Realize that I have some other savings I can "borrow" against if I have to, and set my mind at ease. Realize that Bergmann has been talking to me for about five minutes, and I had no idea what he was saying.
12:40pm Mail a letter at the post office, sell books at Half-Price Books, donate clothes to Goodwill, take recycling to recycling containers, or some other As Soon As I'm Out of the House activity.
12:50pm Stop back by the apartment. Talk to Kelley while absentmindedly glancing around for orphan items on shelves, tables, or the floor, and putting them into a box. Spotting crates without a lid and putting a lid on them, or full boxes without tape and taping them.
1:15pm Get a call from the recruiter with an update about the job in Vancouver. Ask when my revised start date is, and hearing that she'll see what she can find out and email or call me back. Make a note in my Employment Log on Palm Desktop, in case I need to justify what kind of "job hunting" I've been doing for the past three weeks.
1:45pm Feel some cabin fever, and decide to go to a computer store to price up a new motherboard and processor to replace the one that keeps failing. Settle on putting up with further computer crashes until I'm getting a paycheck again (ironically, just now retyped, since a computer crash just made me lose the last two paragraphs). Play a couple of the games on display and marvel at how there are no new computer games. Chuckle at the thought of releasing a series of black and white labelled generic games: Realtime Strategy Game III. First Person Shooter 2. Massive Multiplayer Role-Playing Game Expansion: The Parts the People Who Don't Buy the Expansion Don't Get to See. Leave the store empty-handed. Get paranoid whether the store clerks are going to think I'm stealing something because I'm squeezing through the checkout counters to get to the door because that's the only route to the exit. Decide that having them frisk me, only to find a set of keys and a wallet would only embarrass them, and might entitle me to some kind of reward.
2:30pm Come home. Check email. Click "Send & Receive" four or five more times. Remember that snail mail is probably here. Ask Ivan the cat if he wants to check the mail. Open the front door accompanied by a 16lb blur of black that goes sailing through my legs. Walk down the stairs in the front entryway (I hate the word foyer — pronounced "FOY-err" it sounds like a braindead midwesterner in a burning building, and pronounced "foy-YAY" it sounds like some pretentious person who without exception says "apropos" instead of appropriate, "blasé" instead of blah, "au contraire" instead of on the contrary, and always does so with a bizarre raise in voice pitch and tango-like turn of the hand near his/her right ear — so I boycott them both these days), open the mailbox, sort through the following:
Climb back up the stairs. Ivan, who has just now started down them sighs, turns around, walks up to within about 8 inches of the doorway, and then starts growling loudly as I try to nudge him the rest of the way inside.
2:45pm More undirected packing.
3:15pm Read a book.
5:10pm Look up from my book at the sound of a friend saying he's signing off AIM for the day. I rub my eyes, which are now tremendously nearsighted from having stared at a book for nearly two hours.
5:20pm Heat up something to eat from the pantry. Admit that canned soup tastes better than it looks, but is still no gourmet meal. After I've eaten my soup, decide that I could use some green vegetables. Check the bag of spinach in the refrigerator, which now more closely resembles algae after the last couple of days of refrigerator issues. Trash.
6:15pm Call my mom since I feel like I haven't talked to her in a while. Find out that nothing has changed since yesterday. Hang up.
6:30pm Turn down an invitation to meet some friends for a drink, because I'm trying to save money. Take a book to a coffee shop. Read some more.
8:05pm Watch part of a movie. Make some coffee. Return to computer desk. Answer some emails to friends. Write. Listen to music.
11:30pm Notice that the cat is already asleep on the bed. Turn off the desk light. Crawl onto the bed.
4:00am Dream that the unresponsive refrigerator repair guy has shown up to kill me.