oh...dear...god...

it's another one of those moping about my life choices blog! yay!

so, yes. november is fast approaching. by my calculations, once i've written my rent check and paid for therapy and that other bill that's due in the first week of november, i'll have about $35 in my checking account until my next payday. which will be nov 14. this is assuming i don't buy groceries, take money out of my account, or need anything urgently that i don't currently own.

oh shit. Oooooohhhh shit.

so, um...i'm about to have a real big problem. i do have some savings, yes, and i'm comfortable taknig up to 200 more dollars out of savings. but, um...that's not gonig to be enough. let's put it this way...i'm making about 65% of what i had been making per month for the past, oh, 2.5 years. this is not okay. especially since what i had been making didn't really give me any money leftover at the end of each month for savings.

and i have been applying for any and every possible non-waiting tables job that is part-time that i can find. it's rough. it's really rough out there. and right now, it's not looking so good.

so...whereas before, i was having difficulty sleeping because of teaching the spider lesson at my otherwise nifty-but-part-time job, i am now having difficulty sleeping because of my financial situation created largely by my unwillingness to remain unhappy at a nightmare job.

theory - if it holds true - is that i am happier now. and to a large extent, yes. i am. but uh...wow am i worried. Wow. wow.

add to that, there's a lot of other shit happening right now. nevermind the whole national/international economic crisis and it being election season (which is stressful enough on its own), but then there's a lot of weird personal things happening right now including my further demonstrated inability to date successfully, octagenarian that i love and their many varied health crises, my sister having a really rough time of it right now, and impending mysterious changes at my artistic institute of choice (the one where don't get paid), and it's fucking cold already. it's uh...it's a lot.

and i hate to say it - especially since for the most part this year has been really positive for me, and on the whole i feel like i'm in a lot better 'headspace' now than i was 12 months ago - but the astrologers were right. 100%. i do, to an extent, fall into that horoscopery bullshit. no, my daily horoscope usually doesn't mean anything. and usually, i don't remember or care about the 'yearly astrological predictions', but all the ones that i read for 2008 essentially said that this year would be a doozy. and a doozy it has been. just...one thing after another this year. broad, sweeping, constant change. in all areas all teh time.

so i guess what i'm saying is, i'd like to get paid to be stable. maybe it's like a dare. like 'i dare you to not make any ginormous life changes for at least a week and to roll with the people around you making ginormous life changes in a pleasant manner and if you can do that, i'll give you $300'. Okay. sign me up. dare accepted! give me the $300! or even $100. or $10. whatever. i just...sigh..

okay, well...i'm going to go see if any online surveys need me to take them. i'm being dead serious, i signed up for like three 'get paid to take free online surveys' services yesterday. in addition to applying for a bunch of jobs.

heigh-ho...

done lost my damn mind...

so, in the past three weeks...

i have lost and re-gained internets.
celebrated about 50 million birthdays.
watched my bank account leak money into the ether of my spending habits.
been unable to hear my alarm and wake up, but have all my neighbors hear my alarm and they wake up which has led to my landlord building me an alarm clock box on my wall.
been to a wedding.
been to a baby shower.
had a friend from london crash in my living room for a few days.
been in a couple shows both with and without dad's.
got signed to a talent agency.
half-heartedly pursued dating some dude.
been unable to find part-time work, still.
applied to a temp agency, with plans to send resume to two more today.
taught a whole bunch of lessons on spiders.
and today applied to a jorb at the georgia aquarium.
also gotten drunk a lot.
and skinned both of my knees in one awesome fall.
and been to bamboo luau twice.
and still not decided what to be for halloween.
and seen a bunch of high school friends.
and been a hermit.
been to two clinics and made an appointment to got to a doctor.
i also almost blew up my apartment (and, probably the other apartments in my complex) while making real mac 'n' cheese.
then today i decided i could make it until this weekend to go to the grocery store again.
i also have a headache.
i tended a friend's vending machines for a minute or two.
broke stuff.
got a printer again.
paid some bills (sob).
been in a parade.
started work on that christmas show.
t.a.-ed some classes.
broke out the damn space heater at my apartment.

yeah...

i've been ridiculously busy, in other words. which, is okay. actually, it'd be a-okay and no worries at all if i were getting paid for the majority of this stuff. not the social stuff, clearly, but uh...yeah. and i reckon some things, i do get paid for. but it's about to get VERY VERY scary at the ponderosa del krueger. Very Scary. and i ain't talkin' about halloween, folks.

the big hope - other than the jobs i've replied to - is that i'll get some work through this agency. that would be bad-ass. one or two gigs a month and i might be okay. really. which is ideal. of course, there's zero gauruntee of that. i have no clue how to spell gaurantee. that second time seems closer, nu?

anypoo...uh, i say i've lost my mind for any number of reasons. but the most pressing one at this moment is the 'applying to a job at the ga aquarium'. mama hates aquariums. they're dark and creepy and those fish stare right the fuck back at you. they're creepy, creepy places. even the ones that try to use natural light. but the job that i've applied to is pretty cool - if it's what i think it is. the description on all three websites (including the aquarium web site) is REALLY vague, but it sounds like another 'alternative education' type of teaching thing. which i am 100% down with. and yeah, i'd love to do some office work, but this would be super-cool too.

so we'll see what happens. maybe something. maybe nothing. either way, by the time november hits, mama's gotta have an income supplement or...man....

wish me luck kids, this job market is total bullshit right now. even for part-time assholes like me.

help me obi wan kenobi*...

you're my only hope.

* if you are reading this note, you are obi wan kenobi. congrats jedi master.

so, yes. i no longer work at norcostco. this is great. great because that job was not great. at all. wowsers. worst job ever.

i love, love, LOVE my new job. Love it. can't say enough how happy it makes me. i'm at the center for puppetry arts in their distance learning program. i get to teach kids, make crafts, and be around as much puppety goodness as i can be around before i get tweaked out and have to get away from it. but...it's only part time.

you see, mama left hell to find something better, and it's working-ish. i'm fine monetarily until i pay october rent. then...we'll see.so, you my friends, if you hear of anything - even if it's like a week of stuffing envelopes - please, please, PLEASE let me know. i'm about to be CRAZY strapped for cash/living expenses and i don't really want to move in with my folks. i am not 'above' waiting tables, but would like to save that as a last resort and even then i'd still be looking for a steady day-time thing.

let me tell you when i can work - 2:30 to 5:30 or 6 (some nights even 6:30) M-Th, all day Friday (so, like 9 to 5 or 10 to 6 or whatever). that's - for those of you keeping track - about 22 hours that i can work per week. i'd like to avoid nights and weekends, if possible. but if you hear of something that needs doing and will pay me to do, and it's on the weekends, please let me know.

i'm sorry to make this whiny/help me/i'm an idiot so help me find a way to eat, but uh...yeah.

thanks for your time. lemme know how i can help you...word.

oh, and if you stumbled over here from another blog, with the promise of fun times, just...read other things...or i'll get goofy and post something here...whatever...

vi-o-lent dreams

i had a dream on saturday night that i was sleeping in my office at norcostco. this was unusual for any number of reasons, not the least of which being 'norcostco' - for the purposes of my dream - was set up like a ranch-style house. where the shirt room is was a kitchen with lots of windows. the gel room was a sitting room, once again, with lots of windows. the showroom was the same, but instead of leading off to costume rentals there was a sitting room with a tv. then the costume shop was a sort of ante room and my office was set up like a bedroom. all the furniture was old and distressed. it was clearly an old house in a small town in the south that had been shoddily converted to a kitchsy theatrical merchandiser place. and i believe the whole thing was on cinder blocks, as though it had been plucked from monticello, ga and placed in the middle of atlanta.

there was a ton of people in the store when i decided to call it a night. some i knew, some were just dream people. but instead of looking at crap to buy, they kept following me like a tour group as i did all my stuff. i tried to explain to them that the store was closed and they should leave, but they didn't get the idea until i told them it was time for me to go to sleep.

so i tuck into my bed, am drifting off to sleep and i hear loud voices outside. trying to get inside. adn though they were laughing and joking, it was clear that they were 'doing a job'. i went to investigate and got to the kitchen. two dangerous lookin' guys were trying the screen door. they didn't see me, and i tried to run into the sitting room, forgetting that they were gonig in the same direction (towards the front door) and that the room was full of windows. i caught one of them's eye, tried to hide on the wall and woke up. it really freaked me out.

let me explain.

this is the second time i've had a 'they're at your screen door try not to be seen, oh shit they saw you' dream. oddly, it was about a house i was living in during college (which may have actually been on cinder blocks) that iw as about a week and a half from moving out of. this is the interior of that house and my roommate. he wasn't usually this slovenly or angry looking. that's why i took the picture.

now, then, that first dream was all about another completely weird situation that had everything to do with the place i was living in. i had teh scariest potential stalker that i've had to date at that house. i'm not in the same situation at work, thankfully. but...

i haven't been at norcostco much lately. well, no that's not entirely true. m-th i'm there for about 3.5 hours (3.75 today...whee). so i don't really know what's going on. all i know about last week is that i saw one of my co-workers (the other female) in the store once on monday. then she hadn't been in at all. friday, when i'm there 8.5 hours, i decided to find out where she was. the story i got, we got, was that she had food poisoning and had gone into the hospital on tuesday, but that she was supposed to have been released on thursday. if you've known someone who's gone to the hospital with food poisoning, this is kind of weird. generally speaking - even if they have to pump your stomach and put more fluids in you - the longest you're there is overnight. but still no word from her, and no one had been able to get in touch with her by the time i left at 5:30 on friday.

this posed a special problem since she was supposed to work on saturday. normally, the new guy will be working saturdays and this girl will work m-f. but he had a prior obligation that would take him out of work until like 2:30. so he had switched with this girl. who is totally awol. on the weekend before dragon*con at a costume/make-up/bizarre tzchotkies emporium.

so i worked alone on saturday from 10 to 2:30. seriously, from about 10:30 til 4:50 there was always at least one customer in teh store. most of the time there was more than one. and from like 1:30 to 4:30-ish there were about 25 in the store at once. and the two people (once the new guy showed up) working the store have the least cash register experience of any one else in the store.

it was hella fucked up. crazy stressful. and it doesn't help that out clientele is weird any way. and even weirder this week.

around closing-ish, i asked if new guy had gotten in touch with that girl we work with. which is when he informed me that, yes he had and that she hadn't gotten food poisoning afterall. she had o.d'ed. on liquor and a bottle of advil. that in fact, she wouldn't be out of the hospital for at least another week and that she almost needed a liver transplant.

yup.

fucked up, right?

anyway...this was my saturday, or at least the first 7.5+ hours of it. this is why i took a four hour nap after i got home (incidentally when i got home i got some bad grandpa news too, nice for weekend, no?) and didn't do anything remotely active on saturday night.

sunday was dropping the cat off at my folks house in woodstock, hanging with the parents, heading up to canton to see grandma, stopping at home depot to get copies of my keys made, going to the grocery store, cleaning my house and doing laundry in anticipation of the canadian i'm housing for tournament this weekend, and generally worrying.

and this is just the end of week one of the 3 week marathon. this week, this one that started today might kill me. i'm for serious. i'm tired just thinking about it. and while the non-work stuff is going to be a lot of fun, it's still going to be business-related.

in fact, right now i can't escape 'business'. there is no un-business right now. which really bites. i'm not sleeping well, i'm gaining weight, and i'm stressed to my eyeballs. it's shitty, shitty.

which is probably why i had a dream that i was trapped at work and people were about to attack me there. i don't have a lot of nightmares. in fact, i probably had only had about 7 bad dreams before my sophomore year of college (when i had a week straight of a recurrent bad dream) so i remember most of them really well. they always mean something. or at least, since i've been an adult they've always had a really specific meaning to them. this one is shoving me out of norcostco. which is scary and weird, but it's still better than being at norcostco.

in other news, the new job kicks ass. i think once i'm a bit more comfortable with it, it'll be a breeze. also, in a related story, i have a job interview tomorrow for a position with an ambulance-chasing law firm. which, is better than no interview, no? yes.

i had a dream on sunday night that i was attending a 'corporate training' session being led by one of my old college professors. it was pleasant but odd. there were at least 50 people at this thing and we were all paired up with someone else. now, this might have been a metaphor or an allegory, but we were all either in the marching band of color guard and we were paired with the other.

for some reason, we were donig a birdie on the perch-like exercise with our partners, but instead of mingling and having music played and stopped, we just were climbing on each others backs. or at least the color guard (me, et al) were jumping on the band's backs.

then, my professor called up two audience volunteers who were two other professors from my college who i never had. i remember my teach said something funny and i woke up. i don't know what he said.

seems like fall to me.

alright norcostco,

that's fucking it.

all i wanted to do was go pee. seriously. Seriously. that's, in fact, all i need to do. and for all the things this store doesn't have, we are lucky to actually have a bathroom. the women's room has two stalls, actually. and it has access from the sales floor.

now, i hate my job, hate doing customer service - although i'm good at it. so most days i hide in my hideous, salmon-colored office far from the sales floor. and then i'll have to pee, or kylee and bill will go out to smoke, or clint is busy and i'll hit the floor.

i don't like the salesfloor. not only does it leave you exposed to our crazy-ass customers, but it's also full of things that tweak me out - latex masks, plastic bugs, plastic spiders of varying sizes. i'm kind of a pussy when it comes to bugs and spiders. really. even the fake kinds. i readily admit it. and aside from the whole i might starve and die because i took it factor, the only other thing that really tweaks me out about this new gig is that i'm going to have to do a big ol' spider lesson. that said, yes...fucking norcostco has spiders of various sizes and construction scattered throughout the salesfloor. this disturbs me as much now as it has since day one of this stupid job.

but while i find these things chill-inducing and unpleasant to be in a 10 foot radius of, i can deal with most of them. there is, however one area of the store that i will not go in. first of, there's a full wall of half-masks - not the masqueradey kind, the scary-gross latex kind. second, on the ceiling beam thing (and interspersed with a autumn leaves garland...for some reason) is a fairly large plastic spider - the kind you may buy for some sadistic little boy. and third (and most imporant) there is a gigantic hairy spider just hanging out on the floor. it's not quite the size of the giant spiders that would attack adults in b-movies of the 50's, but it could definitely attack a toddler in one of those masterpieces of celluloid. i can take the masks. i can take the dangling rubbery spider on the ceiling (even though it may fall on me at any moment). but i cannot stand near the damn giant spider-thing. which is a shame since this little corner is directly across from my favorite part of the sales floor - the wall of facial hair.

so today.

all i wanted to do was pee. the bathrooms are down a very short hallway across from the register and sort of between the tech area and the make-up area. the make-up area has this wire bin thing with clearance items in it. and i turn the corner - averting my eyes from the free-standing kiosk of spiders, roaches, flies, and snakes as i often do - and i see that fucking giant brown spider thing perched on the clearance make-up rack. gaurding the mother-fucking bathroom.

i have two options, the way i see it... 1 suck it up, take an alternate route to the bathroom, pretend not to see it on your way in (goddam impossible), take a pee. or 2 write a stupid blog about your insane phobia of things that are inanimate and pee when you get home.

guess which option i chose...i hope it's not still raining while i drive home...

t-minus 30 days

-or-

what the hell have i done?

oh eve...why? why do you keep doing this to yourself? why do you keep finding jobs you hate then quitting them for things that aren't stable? why? why do you do this?

oh man...

so, monday - when i accepted this job - i was really confident and feeling good about my choice, right? yesterday, a little on edge about the whole 'need to find something else' thing. today the shit has hit the fan in my brain.

let me explain, i'm still stoked about the job i accepted. it's really going to be fun and cool and expand my 'skill set' and whathaveya...but holy shit am i freakin' out about finding other things. other money things. really, i just need one other thing for money purposes. Ho-ly Shit.

god, i'm just... i mean, isn't that the definition of a crazy person? or at least part of it? doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. god, what the hell is wrong with me?

oh man. i just...oh man...

pants pooped.

30 days to find more employment.

oh jeez...

so...now what

welp...

i accepted the job. the part time job.

i feel good and nervous about this. good because for once this isn't an 'oh shit, i have to have something and this will do' job. this is actually something i'm interested in. and it's actually adding to my 'skill set'.

nervous because i have a month to find a companion part-time gig. if i can find one for 20 hours a week at $12/hour i'll be making the same amount that i've been making for the past three years or so. yup, my pay scale is astronomical.

so tonight is supposed to be night one of (hopefully) a non interminable job quest. unfortunately, my nerves (i'll get to it) and laziness have forced me to eat a half-pan of brownies. so i'm kind of brain dead right now. also, i'm just kind of brain dead after today in general.

never in my life have i felt so close to puking at a job as i did this mornign. because i knew i'd have to give notice today. and it went well, really it did. and my coming in september boss who's still in jersey asked that i write a list of all the reasons i'm leaving. which gave me the opportunity to, in a very professional way stick up for my co-worker and tell the uppers what i think is wrong with this place. that felt really good to do. new boss will be sharing this thing with the 'appropriate parties' after i leave. it's nice. and i've worked it out so i don't feel like such an asshole leaving - i'll be full time all this week and next week, and then starting the 18th i start at new job and go part time until sept 5 at my current job. that'll give my new boss a week to settle in and make sure my co-worker isn't driven insane by crazy amounts of work. and it gives me a month to find something else...

but all day i've been just this little quiver-box of nerves. it's like being some sort of creature made out of jello with butterflies in it. it's been...tense. and apparently jiggly. add to that the fact that i talked for at least an hour and a half (altogether) with more than half of my co-workers about the shitty state of things and i'm just...beat...

and then i had to talk to my mom about all this. which made me much more nervous than i thought it would. ah...nothing like being nuerotic and afraid of disappointing the people around me.

so tomorrow at work i start getting everything i possibly can set up and ready before i hit part-time and before the busy time really picks up. and tomorrow night will begin night one of part-time finding...oh my jebus.

once again...i may be an idiot...but at least now i'll be a much happier idiot. and really, isn't that a good thing? really?

parte dos: everything in between

point a - this week

when an audition calls for an actress to be mid to late 20's, witty, intelligent, and (glory be) tall, i should probably go ahead and audition. and i did. and i didn't do well.

in the audition room i was witty and intelligent. i was tall and mid to late 20's (though there's not a whole lot i can do abuot that either way). i jsut wasn't any of these things when i was reading.

here's the deal with the theatre crap: i've had more auditions between now and april than i've had since i graduated from college. this is good. and there have been some auditions that i'ev been called to and not gone to. this is also good-ish. what is less good is i haven't actually booked anything. i'm 'making the rounds' and getting nothing. it's frustrating. and i really do feel like i've had more good reads than bad. sometimes it's a good read for a part that i would be terrible at. or i get a callback and i'm grateful, but someone else gets it. these things happen. it's what happens.

it would just be nice to get paid.

oh money, you old bastard you. i'm not making money at my day job. i mean, i am, but it's just enough to get by. which, kind of defeats the purpose of a steady day job, no? like, if i'm supposed to get enough to live on and health insurance and also be able to 'do theatre', shouldn't i actually be getting enough to do all those things?

well, i'm not. so i'm applying to jobs like a mad woman. in fact, i'm taking a mini-break (that doesn't include dim sum) from dad's right now to partly apply to jobs like a mad woman. now, i tend to have a harder time getting an interview (the audition of the real world), but if i can get an interview, i can generally get the job. since i started at my current job (3-ish months ago...seriously) i've had two interviews and a second interview. i did well in all three. in fact, i did so well in my second interview that i've been offered a job.

this job is great. it's with an arts organization in town that i adore - both what they do and the people who i know that work there. it's with a program that's REALLY badass. i mean seriously, it's cool. it uses the customer service skills that i've picked up, performance stuff, teaching experience (both that i already have and building on that), gives more tech skills, and i'd get to make awesome arts and crafts. every day. how cool is that?

so, waht's stopping me, and what i've been taking the weekend to process, is that the gig is part-time. oh, part-time... now, if it were part time and more than i'm making hourly, it'd be no problem. take the job, get something else that pays more than minimum wage and i'm set to make at least what pittance i'm making now. but hourly it works out to about what i'm trying to live off of now. which is not enough. and once again, if i'm leaving this job not just because i hate it, but also because i need to get paid, there are so many unknowns in taking this job, that i don't know if i can do it.

i just want to take it. really badly. but i'm not sure in the least that i can.

today i have spent some time on some job sites looking at part-time jobs that want 20 hours a week and how much they'd pay (i've also kept busy today doing any chore i can think of so as to avoid commiting to a decision). some things pay pretty well and don't seem mind-numbing. some things don't. either way, there's no promise that i'd get any of these promising jobs. and then i still don't know if i'd be doing alright, or if i'd want to say the hell with it, or if i'd have time to do a show if i ever actually book one.

oh time, the other thing that i don't get that seems to rule my life jsut as much as money...

the fact is, i need more time. for everything. to look for jobs, to do theatre, to do dad's, to visit grandma.

ah? what's that eve? i thought you said grandmas all live in chicago?

so they did. but this week my parents were up there moving grandma morawski down here. and on friday i was helping them move her into their house. and she'll be moving to an assisted living place in another week or two. this is because she can't take care of herself anymore and we're the family.

i'm happy to have her here, i don't worry as much that way, and i actually - in theory - can see her on a regular basis instead of once a year. in theory i'd like to make it up there to visit once a week. dno't know if this will actually happen or not.

the thing is, this is really, really hard on my parents. for so many different reasons - the least of which being concern for moving my 89 year old dementia-ridden grandma from the city she's lived in her whole life and the place she's lived in for 20 years. it's difficult. and i want to be there for them more. and, it's really really hard to do.

grandma herself is apparently worse off than my folks originally thought. but this might also be because of the move itself. i don't know. she doesn't really know what's going on right now. which is no good. sigh. it's a...it's depressing.

so, yes virginia, there is a point b in all of this. i have no clue what it is. zero. or how to get there from here. but i've made it through this long week at least, and will make it through the next one too.

i don't know.

anyway...my tomorrow morning will be one of two things (and i hope i know which one before i go to bed tonight) eventually leading to one of a million point b's: (1) i call and do not accept the job, continue job hunt, eventually find something; or (2) call and accept the job, call my soon to be boss (it's hard to explain) in new jersey, call corporate in minneapolis, tell my co-worker, try to finagle part-timing at current gig until they find a replacement or i find something lucrative-ish...wonder about what the future may hold.

so yeah. it's been a rough week. and a really long weekend. and i'm not done yet, dammit.