So I’ve been back at work since yesterday, and well, this sucks.

What’s weird is that I would come in, and after a few hours I would just feel completely drained, like something in the air was sucking the life force out of me. I’m not imagining it either, almost didn’t go on vacation in fact because I always felt drained. But I actually felt better and healthier too the moment I started my vacation, even on a diet of ice cream and ‘boigas’, that is of course, until I came home and started working again.

Maybe there’s something in the air here, some allergen that plays life force suckage on me. I don’t know.

But for the past 2 days I’ve been ignoring my job and instead been working up a to-do list of sorts so I can get better prepared for my next trip. Which includes getting a new GPS device.

So here’s where I’m at, which I’m sure will interest absolutely no one but me: I have to decide between getting a more traditional GPS device (from Garmin likely) or I can go a more nonconventional route by getting a GPS addon for my iPod Touch, then getting a navigation app from the Apple store (such as Navigon). I’d prefer this route because it would save on having to get yet another gadget, and since I take my iPod everywhere with me, I won’t have to worry about a GPS in the car attracting would be thieves who carry big lead pipes and have far too much time time on their hands.

Only trouble is, there’s only one GPS module on the market that I know of that’s available now, and it requires that your iPod be jailbroken, along with lots of other finagling in order to finally get it working right. Eventually there’s supposed to be two possible solutions coming out soon: one being a TomTom car dock that will have GPS built in, and another possible GPS module to be released in November by Dual Electronics. There’s no indication at all as to how well either of these will work, if they will at all. Assuming they did work though, then the only downside I see is the lack of bluetooth features that GPS devices sometimes have, so I can use my cell phone hands free while driving.

So I have the option of waiting to see how these future GPS modules will work on an iPod Touch, or getting a Garmin now. For Garmin I have been looking specifically at their nuvi 265WT and nuvi 765T models. Although… assuming the iPod solution doesn’t work out, I may go for a nuvi 500, a multifunction GPS that would allow me to participate in a beautiful thing called geocaching (which I’ll write about at length in a future post.)

Other than that, I’m planning to completely dump the built-in gallery on my blog this weekend, and integrate Flickr into it instead via a plugin. While on vacation, it occurred to me that Flickr provides a great way to upload videos and pictures from my cell phone on the fly, something I was trying to do on my own with mixed results (photos uploaded ok, but my first video upload garnered an epic FAIL.) If I can integrate Flickr into my blog without killing myself in the process, it would allow me to save tremendously on bandwidth and keep my photos centralized for easier management and viewing online. Please light a candle for me this weekend, so I can pull this off without losing my sanity in the process.

And of course, I do this all for you, my beloved audience, so that you may all share in the joys and wonders that is my life.

Tags: blog, flickr, gallery, gps, home, ipod touch, job, mobile, Photos, plugin, vacation, Videos
Categories: Blog Fog, In The Coal Mine
 
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I have some extended time off coming up in October, so this week I really need to take the opportunity to like, do work and stuff.

I actually take some pride in staying on top of the mass of crap that only an inept, broken system of a bureaucracy could spew forth my way, but there seems to be a hidden alert system somewhere that causes the inner bowels of the system to drop maybe 5-6 months worth of work on my desk in one day, all because I dared to pollute the bureaucratic matrix with my efficiency.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, my coworker (otherwise known as THE MOUTH) gets positively FIXATED on any particularly horrendous backlog we experience at work, and despite having a job title that puts her somewhere between a roadkill remover and a gas attendant, she would proceed to declare herself the boss of the known universe and badger me to half to death to pick up the pace so we can catch up. I just ignore her, yet instead of getting a clue, she only does it more. Since blowing her off doesn’t work, my next option will involve some form of violence. (After all, nothing quite gets the message across that you talk too much like stapling your tongue to your forehead.)

But anyhoo, if I can’t clear the workload by the time I start my vacation, it’s going to be really unpleasant when I come back, and that’s something I would very much like to avoid if I could. So blogging, twittering and facebooking will be light this week until I get ‘er done.

In the meantime, light a candle for me.

Tags: bureaucracy, coworker, efficiency, government, job, vacation, workload
Categories: In The Coal Mine
 
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Yep, it was one of “those” days.

I came into work, and I see a note at my desk telling me I need to report for duty outside. Eh?

So I go outside and I see my old CO, who tells me, “Linc, thanks for volunteering to help us out today.”

“Hmm, that’s funny, because I don’t remember volunteering for anything.”

“Oh, then your supervisor must have volunteered you.”

… … … …

“Oh, don’t worry about it, it’s just for today. Here, help me bring this stuff on the bus.”

I helped him carry a few folding tables and then saw the bus.

“Dude, that’s a prison bus.”

“So?”

“I’m not getting on a prison bus.”

“Why not?”

“It’s got bars on the window! Are you gonna like, chain me down too?”

“Stop whining, look if you do this you’ll get to go home an hour early.”

… … … …

“Let’s go.”

Our trip would take me down to the local Medicaid office, where I had to help out in screening applicants. Yes, seriously. Interesting job I have, after all not many people can say they rode a prison bus to a Medicaid office so they could run background checks on applicants named Pablo.

It wasn’t a bad day though, but had I known I’d be there for HOURS, I would have taken my laptop with me and jacked it in so I could check up on all them wonderful people who follow me on Facebook, Twitter and whatnot. Ah well, maybe next time.

As the applicants rolled in, I took them in one by one and went over their forms. A middle aged lady who looked like she just got off the bus from Guatemala handed me hers and I took a quick look. I noticed she hadn’t put in her height.

“Ma’am, you forgot to add your height here.”

“¿Que?”

“Umm, your height? You need to fill out what your height is right here.”

“¿Que?”

Sigh.

Fortunately I didn’t get too many like that, but this is definitely not a job I’d want to do on a regular basis.

So what did you do today?

Tags: job, laptop, Medicaid, medicaid office, screening applicants, supervisor, volunteering, work
Categories: In The Coal Mine
 
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So today I hear a story reflecting the sheer brilliance of my coworkers:

Guy comes in, needs to file a report. One of my coworkers gets up to help him out. She checks the computer and tells him:

“There’s already a report here with your name, only the first name is different. Same last name, same date of birth.”

“Yes, that’s my brother, we’re twins.”

Blank look.

“Let me get this straight, same last name, same date of birth, different first name. Are you sure this wasn’t filed by you?”

“Um, no it’s my brother. I said we’re twins.”

Blank look.

“Are you sure it wasn’t you who filed this? Every thing but the first name is the same.”

“I told you my brother filed that. We’re twins, we were born on the same day. You understand?”

Blank look.

At this point someone else takes her aside and says, “Tammy, why don’t you take a break now, I can take it from here.”

As if people like this working in government wasn’t depressing and scary enough, think about this: What if she was handling your health insurance too?

Tags: coworker, coworkers, government, health insurance, job, stupid
Categories: In The Coal Mine
 
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It was a dark and stormy night.

Actually no, it was a sunny and illuminous day here, with the weather dipping to the low 70s and the skies dancing with the billowing remnant clouds of Tropical Storm Danny. What a great way to end August and unofficially, the end of summer.

This was my week to leave the office for what we call THE RUN. Basically it involves stopping at a slew of government offices for pickups and dropoffs, and while I’m usually not crazy about this part of my job, I definitely welcomed the opportunity today. If you’re quick about it, The Run usually takes about an hour and 45 minutes to do, so naturally it takes me about 3 hours. It also gave me a chance to enjoy the weather and get away from the office’s resident hens, who cannot help but talk, and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk talk talky talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk…

So I’m driving around far and away from the mindless, white noises of the office, and I’m thinking about things. I had been so desperate to move out on my own that I hadn’t really thought about another possibility: What if I could move out of state for real?

I was ready to give up on the idea that I would ever get another job or move out of state, and in that frame of mind I was looking around for any kind of apartment I could find simply to get away from my parents, resigning myself to the reality that my job now was the only job I’d ever have, and while I was lucky to have it, in another sense it was a blackhole too. There’s no promotional path, no training seminars, no chance to expand my skill set at all. In 9 years, I have learned nothing new. And because of it I was pretty much unemployable as far as the private sector goes.

But the public sector… well now, they actually EXPECT you not to have any skills whatsoever.

It also occurred to me that I was in the most ideal place you could ask to be in if your objective was to make a life altering, dramatic move and career change. I have no wife and kids, no debt, no property that I owned, not even furniture. I could up and leave a moment’s notice, literally. And while I’ve been building up my nest egg in preparation to move out, I wonder now if I should stick around for the time being and invest in something even bigger, not simply just to move out and find my own place, but move out of my job and my state altogether.

I always thought the Feds would be my ultimate destiny, mostly because since I graduated it had been my dream to work as a special agent for a law enforcement agency, whether it was the FBI or somebody else, a dream I had to give up on partly because of my disability, and partly because I’m, well, pretty much an idiot.

But now there’s no better time than the present to shoot for the stars again, and maybe even if I couldn’t work as a sworn agent, I could still serve in a civilian capacity somewhere. I have the luxury now of being able to apply and go to any job in the country (except New Jersey, cuz, ewwww). I could also take a salary hit without feeling the squeeze now that all my debts have been taken care of as well.

I think I owe it to myself to at least give it a try before accepting the sentence of life imprisonment in New York. Maybe there is a faux log cabin and a bonnie lass waiting for me in Colorado after all.

Tags: apartment, career, debts, destiny, dream, government, job, law enforcement, life, new york, parents, public sector, weather, white noise
Categories: In The Coal Mine
 
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With all the news about the economy being in the toilet and people left and right losing their jobs (and unable to find new ones), I’m reminded of the personal recession I once experienced shortly after I graduated college, waaaaaay back in ‘98.

I had just wrapped up my undergraduate “career” and finished with a degree in computer science, all during a time when the IT industry was BOOM-ING, BABY, OW! You couldn’t so much as turn without smacking right into an IT/computer related job. I had made the right choice for a degree, patted my back for a job well done, and at 21 years of age I was ready to take on the world and start on my way to becoming a buff, studly FBI hacker who would single-handedly capture Russian bad dudes with nary a few taps on the keyboard. The world was my oyster, baby!

Well…

One job interview went by. Then another. Then another, and yet no one got back to me. Soon I started getting rejection letters, and it wasn’t long before my post-college bravado gave way to concern, and then outright fear. I was going to job fairs, handing out resumes like candy, responding to newspaper ads, emailing companies, literally knocking door to door, and all I was beginning to show for it was a growing stack of rejection letters (which I still have by the way.)

What was I doing wrong? The industry was booming, I had picked the right field, the demand was high, and yet no one wanted to hire me?

One month became two, then six, then before I knew it a whole year had gone by and I was still gainfully unemployed. My relationship with my parents was really taking a turn for the worse too. At some point things got so bad between us that they eventually became convinced that I wasn’t serious about finding work, that the only thing I was really doing all day was playing games on the internet. So as punishment they took my speedy 28.8 dialup modem away.

There’s probably nothing more demoralizing to a 22 year old college graduate than to have not only his modem taken away, but access to a car as well (since my parents both worked during the day.) So there I was, with no access to the internet and no access to a car, and yet I was still expected to somehow find a job.

Their suspicion that I would only spend the day playing Battlezone 2 or surfing Usenet groups to argue with stupid Christians was totally unfounded too. Ok… MOSTLY unfounded. It said nothing of the fact that I was desperate, DESPERATE to get the holy FRICK away from my parents and get my own place so I could live my own life. You think they’d understand that ALONE was more than enough incentive for me. I wasn’t gaming all day long on the internet. I was trying to network, research and brainstorm ways I could find a job. Then when I needed a break, I’d play a round or two of Wolfenstein. What else could I do, really?

But still they locked up my 28.8 dialup modem in their bedroom before leaving for work every day, and my only means of transportation then was a 20 year old woman’s bicycle (with a flowery basket in front) that we kept on the porch. Thank God YouTubers weren’t around then to capture the comical display of me riding around in a suit on a girlie bike with a stack of resumes crammed in my basket. I never would have lived it down.

Most of the time when I wasn’t out riding into town and feeling really stupid about myself, I was left to twiddle my thumbs while I stared blankly at the wall, wondering why God hated me so much.

I think the first low point then was when I managed to get a part time job delivering flowers, only to get fired a week later when I asked to come in later than usual so I could go to a job interview. When they realized I had graduated college and was spending time going to interviews they figured I wouldn’t be around long term and fired me. My parents blamed me for it because I shouldn’t have said anything about a job interview, but I wasn’t street smart enough to know about these things. Their harsh criticism and the embarrassment of being fired from a florist delivery job made me hate myself more than anything. I thought I was the most worthless idiot on the planet. Everyone else was landing jobs left and right and here I couldn’t even hold on to flowers.

Eventually after some more time passed, I had an idea. My modem was still being locked away safe and sound in their bedroom, but one evening I had to go to the supermarket to get some groceries for my parents and borrowed the car. When I went to get the keys, I realized one of them was the key to the bedroom.

Hmmmmm….

I had a bunch of extra quarters saved up in a can somewhere, so I grabbed those up, got in the car and stopped by the hardware store.

“Yeah I’d like to get an extra copy of this key?”

“Sure, be a few minutes.”

I watched him as he forged a magical key that would unlock the mysteries of the kingdom. I dropped a bunch of quarters on the counter while he threw a quizzical look at me, as if to say “Are you so cheap you can’t even pay in bills?” but thankfully took them anyway and gave me change.

YES!

The next morning I cheerfully waved my parents off as they went to work, then waited a few minutes to make sure neither of them came back in case they had forgotten something, and raced to their bedroom door.

*click*

You could hear the angels singing as I unlocked the door and the light from outside shone into the room. I started looking around and quickly found my beloved dialup modem. I was in the game again!

The thrill of sneaking around like that breathed some new life into me, and I would spend the next few weeks making the rounds of unlocking the bedroom door, grabbing my modem and then going through my daily routine of job hunting, networking and whatnot before I ended with a fast game of Battlezone, then quickly returning the modem back into the bedroom and locking the door again when the timer I set for myself buzzed, signaling the time I needed to get off so I wouldn’t get caught redhanded.

Once my internet time was up, I would break out the Ragu pizza sauce I kept hidden in my room and use the bread machine we had to make pizza. We had the same equipment restaurants used to make brick oven pizza, and with it all I was turning pizza-making into an art form, even learning how to toss it up to spread the dough. It was truly my source of comfort and joy. I would take a few hot slices, head over into the living room and watch General Hospital so I could catch a glimpse of my dream girl at the time, Rebecca Herbst. The fantasies of getting snuggly wubsy woos from her and the exquisite tastes of my homemade pizza helped get me through some very dark times then.

You could have had my pizza anytime, baby....

I’m not sure if my parents ever figured out I had been able to get into their bedroom, but they must have been suspicious. One day when I was going through the usual morning routine of unlocking their bedroom, I stepped in and suddenly saw an empty seltzer bottle rolling around on the floor.

Hmmmmmmm… where did that come from?

When I picked it up and tried to get a read on where it had been before, I realized it must have been right behind the door. There was no way to avoid knocking it down when you opened the door either, and that’s when it occurred to me that it was placed that way on purpose. My parents had set up a primitive boobytrap to see if I was indeed invading their bedroom while they were away at work. If it hadn’t rolled around in my view the way it did, I might have never noticed it, and it would have made for a very awkward conversation that day.

Ah well.

I took the bottle and placed it upright again behind the door before leaving and locking the room.

And so it went, week after week, unlocking their bedroom, knocking the bottle down, and then putting the modem back and setting the bottle upright just before I locked the room up again. I felt like James Bond. Fitting that they would use an empty bottle for this too. They always did see the glass half empty. *sound of corny 007 music playing*

I think after a while my parents finally started to mellow out and realize I was indeed going through a hard time here. After about 18 months of job searching, I hit my lowest point when I was even turned down for a job as a cashier, but not before enduring three humiliating interviews where they put me through a psych test, a counting test, and a few other tests to determine my knowledge of all things cashier related. I got the rejection letter 2 weeks later.

That last rejection had me throwing up my hands in defeat and ready to jump off a bridge somewhere, but shortly afterwards a recruiter found one of my resumes in a databank, at long last leading me to my first full time job, 19 months after I graduated college. Finally, my recession had come to an end.

Of course I would soon be laid off 5 months later, but that’s another story.

Tags: car, career, college, computer, economy, graduate, internet, job, jobs, life, networking, parents, part time, pizza, recession, rejection, work
Categories: Lincoln's Personal Log
 
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