Friday, April 10, 2015

A Pretty Good Day

I have been looking for a "real" job for quite a while now. That is to say one that, unlike writing, pays me instead of my spending time and money to do for free. Yes, I know I am demanding. (Sorry.) I have been working with a couple of agencies for about a year and finally found a job that I could do from my home office... or at least I thought I did, and I had great plans to hire a book publicist with my new income. How exciting!

I did a short, unpaid training and passed through to the next step, the paid training. (Yay!) I got my office all set up with a computer and a dedicated phone line, then I began my paid training. I worked two days of eight. Then my instructor took ill (or had personal problems or something). I wound up
checking in for work every day for about 15 minutes to find out that class was not meeting for the day. That lasted about a week. Then a different trainer came in and finished my class' training. It was good and the class was a nice size, 11 customer service friendly people.

The last day of class was April 8, the day before my birthday and we finished in time for me to go out to lunch at my favorite lunch hangout.

Oh, wait. I forgot to mention that in the evening of April 7, I got a phone call on my cell from a strange number. I don't answer unfamiliar numbers on my cell, so I let it go to voice mail then I listened to the message. It was from some irate man who laid it out that he had been trying and trying to reach me and this was his LAST attempt to contact me for a peaceful resolution. So I had better call (8xx) xxx-xxxx in reference to case number xxx-xxxx-xx if I didn't want to go to court. Then a differnent voice said, "This message is for [my personal prodigal's sister's name]."

What?? Why am I getting irate calls for someone who does not talk to me and with whom I have not talked in years? Needless to say, two days before my birthday, I was not happy. I emailed the information to my personal prodigal. So that was a lovely birthday surprise (not). Later, I learned from my mom that the call was likely some kind of scam, as something similar had happened to her and the case / case number were bogus. (Sigh.) Now... back to my birthday story.

Because my job training was finished on the 8th, I had off on the 9th -- my birthday, and I was pretty happy about it. First, I took myself to the chiropractor, whom I had completely ignored during my job training. Then I went to lunch at my favorite lunch spot. My friend, Karen, was working so I asked to sit in her section. While there, I also talked to my beta reader and got some good feedback on the first three chapters of my newest e-book. But the restaurant was crazy busy, so I wound up being ignored. I hate being ignored. It is a real pet peeve of mine, so I left after waiting a good long time (I had not yet placed an order) and went to Applebee's. No fuss. I just left. (Note: Nobody ignored me today when I went for lunch. They did not seem to like when I silently disappeared. LOL)

Applebee's  was also kind of a bust, but I stuck it out and ate there because I did not feel like leaving. My server there was moderately inattentive and also made me wait a pretty long time for service. (Even getting a glass of water to drink when I sat down took just about forever.) It was not turning out to be a good birthday at all. So I went home. Bad idea. Not only did I have a distressed message from Karen waiting for me on Facebook ("Where did you go?") but, about half an hour after I got home, I received a phone call from my employment agency.

Are you saying, "uh oh?"

So... Out of 11 candidates, three did not get job offers. I was one of the three. Shaken, I messaged my family, Karen and my beta reader friend. Everyone was sad except my beta reader and me. We were sad for about half a minute. Then we realized that this means I now have time to devote to the sequel I am writing. So not getting the job is really sort of a a mixed blessing. Still, rejection is always a little hard to take and I now don't know how I will pay to publicize my books. I guess we will have to figure it out.

I spent a little time messaging people and called my mom to let her know about the job. I felt both crappy and happy at the same time for a while. Then I looked at my clock.and saw I had better leave so I could keep my promise to return to my lunch hangout for dinner. Believe it or not, the restaurant was less busy at dinner that day than at lunch. (Go figure.)

I am glad I went back because that is when my birthday did a little twist. Karen bought my dinner for me. She also told me that a mutual server friend is in need of a place to stay. My daughter told me about a week ago that she is not coming home for the summer, so I have a spare room in my house. Now I will have time to write instead of taking on a "real" job and I may be getting a roommate to help make ends meet. (Or maybe not. We will have to see.)

Last but not least, I was home after dinner and my son called from work. He had to hang up and call back a few times because he needed to concentrate on tasks at hand, but he still talked to me for a good long time to make sure I did not feel alone on my birthday.

All in all, I would say that it was a pretty good birthday.

No comments:

Post a Comment