With a mixture of unhappiness and rage, I finally went through with something I've been considering doing for quite some time. On April 24th of the year 2015, I gave notice at work that I would be leaving and quit my job. Some will consider me crazy for quitting my job without having a new job lined up and would probably really think I'm mad if they found out I have also declined two potential job opportunities, one which is only about ten minutes from where I live. I'll get into the declined job opportunities later, but first let me do my best to describe what I've been going through for the past two plus years.
The best way I can describe the place I've worked since the beginning of 2013, I'd describe it as a horrible place that creates tortured souls. From the exterior it's a growing company in a growing industry, but what can't be seen is how terribly bad things are internally. To the best of my knowledge, I don't know anyone who is truly happy there, but at the same time it does sound illogical to leave a company trending upward. What it came down to for me was quite simple, the painstaking daily responsibilities handed to me far outweighed the nonexistent positives of the role. I found myself hating every waking moment and hating myself for every day I let go by that I didn't quit. By the 24th of April, I met my breaking point, I just couldn't take it any more and finally quit. I knew it was getting really bad that week because I had only been to work three days that week and I was still insanely angry about everything that was my job.
My anger and disgust boiled over to the point where I didn't care what the company was, how much it was growing, or about anything, just that I knew it was time for me to leave before something bad happened. My job isn't worth my mental sanity. Now you're probably wondering what was so terrible about my job, so a good place to begin is my personality. I'm not one to verbally fight with people, in fact I hate it and I get frustrated very easily when I'm personally hung out to dry. My role with this soul torturing company evolved into primarily collections. Basically I've been spending the last two years telling people that they owe us money from obscenely long times ago, some dating back as much as two years. Then of course there's no way this can be right and I, let me repeat that, I am responsible for the mess. I can only take so much of that before I want to break my phone and everything else at my desk. I'm sure the people who sat in the cubicles near me must have thought I was crazy from all the swearing under my breath and whatever other things I did while I was being tortured daily on the phone. Oh and did I mention that I was the only person to deal with any issue that involved money? Cue 100% of phone calls that had to do with invoicing, account balances, payments, I need someone to yell at, coming to me and me alone. I stopped answering my phone on incoming calls because let's be serious, I don't give a shit about these people's problems. I was basically a secretary for myself. Sometimes when I'd get back to my desk after lunch, I'd have 10 missed calls. I don't think I should have 10 calls in a week, never mind an hour. Basically my role evolved into a collections/customer service job. If I wanted to answer customer phone calls, I would have interviewed for a customer service role.
I figured as time went on things would get better, but a year and a half later and it's the same shit. My position was a newly created role, and to put it kindly, what the company has found it needs is not at all what I want to do. Frankly the job sucks and has been the worst experience of my short life. I won't ever be able to look back fondly on my time there, it has been marred by the years of horrible experiences my anger.I'm so full of hate toward that place that you could call me Anakin Skywalker. Another way to describe the job is an abusive relationship. The benefits of the job are the salary, but man does it beat the shit out of you on a daily basis. Why do I keep going back when all it does is abuse me?
The best way for me to relate/rationalize things is in baseball terms. To sum everything up, I feel like 2008 Manny Ramirez. I'm disgruntled and I'm ready to force a move away from the Boston area. I've taken the next step and left my job so now all that's left is to see where I end up. Hint: Manny went to Los Angeles, that sounds nice.
Every day I when I wake up my first thought is "f*ck." Then I lay in my bad for a few minutes and think "f*ck." Why are my my first thoughts this wonderful obscenity? Well, I've about had it with my job at this point and to make matters worse from a personal standpoint, the damn weather is beginning to change for the worse. I f*cking hate the winter and its cold weather and shitty snow. That's beside the point, for now at least. Over the past year I've become increasingly unhappy with my job and all the shit that doesn't work, most of which I'm beginning to think will never work correctly. I think my boss summed it up best when he said that we were the funnel for all the bad things. He couldn't be more correct
Part of my problem is that I don't really know what I want to do. Eventually I would like to find a new job, but I'm almost certain I do not want to live in the area I currently live. As a young, stupid adult, I think I'd like to experience living in a new place with what I consider nice weather. Also, who the heck is Derek Jeter?
I often do this thing where I like to change the subject of what I'm writing about with little warning. So how lame is it that Netflix has delayed the release of season 2 of Arrow until October (was originally scheduled to be released in September)? Now they're forcing me to watch it on streams that might be frowned upon, but honestly, what am I supposed to do?
Stephen Amell, he's so hot right now. If you haven't watched Arrow yet, the picture above should give you plenty of reason to... whether you're a girl or a guy. In honor of Stephen Amell and the return of Arrow, I'm considering watching the premiere without my shirt. I feel that would only be fitting and encourage you to do the same, again, whether you're a girl or a guy. And of course you're welcome to come watch it with me... without your shirt of course.
Speaking of shirts, one of my favorite posts of all time is about loose-leaf books, go look it up if you haven't seen this email I got from some dude on eBay. The week I was on vacation to the very beautiful Hilton Head, South Carolina, I received a strange email, this time at work and not to my personal email. I'm contemplating posting that email here, but I'm not sure how appropriate that is, but then again I don't really give a shit. It's bad when I would be happy if I was fired from my job. So, here it is:
While I was reading this, I was wondering which grade this person dropped out of school (feel free to offer your best guess) because they do not know how to form a complete sentence. The lack of punctuation and run on sentences is down right appalling. My brain hurt attempting to read this utter piece of garbage. Needless to say, these people hate me, along with a whole bunch of out other customers because I'm apparently responsible for managing the finances for every single customer of a multi-million dollar company. That's ok, though, if they don't want to speak to me that's fine. They can just go speak to nobody. Of course I haven't responded, but if I did, I think the only appropriate response would be "what?"
Well, my bed time is rapidly approaching so I'll abruptly end right about... here?
Over the past two weeks or so I have been burning through the show Heroes on Netflix. I just finished the first season yesterday and began watching season two later that night. The first season brought me much enjoyment and I'm hoping the second will do the same. I'm not completely sure, but in my estimation, I would say that this is the fastest I've made it through any season of any show. This got me thinking about the word "binge." Binge is a word defined as "a period or bout, usually brief, of excessive indulgence, as in eating, drinking alcoholic beverages, etc.; spree." by dictionary.com. Or you could use the #1 definition from urban dictionary: a period of time that you do alot (should be two words) drugs in and/or drink a lot (got it right the second time) of booze. Must be more than one day. I'm also going to point out that dictionary.com's wonderful usage of the word "bout." Anyway, I think "binge" is a word used too much, and why is it only used for indulgences? I think that's complete bullshit. Why? Because there are plenty of other things that people do in a binge manner, mainly work, that doesn't get a bad name for it. Yes, I understand that's probably part of capitalism, but wouldn't everyone like some more time for themselves spent away from work?
I'm not overwhelmed or overworked at work, at least not yet, but I would certainly like some more time to do whatever it is that I feel like doing. I could have finished the entire first season of Heroes in about 3 work days, but I couldn't because I was at work... sitting in my cubicle... looking at a computer screen... I'm sure doing that five days each week is wonderful for my health. And even though I did watch a whole season in about two weeks, I bet I still had way more physical activity than many people did in the same time period. Imagine if people drank alcohol for eight hours straight each day for five days a week? I don't want to know the answer to that question, but I do know what happens to people when they go to work and sit around for eight hours a day, five days a week. A lot of these people gain weight and become fat, especially in the United States. You know what I call that? Binge working.
Binge working is a result of the insatiable desire to make money, turn profits, and make money. I recently spent four years at a college geared toward business. I've heard more than my fair share of acronyms and other bullshit, but I've learned so much about business from Jack Donaghy, a Harvard business school graduate for the mere cost of Netflix, $7.99 per month. Before I go any further, I would like to point out that I am not an anarchist. What I would really like is some more free time. Do we really need to work for eight hours a day, five days a week? I think not. We could probably work a few hours less per day and a a day or two less each week and get about the same amount of work accomplished. I know that not all 40 hours in my work week are incredibly productive and I think we could all use some more time for fun!
People like to watch television, people like to play games, people like to do drugs, people like to drink alcohol, and people like to eat. I don't care how much or how long people do these activities, but the word "binge" should be all inclusive. Binge working is a part of mostly every person's life. I don't really know where I'm going with this anymore, but I'll be sure to crush this problem with my A.S.S.
With all this said, I must be one of the very small minority of people that enjoys life after college more than life in college. Sure I had more free time and got to run track in college, but I didn't like it all that much. There were some good times, but now I don't have to be surrounded by people that I would not choose to surround myself with. That right there is the biggest difference. Now I feel like I can choose who I see and avoid all the retards, something I could not control in school. I still speak with my friends who are in school and I've been back three times to visit this year. Each time I used my old ID, so that was worth keeping. I might be a part of the machine that is our workforce, but I like it better than at an institution where they want everyone to think alike, and I thank Mr. George Carlin for that one. Man was a genius.
Love this guy
Well, I'm done for now, but I will provide some foreshadowing for the next post. I've had a bunch of people ask me if I have a girlfriend in the past two months, what's with that? I might take on this topic in the next post, and maybe I'll even put it up in less than two weeks!
No, I don't have one. I contemplated ending this post with that sentence, but I shall go on. Before I go on, though, I would first like to make a distinction between Staffing Agency Alpha and Staffing Agency Wewannatakeyourclient. I have been working with Staffing Agency Alpha since I graduated from college last May. Staffing Agency Alpha placed me with the temporary position that I have been working at over the past six or seven months and ultimately brought this wonderful permanent opportunity to me. Now I can continue with the story. About a day or two before Staffing Agency Alpha introduced to the job that I am taking, some dude from this other staffing agency called me, this is Staffing Agency Wewannatakeyourclient. And, yes, I am listening to David Bowie as I write this. So this dude from Wewannatakeyourclient calls, emails, and texts me. I think I got the message. Eventually I got back to this guy and I listened to what he had to say. The opportunity he had lined up was a solid one, so I pursued it and went to the interview. Despite this interview taking place before the one set up for me by Staffing Agency Alpha, I got an offer from the other job first. The offer was actually from the job that was at the top of my list to obtain, so of course I accepted it. Then today happened and what an afternoon I had.
I got contacted today by Wewannatakeyourclient about going in for a second interview. I politely told them I have already been offered and accepted a different job. That was not good enough, I was continuously pestered with phone calls and text messages. I know I accepted a job with a longer commute and all, but how many times do you want me to tell you no? I told Wewannatakeyourclient I had already made my decision via text and then on the phone. Maybe I should send them an email, too, just to complete the trifecta. Seriously, though, these guys would not quit.
When I was on the phone with them, I told this dude that I already signed a contract with the company who's position I accepted. This guy told me that the signed document was not legally binding or something and I could still change my mind if I wanted to go after the opportunity through their agency. Yeah man, I'll see you there. If I had any doubt, then I would not have accepted the offer I received. Just the thought of calling the people I just told I would take the position that I was going to take another one instead makes me sick. Thinking about it aggravates me. Eventually I got this text message, which upon lots of consideration I did not even respond to.
This text kind of amused and pissed me off at the same time. I had many different not so nice responses lined up in my head because I'm an asshole when people bother me, and just in general to be fair. I'm really tempted to text this guy in three week about how I wish I had explored this opportunity and I'm thinking about what could have been. Waiting for his response and then texting back "SYKE!" regardless of what his response is. The temptation is amazingly high, but I think I can control myself.
I just cannot believe how inconsiderate these two guys I was talking to at Wewannatakeyourclient were regarding my decision. They wouldn't accept that I had made up my mind. The other thing they neglected to take into account is the actual job itself. The job that they had lined up for me is not the same as the one I accepted. The one I accepted is a more advanced role from the start with better potential for growth and advancement with a much larger and still growing company. It's not like I was choosing between two exact same jobs, one which is about 15 minutes away and one which is about 45 minutes away. I chose the job that's further away because it's simply better. Those clowns at Wewannatakeyourclient just wanted the commission from me taking the job that they set me up with. Damn, it pisses me off thinking about this, but at the same time I'm really glad this all happened because it's also extremely amusing.
Those clowns at Wewannatakeyourclient also pulled the "I'm their number one choice for the job" card. Well guess what, ass clown, I'm also the number one choice for the job I accepted. I'm honored to have a choice in all this matter, but I made a decision and these guys apparently just could not accept it. I was also tempted to tell these guys that me getting this job was more beneficial to them than me because they would get whatever commission type payout for it while I would find myself at a job that is not my first choice in a role that is not nearly as interesting as the one I'm going to have.
What about my commission?!
Going back to that last text message I received from one of the guys at Wewannatakeyourclient, look at that last line again. "Thinking about what could have been..." Really, dude? Really? What is this job, my girlfriend? Wow, I'm so tempted to text this guy three months from now just to be a huge dick. Here's a sample of the things I wanted to respond to that text with:
Yeah, I'll see you there (which would have been funny because this guy is unaware of my type of humor)
Sign me up! (again, he doesn't know my humor)
How much money would you/your staffing agency get out of this?
That's pathetic
Really?
How many times do you want me to say no?
Where all da white women at?
I can clearly see you care about my decision
Have you ever heard of fluoridation?
I haven't felt so compelled to write about a certain situation in my life since the loose-leaf book post. Good memories right there. Can't believe that was two summers ago now. Anyway, I'm excited for this new chapter in my life. I've got one big thing to cross of my to do list, get a good job. I'm excited for this new job and what lies next in life.
Wow, this has been a hectic week, a week in which much progress has been made. And by progress, I mean that I have finally obtained a legitimate job. I officially accepted a job yesterday, a salary job, too. No more hourly wages for me, thankfully. I think I've done my time, so now it's about time to flourish. I believe I mentioned it before, but I'm a late bloomer. I didn't have any internships during college, I worked at a movie theater, which you would probably know if you read this blog. If not, then go check out the "Summer Job Chronicles" in which I give a little insight into what that job at the movies was like. I do have to admit that I did have some fun at that place. But anyways, I've been a late bloomer in my estimation in multiple aspects of life. But I'd rather bloom late than rot, so I'm not complaining.
This past week I've spent a large quantity of time preparing and going for interviews. I have to say that it's actually been a good experience. I was actually getting to the point where I was enjoying getting interviewed. It was kind of fun. All of this culminated with a job offer last night, which I have accepted. Hooray for salaried employment! I won't be starting this job for another two weeks, but I am so happy that the search is finally over and I can focus on some other aspects of life/just chill out a bit.
Sir Alex Ferguson?
Now that I come to think about it, I don't really have that much to say right now besides what I've already told you. So let's talk about Dead Space 3 then. While I have yet to complete the game, I don't see anything wrong with it. I think it's fun and that's really what I want out of a video game. The only thing I don't like is that the death scenes have been toned down to a very boring level. The death scenes in Dead Space, especially the first one, were very entertaining, and Isaac's head usually fell off. In Dead Space 3 you merely see Isaac's body get smacked around until it lies motionless on the ground. Not very interesting. And for those people shitting on the story, I don't think it's much different from those told in the first two games. Of course the story is bizarre, it's a video game based in a fictional universe with fictional characters battling against a fictional marker that has some fictional religious group fixated on its powers. As for Isaac's ability to understand things about the marker that no one else understands, I'm rather certain that at some point in the second game players are notified that the marker from the first game like imprinted something on his brain. That's how he was able to unknowingly construct the marker on the Sprawl. I think that pretty much sums up why he can figure out/read some things that other people cannot that pertain to the marker.
Another big plus to this game is you can use a shotgun. In Dead Space almost all of the enemies run at you and get in your face. What better weapon to defend yourself from this type of attack than a shotgun? Is it a frickin' 12 gauge? I don't know, but it sure does pack one hell of a punch. And who doesn't like shotgunning baddies in a video game? I honestly do not understand the complaints about this game. Some people say that it's not scary anymore. While it is definitely not as scary as the first game for sure, what do you expect the game makers to do, make the same game again? I think that if they stuck to the exact same style as the first game people would complain that it's just the same game. It's one of those situations where there are always going to be angry people. Well, that actually sums up every situation, so I'll just go fist myself.
Heskey?
Since I don't have much more to say, I'll keep this short. I'm happy to finally have found a job that looks like it will be a good fit for me and a good start for my career. I'll do my best to come up with something to write about soon. Until then I hope you enjoyed the two random pictures.
Happy new year! I do realize that the new year has been around for about two and a half weeks at this point, but I hope you will take my bidding kindly. I don't make new year's resolutions or any of that crap, but I do have one goal in mind: get a decent job that doesn't make me want to shoot myself in the face. My current temporary job that has lasted six months now is really starting to bore me. When I actually sat around and thought about it, my job is a joke, for lack of a more descriptively captivating piece of the English language. Allow me to describe why my job is easily classified as a joke.
Let me start with how I got this job. I got my temporary employment via an agency. This agency set me up with a few interviews, but apparently the people I interviewed with didn't like the cut of my slacks or something and decided against employing me. The job I eventually got required no interview. That should have been a big red flag in my face. I did think it was very odd at the time and I was very skeptical, but I'm a stupid asshole so I accepted the "assignment" anyways. Also, let me randomly interject about how temporary positions are called "assignments." An assignment sounds like I'm set out to kill a target or something. But anyways, no interview! I could be a huge turd, waste of life, money stealing, woman impersonating, sleazy pedophile, shithead. That's also probably why the position was originally only supposed to last about a month, that and the owner was selling the company. But here I am six months into the temporary position.
My boss, the person who has power over what I ultimately do each day, even told me that when she was looking at my resume she thought I was overqualified for the position and was fearful that I might get bored. All that was on my resume at that point was basically that I graduated from college and worked at a movie theater. Really impressive stuff right there. Well, she wasn't wrong, I'm bored as shit each and every day. My recurring easy tasks don't take much brainpower to complete and I always feel under stimulated.
Another really bad sign is that the people at the local post office know me. Yes, one of my tasks is going to the post office every day, and I've done it long enough that they know me. Essentially my job makes me feel like I work in a copy center. I might have mentioned that in another post, but it is entirely accurate. All I really do now is scan and copy things so other people can see them. I definitely went to college for this! And apparently I've assumed the role of "office manager," something that I never wanted. When we're running low on supplies they tell me, I should start replying "great, tell someone who cares." People always ask me if we have certain things, to which I think "I don't f**king know, I've been scanning shit for the past three hours." I don't take inventory of what office supplies we have because I don't give a shit. That's not a responsibility I think I should have. I guess this is all I deserve since I can't seem to get another job. I don't have an inside connect to any sweet jobs, I didn't have a ridiculously high GPA, and I'm not a huge suck up or involved in twelve million organizations. I'll just go fist myself.
Did I mention I make shit for money, too? There is no way in hell that I could live on my own with this job. I would go broke relatively quickly and possibly end up on the streets smoking crack or something. My job title ends with the word "clerk," never a good sign. I also thought of all these reasons why my job is a joke while at work. So that gives you an abbreviated description on why my main goal for the new year is to find a new job. That has actually been my goal for the past five months or so.
That all sounded really negative, but I'm really excited for 2013! I'm happy 2012 is over, that year unfortunately had a lot of stuff happen that I was not happy about and would like to forget quickly. I did not really enjoy 2012 and I'm relieved that it is now behind me. The last month or two have been great since all my friends who are still in college were back around town for winter break. Now that they've gone back to school, I'll have more time to look for that new job and keep the happy trend going!
I'm also planning on changing the course of this blog, but only slightly. When I say that, I mean that I'm not going to spend much time on telling stories anymore. I think I'm going to focus mainly on my thoughts and ideas which may briefly shed light on a story of mine, but I'm no longer going to have entire posts dedicated to some shit that happened to me. For example, I'm not going to write a post about my New Year's eve celebration. I went into the city and it was a good time, that's all I have to say about that in reality. Posts will follow more closely what you have read in this one, I think my job is a joke, here is why. I really like ideas and opinions, I think they are far more interesting than the stupid stories I have told here in the past. If something noteworthy happens, then I might, but don't get your hopes up, it's my life we're speaking of. My life and noteworthy events usually don't go together.
One other thing, I hate Fun. I would much rather be miserable and loathing everything for every reason you can think of. Or if you are clever you might have noticed that the Fun I don't like has a capital "F." I don't like the band Fun. I have no definitive reason why, I just don't like them. So don't tell me that tonight we're young, you can just eat my asshole. Go listen to Foster the People or something.
Well, I'm done for now. Hope you're having a good start to 2013!
I've decided upon proactive action instead of procrastination, which I usually choose, but alas, my dreams of creating a new, and most likely boring, segment for the critically acclaimed blog I have created that barely anyone reads begins to flow from my most creative fingertips through to your brain. I cannot promise the frequency of updates for this new segment, "Good Friday," but I can promise that it is very real, in a legal and binding way. Fridays, better than good in my estimation, reign high among the other days of the week since it marks the end of the work week. However, I will not name the segment "Great Friday" because that name does not sound like the Friday that Christians have named "Good Friday," a day which has the power to make meat forbidden. What a bunch of loonies if you ask me. Go ahead, eat your meat laddies, and read Sycophantic Laughter to support a strange f**k!
Honestly I have yet to put in much thought for "Good Friday," but I do think that I will keep tabs of things that bother me, no matter how much or how little. I don't feel like bullshitting you, so let's dive right in. Most things I have found bothersome lately revolve around work. My "work," or as I like to call it, "the somewhat degrading shit that I'm asked to do," forces me to notice all the little things that bother me. Why? Simply because I'm rather certain I could perform most of my tasks even if I were brain dead. I've been attempting to get estimates for fixing some damage that has been sustained by one of our trucks, but apparently I'd have better luck talking Satan into letting me out of hell when I die. One of the collision repair people I was speaking with on the phone sounded very nice and pleasant. Now that we have been communicating via email, I must say I cannot stand the way this woman converses via electronic mail. All the emails she sends me are one to three sentences and always end with like seventeen question marks. Is that necessary??????????????? Lady, I get it, you have a question. One question mark would suffice. This did not happen in one email, but each and every one that this woman sent me. I know it's f**king stupid, but it bothers me.
With the recent sale of the company that I work with to one that is 3,000 miles away, I've also felt like my role has been reduced to that of the copy room worker in the high school. I make copies of things and then scan them. Given my extensive use of the copy/scanning machine, that thing bothers me, too. Sometimes I have to scan like 1,923,329,854,387,493 documents and of course they are not all the size of normal paper. So instead of just feeding them through the top of the machine so it can do all the work itself, I have to put each one in one at a time. Put the paper in, shut the lid, pres the scan/copy button, take the paper out, don't mix up the paper so shit gets f**ked, and then repeat another 12,439,476,809,914 times. I find myself hating staples because they make my life harder and you don't even want to know how many paper clips I've put through intense labor. And I thought Mexicans got paid shit for the work they performed. Also, remember, I'm not racist, I'm funny. But, yeah, some companies use the strangest size paper for invoices/statements that I have to keep rotating pages and practically make a puzzle to fit the damn things on the correct part of the screen. Damn, I need a new job.
I'm also deeply unsettled by the thought that every time we need something in the office people come tell me about it. I don't want to be an "office manager." I did not go to college, and graduate, so I could order shit from Office Depot. I could have done that when I was eight. F**k my asshole. And don't even get me started on the number of piles of paper I have building up everywhere in my office. Good Joe, my office, inundated with paper, makes it hard for me to find space to actually do anything. I understand why so many companies want to go paperless, I wouldn't even be surprised if the real reason had nothing to do with saving the environment by saving paper, but rather to keep from creating mile high piles of paper. Whenever I need anything I have to go looking through the various piles I have on my desk. Wrong pile, wrong pile, wrong pile, oh here it is!
At least it is Friday though! I'm done bitching about work for now. Basically I want/need a new job as soon as possible. I'm not cut out for this type of job, I need something more stimulating with room for growth and advancement. Hopefully one day. Instead I will turn my attention over to a little social experiment I inadvertently started the other day. I noticed sometime this past Tuesday that I had not sent or received a text message for a while. I looked back in my text log and my last text conversation was from Sunday night. So I decided to see how long I could go without texting anyone or getting a text from anyone. I made it all the way until Wednesday afternoon. I went from sometime Sunday night to sometime Wednesday afternoon without a single text sent or received. I am fairly certain that is my longest stretch in quite some time. I felt like I was back in the nineties or early 2000s when I had to call my friends, or just not speak to them at all. Two plus days with texting though, I don't think most people my age could do that. Go ahead, give it a shot. Speaking of texting, what's up with people not responding to texts? Notice I used one question mark there. Actually, let me clarify. I understand not getting a text back if I send out a general message or something that is not a question. However, if I text a question I expect a response, even if the response is "f**k off asshole." That's a valid response. Sometimes I text my friends a question and they don't respond. What the f**k is that? I think that's like asking someone face-to-face a question and them just blatantly ignoring them. I've never asked anyone to go on a suicide bombing mission or suck my d or anything like that. Tell me to f**k off if you don't want to talk to me, I'm down with that.
Another note on texting, for those who have iPhones at least. I've noticed that iPhones grant users to turn on this setting that allows people who have sent you texts to see that the text they have sent you has been read. I would never turn that setting on. What if I was ignoring someone? I would read their text and I wouldn't want them to know about it. I'm waiting for that moment when I ask someone a question in a text message, see they have read it, and not get a response. I can't understand why anyone would want that function on, but there sure as hell are people who use it. I guess iMessage already tells you when a message is delivered to other iMessage users, so you can already tell when some people are ignoring you anyway. So why not go one step further and let them know that you've read it and you still don't give a shit. You know what, burning bridges actually brings up a lot things that I never would have thought of before, so maybe I should be glad that this happens. Though I do find it quite strange because there a few people I used to have very good friendships with that have become very flaky, for lack of a better term. Dodgy or no response to text messages, hanging out with a completely different crowd and simply not really being my friend anymore. What can I really expect, though. I've graduated from high school, I've graduated from college, I should expect I would meet a decent amount of fickle people in my time. How the hell did I get here from discussing texting?
In other news, I think I'm finally going to tackle it. What is it? Hardcore mode on Dead Space 2! Dead Space and Dead Space 2 are two of my favorite video games of all time and I think I want to attempt beating Dead Space 2 on Hardcore mode! What is hardcore mode? Well, hardcore mode is a difficulty setting in Dead Space 2 that grants the player 0 checkpoints and only 3 f**king saves! You die and you go back to your last save, or the beginning of the game if you haven't saved yet. How excruciatingly daunting and cruel! Can I also add that the marketing campaign for Dead Space 2 was fantastic. I loved the trailer with Smashing Pumpkins' "Bullet with Butterfly Wings!" So good! Watch it below!
Who knows if I'll ever actually complete the task, but I know that the reward for doing so, the hand cannon, is so worth it! So I'm sure as hell going to try! I don't know why I enjoy the Dead Space series so much, but I do know that I like f**ked up stuff, and if there is one thing that is certain, Dead Space is f**ked up. I like things that are f**ked up in two different senses. There's Dead Space f**ked up where mauled people for some reason amuses me, and then there's f**ked up in the sense of making fun of people to the extent where it's considered f**ked up. Those are the senses of the phrase that tend to interest me. Dismembering necromorphs and then killing them with their own body parts is just amazingly fun!
Happy Friday everyone and have a great weekend! Be champions, my friends.
Yesterday, just before leaving from work to enjoy the weekend, I was offered a full-time position at the business where I have been working on a temporary basis since the middle of July. When I first took this position it was strictly temporary and it was only supposed to last for 30 days I think. Now it's November and I'm still there. And now I have the option to make it a permanent thing, but the question is do I want that? I don't know right now. The position is not what I had, at any point, envisioned myself doing for a career and I'm not sure I want to commit to it at this stage in my life. What I really want to do is go work in a much more booming area for people in the young adult age range like myself. I have no problem with the area I'm working in now, except that it is a wasteland for young adults. If I was in my forties looking for a nice quiet place to live/work, I would probably be all for it. But at this point in life I want to go do things and not have to drive for an hour plus to get anywhere near a good time. I also think that accepting the position full time would make continuing to run track extremely difficult given the location of indoor tracks compared to where I live now. Also, I don't want to live in my parents' house for the rest of my life and I don't think I could afford even rent with the money I would be making.
Sooo, I'm very perplexed right now. As of right now I plan on keeping the job on temporary terms. I just feel like I want something more, actually I know that I want something more. I'm happy, but I'm not satisfied with my life yet, at least to the point where I would basically decide to live for a decent part of my young adult life within the constraints of the aforementioned (I like that word if you haven't been able to tell from any of my other posts) wasteland. I still want to run/compete, I still want to meet new people that are around my age, I still want to be able to go into the city on weekends and not have to trek for over an hour to get there, and I still want to eventually get an apartment or some place to live with friends. That is a very vague description of what I would like my life to be like and I'm not sure accepting this offer will allow me to live out any of those things.
In conclusion, I'm a huge piece of shit because I'm most likely going to keep this a temporary thing. I'm sorry, but my hopes for life surpass what I believe I can accomplish at the job I currently hold. Like I said before, I'm happy, but I'm not satisfied. In fairness, though, I doubt I'll be satisfied until the day I die. I always want more or something better, sometimes I don't know if that's a good or bad thing. Oh well, I've put up with myself for twenty-two years, so I think I can stand myself for a bit longer.
One thing I'm absolutely not perplexed about is Halo 4. Holy crap do I really like this game on first impressions. I've only played online for about an hour and only completed one of the campaign missions, but so far I think it is ridiculously good! Maybe I'll do my own extremely opinionated review on it once I've played a bit more and finished the campaign. In other video game news, I have started working on a post dedicated to the things I yell or say in a very violent way at my television screen when I'm going on a hell-bent rampage over video games because they are pissing me off. Stay tuned for that! I hope you'll be able to visualize me wetting myself into a rage induced coma while reading it!
Poor people who haven't played Halo 4
Now I'm going to write about something completely different from the first two things I mentioned in this post that already didn't go together! Thus is the disjointed nature of the my "mind." I wanted to go back and touch, but not like a Sandusky touch, on something I mentioned in my most recent published post. The one called something about how roller coaster rides are cliche. In case you didn't get that title, what I was referring to is the phrase that something, usually life, is like a roller coaster because of all the ups and downs. I don't believe in downs, though. I choose to believe that there are different levels of ups, so in that case, there is no roller coaster life because there is no roller coaster that continuously goes up, up, up, up, and up... until it dies. Now if I've confused you, just forget about what you just read because it is absolutely meaningless, much like most of the stuff I post on this blog. So back to before I was talking about roller coasters as a means of describing life, which is actually just a word like that guy in one of the Matrix explains to us using the word "love." He was totally right, "love" is just a word, just like "roller coaster" and all the other characters I've been using to create other words in an attempt to convey to anyone who cares to read what is going through my "mind," yet another word.
Now I'll go back to before I was speaking of roller coasters and before I was speaking of words to where I said I wanted to touch on a subject from my most recently published post, before this one of course, and not a Sandusky touch. I really want to stress the point that I am not using the word "touch" in the way Sandusky touched boys. I merely want to go through a small timeline of events that recently occurred in my sometimes amazing, yet sometimes simultaneously boring life.
At the end of October I had dinner one night with a lady friend that I hadn't seen since sometime in January. So it had been about nine months since the last time I had seen her. And no, she was not pregnant you sick f**ks. So we had a fine time, but I wasn't really looking for much to come out of it. But somehow it got to the point where we were planning on watching V for Vendetta, going to see another movie in the theater, and hanging out not the next weekend, but the weekend after that. I was still not thinking much of it, because of course I would never turn down friendly hangouts. Over the next week we had frequent texting communication because that's what has happened to communication. Then when it was only a few days before the weekend we were going to hang out, I texted her a question about the upcoming weekend. A few hours later she responded that she could no longer go because she was now seeing someone. That's fine with me, but we had made those plans probably three days ago.What I'm getting at is how awesomely abrupt that was. I'm actually really glad that whole series of events went down because of how amazingly abrupt our renewal of friendship started and for the most part has ceased. I think it's actually quite impressive. In the future I hope to accomplish this in an even shorter amount of time because I'm not satisfied with three days. It could certainly be quicker, but damn was that fast. Definitely was the best thing that could have happened, hopefully for both parties, but I sure as heck know I'm perfectly content with what happened there. I can feel the inner asshole coming out again. I sure do have a lot more fun writing these posts when I write like an asshole. I usually do this by making fun of fat people and their expanding waistlines, degrading people for drinking too much alcohol, thinking less of people who smoke any kind of thing that can be smoked, and writing extremely opinionated things.
Also, why doesn't Blogger recognize the words "texting" and "texted" as actual words. Stop putting that red line that indicates a misspelled word under "texting" and "texted," two words that are heavily ingrained in the English language now. I receive/send out at least 1 texts per day because I'm so popular, enough evidence that the two words should be added to Bloggers vocabulary list. And don't tell me the red lines aren't there, I know they aren't, the red lines only show up on the composition side of posts, not the finished product. So I could misspell every word in a post and it would not have any indication of my stupidity in the finished product except to people who know how to spell. I could make an incredibly racist comment here, but I will refrain and let John Terry do that instead. And speaking of John Terry, I should be commended for writing two articles in a row for Penultimate Round Pick without mentioning John Terry. That is a very hard thing for me to accomplish because Terry has left himself in a position making him an easy target for totally unimaginative jokes about affairs with other peoples' significant others and racism.
One more thing, wtf NBC. NBC was in very high regards with me since it signed a ludicrously expensive contract to show English Premier League games starting in 2013 I believe, and it is the home of my favorite show ever: 30 Rock. What disappoints me and pisses me off to some extent is how 30 Rock, in it's final season, has been moved from it's normal airing time, Thursdays at 8:00 on NBC, because of the show The Voice! WTF NBC! While I don't watch The Voice, I don't mind if they put it on television, but don't f**k with the time slot for the best show on television! For f**k sake, 30 Rock is only half an hour long, leave it alone and put The Voice on after it.
Kindly replace "The Biggest Loser" with "The Voice"
On that note I will bid you farewell for now. Remember to be champions.
Almost exactly one month ago I applied for a job that I would have really liked to have. The position was for a junior accountant (I was an accounting major if you don't know) at this sweet gym/club place in the city! The place had it all, a gym, personal trainers, exercise rooms/classes, racquetball courts, a spa, a restaurant, and a bar! And it's location was conveniently near a train stop. I managed to get a phone interview for this position which went quite well, or at least I thought it went well. At the end of the conversation I was told that on site interviews would be held the following week and they would call me regarding these interviews. So I was excited about the prospect of having a chance to get a job at a company that focuses on athletics, something I am very much into. I also thought that this would be a great step toward potentially continuing my track career since I would have access to such an excellent facility and maybe even move to a spot closer by to where all the action is.
I was looking forward to the phone call all weekend and waited with great anticipation for my phone to ring while I was at work. Monday passed and nothing happened. Then Tuesday passed and nothing happened. Then Wednesday came and I thought that surely this has to be the day, but still nothing happened. Thursday and Friday passed without any word and I thought that maybe there had been some unforeseen business that week that caused a delay, so maybe they'll get back to me the next week. Well now it's a month later and I still have heard nothing. I probably should have made an effort to get in contact with the company myself, but for some reason that thought didn't cross my mind at the time. The phone interview had gone so well that I really thought they were going to have me come down. Maybe they were just being nice to me and actually deleted all my information right after the interview. If that's the case, then I'd rather they just tell me they're not going to interview me. Or at least tell me that if I don't hear back from them by a certain date that they aren't interested.
Other than that I haven't really found or applied to any jobs that I would really like to have. The false hope from that one particular job was shitty. Since I've graduated, I've applied to 28 jobs and I've heard back from 3, so not much has changed in that department. I get random emails and phone calls every once in a while from recruiters and companies about positions that I don't want. That's right Aflac, stop sending me emails about sales positions, I don't want to do that. I still think there's something wrong with the structure of work and getting a job out of college. So many undeserving pricks get set up with good jobs out of college that in my opinion, they don't deserve. I'm going to stop right there though instead of going on a humongous rant about how much some f**kin people really piss me off.
I've been saying it for years now, either since high school or at the very least since freshman year of college, I want to be in a position where I can make people suck my dick if I want to. I'm finally out of the academic prison that is college, where it is very possible that the curriculum is a cell block (Thanks RATM! And of course Mr. de la Rocha!), and now it's time to do it the real way. Make like Jack Donaghy and work your way to the top.
Also, I would like to point out that I was wrong back in late January/early February. In that post I mentioned that senior year was trending to be the best year of college, but it was not. Far from it, actually. Besides some people I met that I really liked, senior year blew. Before you judge me for being a negative bastard, let me explain myself. I did not enjoy my living situation, actually, that almost sums it up perfectly. I don't mind the people I lived with, but I had very, very little in common with them. So going back to my house was nothing to look forward too. As a result I spent most of the time there unhappy. I was hoping that out of all that shit I would at least get a good job, but that still hasn't happened yet.
You know what I think is an interesting concept? No one needs a college degree to do anything, you only need one because that's the way society has decided to do things. What do you think came first, the doctor or education? The accountant or education? The business man or education? Go ahead and make your own (like the butt doctor and education). Maybe one day you'll have to go to school to learn how to breathe. Outside of all the education, practice, theory, and plain bull shit, I just think there is something more important. Also, who the f**ck are these people to tell me I'm not good enough to do the job? I'm going to think of them as Karim Garcia.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think that I'm better than everyone else, I know I'm better than everyone else. There's a difference. Serious: that statement was sarcastic. Sarcastic: the readers definitely knew that. End Elcor speak here. I think I'll just take this all in stride. Time for positiveness! I'm going to wait for that phone call, it's only been a month, maybe it will come tomorrow! I have far too many gripes with just about everything, but at least they're usually dealing with the same old shit. I'm just not satisfied yet...
Normally only a few occurrences prevent posting: I'm busy, severe apathy, I don't have anything to bitch about. I think that's an accurate list, and this time I've been busy. Also, only about ten days have gone by since the last post, that is not extremely long, but I've been preoccupied with a job and an excellent weekend. I have acquired a temporary position, in an accounting role, to gain some much needed experience. Each day that passes I pick up a little more responsibility and more independence. All the people at work are nice and I really like that they trust me despite my very short time with the company. However, I'm glad that this position is temporary because it's in a rural area and I would like to work permanently in an area that I wouldn't describe as a wasteland for young adults. I do like the area of the state where I've spent the last twelve years (wow, it has really been that long, that's the longest I have lived anywhere ever!) of my life, but I don't think it is a place to go through the prime of a young adult's life. Ideally I would like to work in or around a city and get an apartment or something with friends. That way we could work during the day and go do things and meet people at night and on weekends. Over the past three summers I have noticed the great decline in things to do in my hometown, honestly it's a boring place for people in their twenties. Recently I've been contemplating the future quite often given the events that have taken place in my life just in the past couple months. Most of these thoughts dwell on a career because that is the next step in defining my life, at least I think it is at least.
While I don't know exactly what I want to do with my career at this point, I do know how I would like to carry it out. My interest in people extends beyond individuals' idiosyncrasies, stretching to how certain groups of people act. In this case I'm looking at the world of business pertaining to my career. I realize at this point I have to start at the bottom and work my way up because I'm not a genius and I won't have any power simply handed to me. I'm at the beginning, but one day I would like a position of power. I just think it would be amazing to conduct business like Jack Donaghy, the Vice President of East Coast Television and Microwave Oven Programming for General Electric on the fantastic television show 30 Rock. The following video sums up why I would absolutely enjoy the stature of a Jack Donaghy position.
Spoken like a true elitist businessman. I enjoy the modern portrayal of bosses in media because I think these portrayals are more accurate than most people would believe. I commend Tina Fey for creating the masterpiece that is 30 Rock, but there must have been some inspiration for the Donaghy character, and the rest of the characters on the show. Donaghy is the boss man who is all about business, who will do anything to succeed and has his sights set on the CEO position. I think aspiring business professionals can learn a lot from him, so take note.
If you haven't seen 30 Rock, then I recommend giving it a view, preferably from the beginning since the show has good continuity and builds well off the characters if you watch it in order. I just absolutely enjoy the what I will refer to as the "Jack Donaghy Approach." He's in charge, he knows it, and he gets things to work while utilizing unconventional measures. Just a side note, I think anyone making a movie with business people in it should cast Alec Baldwin as the main business man because he is superb at that role. There is no one better. Anther great portrayal of a boss in entertainment is Less Grossman in Tropic Thunder, one of my favorite movies, pure comedic genius. I don't understand why so many people say Ben Stiller's movies are terrible. Zoolander and Tropic Thunder, both Ben Stiller films, are two of my favorite movies and Meet the Parents is damn good, too. I couldn't stop laughing when I saw Tropic Thunder in the theater with my friends, probably the best movie going experience of my life. The summer of 2008 was such a good summer for moives with Tropic Thunder, The Dark Knight, and WALL-E. If you haven't seen WALL-E, then go see it now!
Back to my point, though. Less Grossman, played by Tom Cruise, in Tropic Thunder is another boss man that people in charge should aspire to. He's such a dick, but he does his job with authority and power. And trust me, a nutless monkey could not do his job. While I will probably never be a Less Grossman, maybe even for the better, or a Jack Donaghy, I'm still young so why not aspire to obtain a powerful position. But seriously, I think people can learn a lot from watching business unfold on the television through 30 Rock and in motion pictures such as Tropic Thunder. While both are comedies, the majority of what I watch, there is truth in them.
Besides attaining boss-level status, there are some jobs that would be great to have. A really cool job would be working for the CIA. The appeal of working for the CIA, or any secretive intelligence agency, is the secret nature of the work. I wouldn't have to talk to people about my job because that could jeopardize everything! The even better part is that no one would really know what I do, so I would always have this secret aura about me, no one would really know what I am up to. They should also make a new position that eliminates bad drivers, I think I would be good at that one. All you would need is James Bond's car, one with lots and lots of fire power. Then when you see a bad driver, you eliminate them. The subjectivity involved really appeals to me. Unfortunately this job will never exist because it would disturb many people...
So, yeah, this is the beginning of my career. My career isn't much of anything now, but I'll make an attempt to document my path on this blog. I haven't thought about how long I'll keep this blog going and I'm not going to think about that now. I'll blog until I don't want to anymore. Keep it nice and simple. I'm very happy with the development of the summer. Unfortunately the summer started very lame and disappointing, with the exception of the family vacation we took out west to see my sister and her boyfriend. Other than that I was unhappy for a few different reasons and I felt useless with no job and the lack of anything to do. I miss the days when people would actually do things. I'm still waiting to responses to texts from a month ago and I find it very challenging to get anyone to do anything. However, I have a job now and this past weekend was great!
I spent practically the whole weekend with some friends; Chase and I had a good race, too! We'll have to do that again when we're both in running attire, but I hope he enjoyed his head start! And while I'm writing about Chase, I still want a copy of that limerick I wrote for Quelf, buddy. Chase, one other friend, and I managed to get ourselves involved in a pickup soccer game with Hispanics on Sunday to cap off a wonderful weekend where I scored the first goal, assisted by Chase! There's something about soccer that captivates me. I don't regret my decision to not play soccer in high school, thus ending my soccer career, because I just didn't want to at the time. I lost my enjoyment for the game until I went to college and met Seanahue, who rekindled my strong liking for the sport. I've played intramural soccer and some random pickup games, but I've yet to explore my full potential in the sport. I've always been involved in the sport for fun, so I've never tried giving it my absolute all. I hope to have the chance to do that someday, just to see if any good at the game I enjoy so much.
One thing I really like about soccer is the unpredictability involved in the sport. You can do what you like with and without the ball, allowing each player to have a certain freestyle to their game. No one plays soccer the same as anyone else. That's one thing I dislike about track, the sport I'm involved in. Once the gun goes off you attempt to get to the finish line before everyone else. I'm fine with that, track is a great sport, but there's no unpredictability there. Everyone knows what you are going to do, or try to do, it doesn't always work out, cue my last high hurdle race in college. Whereas in soccer you can use your body to fake out opponents and hone your dribbling skills to avoid losing the ball. I just like unpredictability, it gives players the chance to use creativity to beat opponents (watch videos of Ronaldinho at Barcelona to see what I mean). Or you could be like Il Fenomeno and haul ass at opponents daring them to stop you. I just love the way he played.
Now that I've completely changed directions, I will digress. I'm extremely tired right now, I felt like going to sleep at the desk at work this morning. So I'm going to go to bed, and by that I mean watch 30 Rock on Netflix. Going to bed and watching Netflix are synonymous. Now there's just one more thing to settle in my life.... besides finding a sweet job that is. One last thing before I sign off: don't ever bad mouth synergy.
I attribute my current situation, everything about it, to a general lack of direction. What do I want to do? Well, honestly I have no idea. I don't understand how anyone knows what they want to do with their life specifically. When I think about a career I really don't care what industry or field it's in, I just want to have a job that keeps me happy. I wrote about my dream job (one of my favorite posts!), which is not a feasible position, but that is precisely why I don't know what I want to do. From my perspective, unless you are a professional athlete, I don't see how you can have a job you truly love (for lack of a better word). I still maintain that professional soccer is the best job. Since I have no idea what I want to do, I'm going to look for some temporary work in the accounting field, even though I really did not enjoy accounting in class, in hopes that actual accounting work is bearable. Temporary work will provide me with some freedom because I'm not locked into anything from the beginning, an idea I thoroughly enjoy.
A career isn't the only thing I lack direction in, practically my whole life is one mystery. I usually don't know what I'm going to do each day and make impromptu plans (and apply to random jobs) spur of the moment. Mainly these plans revolve around the same three or four people since most of my friends are really busy now, but it sure beats sitting around alone all the time. Life after college sure is strange. My sister already went through all this when she graduated from college two years ago, but I can't really use her as a template on what to do because her situation is drastically different from mine. She worked for a while at the local public library and then moved out to the Washington state with her boyfriend over a year ago now when he got a really sweet job. That's a unique situation that I will not be following, but I would like to get a sweet job at some point! So I don't have a job because of lack of direction because I only went to a business school and studied accounting on the simple thought process that this course of action would lead me to a well paying job. The trouble is that I didn't really embrace the subject matter. Spring semester my freshman year of college I got a 3.6 GPA, and it was practically downhill from there, especially when junior year hit and I disliked all the important accounting classes that made up the major. I still managed to finish above a 3.0 though (but I'm slightly stupid)! My indecisiveness has left me unsure for a while if I made the correct decision, I even spoke to my parents about changing my major during junior year. However, I decided to take it up the ass and stick it out as an accounting major which brings me to where I am today, looking for temporary jobs because I still don't know what I want. I also realize that I have continued to expand on my career (or lack there of one) when I opened this paragraph writing that "a career isn't the only thing I lack direction in..." Feel free to complain if you would like, the unused comments space is not reserved exclusively for the only two people who have ever commented on any of my posts.
Have I ever mentioned that I really like blogging? I think beginning this blog was one of the best things I've done in my life, and that's saying a lot considering how much I've done to this point including graduating high school, holding a minimum wage job, and beating Halo: Combat Evolved on Legendary with JQ. Life has two very important aspects, a job/career is one (which I just discussed), and a relationship is another. These two aspects, in my estimation as usual, are what make a person's life, why they enjoy or cannot stand life. Lack of direction is also a lead contributor to why I have not yet had a girlfriend. In many ways for the same reasons I have had such slow progress developing a career path, but different. I don't have a checklist for the requirements of the person I want to date nor do I go looking for a significant other. I'm waiting for the right person to show up in my life, but the problem remains that I don't know what I want. What I do know is that smoking, of any kind, is a huge turnoff as well as excessive drinking, it's not my thing. Actually, very recently I had a nice conversation with JQ, my longest standing friend, on the drive back from Cape Cod. Somehow we got on the topic of girlfriends, neither of us currently having one. JQ had a girlfriend for a while that ended about a year ago. I remember the two of them coming to watch me compete at a track meet Junior year when we were running at their school. Anyways, we had gone to a bar the night before with another friend and one of his friends. JQ and I left the bar before them after threw up on myself and some huge guy. When we left we simply walked up and down some of the streets talking about random stuff and listening to these two guys tell us not to go into a bar down the street because it was a "queer bar" while he continually shouted back at the people in the bar that they were all "fa**ots." So on the ride home we were talking about the bar and how neither of us were really the bar scene type. I added that I would not want to meet my girlfriend in a bar to which JQ agreed with me. Why, you might ask. Well, I'm not a bar going type as I mentioned, but chances are if you meet someone in a bar they probably do that type of stuff often which isn't a good fit for me and then there is also the chance that two people that meet in a bar might only like each other when they are drinking.
One of my other very good friends, Seanahue (hope he enjoys that one! But I didn't come up with that name), and I have also discussed a similar topic many times before. I've known Seanahue since freshman year of college and even got to live with him and some other really great people for a year! We used to speak about how we didn't want to meet someone (a potential girlfriend if you are having trouble following) at a party. I don't mind if I meet someone in class or an activity who then goes to a party, but I don't have the inclination to meet a girl via party. I like to get to know people, and I don't think parties are the place for that. Of course it's nice to see what people are like in that situation, but there's so much more to a person than who they are when they're drunk. I prefer getting to know someone by having conversations with them personally in a one-on-one situation or in small groups. This probably has something to do with my fascination of how people act, but I really like having one-on-one conversations. Also, if you can't have conversations one-on-one with someone that you enjoy, then there's no way in hell you should date them either. But getting back to the point I was making, I don't have any sense of direction for a girlfriend either. As I said before, I don't go looking for one, rather I believe that it will happen naturally. However, not knowing what I want has led me to taking far too long to begin exploring the possibilities of having a relationship twice now.
Maybe this is the direction I need
I have gained valuable knowledge from each of these experiences, and honestly, I just wasn't ready for a girlfriend at the right moments. In other words, those moments weren't the right moments for me. I don't have a checklist for a potential girlfriend, but I definitely have turnoffs. I mentioned smoking of any kind as one of those because it's not good for you and it smells really bad. I also don't like the smoking of marijuana, not because it's illegal, but because I don't see why anyone would want to get high. But I also don't understand why people like to get drunk, so I'm probably just weird. I think I'll make a post about turnoffs, and maybe turnons, in the future. That actually sounds like fun to me! More studying of peoples' habits! I've also been watching these sweet videos on YouTube for the past few weeks of this guy who does real life social experiments! I really enjoy them and I think you should check them out, too. You can see them in the video below and there are new videos every Monday. See what I did here? I'm helping promote someone's videos on a blog that barely anyone reads, obviously I'm helping out.
While I don't know what direction I'm going, I like what J.R.R. Tolkien had to say: "Not all who wander are lost." Speaking of having no direction, I originally planned for this post to segue into Batman because of how incredibly brilliant he is, but that's not going to happen now. I'll save that for another post, but The Dark Knight Rises is coming out in theaters soon and I'm pumped for that! Batman is my favorite superhero dating back to my childhood when I would randomly dress up as the caped crusader on any given day. Maybe it sounds strange, but I'm happy to have this situation upon me, I don't feel like I'm tied into anything in particular. My options are wide open. I mentioned that I really like blogging, but in case you didn't get that part, I really like blogging. I also like randomness, to a certain extent that is, which is why I occasionally jump around to different topics. But I do like blogging if you haven't figured that out yet. Now that Sycophantic Laughter has existed for over a year I have found that one of my favorite things to do with the blog when I'm not actually writing for it is checking the traffic sources. I like viewing where the hits come from. Most of the hits come from the pictures I post on the blog, meaning that barely anyone actually reads anything on it, or at least I highly doubt they do. So the 6,000 something hits indicated on the blog page right now are extremely misleading in terms of how many people read my dumb crap. However, I really do like looking at the traffic sources to see where hits are coming from and what keywords are bringing up my blog in Google searches and the like. This week when I checked the traffic sources I noticed that I had some hits from Stumbleupon and I think that's great. I think it would be funny if some people randomly stumbled upon this blog and took the time to actually read any of its content, even if they absolutely hated it.
Going back to the career thing, and thoughts of my dream job, I have no idea where I'll be in as little as five years. I enjoy leading an active lifestyle, but most "professional" jobs are almost entirely sedentary. I like to express my own thoughts, ideas, and opinions via blogging, but most jobs don't allow you to express your individuality. Maybe George Carlin was right, maybe it is called the American dream because you have to be asleep to believe it, but at least a job isn't what completely and absolutely defines a person. That's an issue I have with the way things are in society right now. When you first meet someone, often in the introductions you and the person you're meeting introduce themselves with their name and then tell you what they do for work. What bothers me is that people tend to let their job define them. This is so-and-so, they're an _______________ (accountant, student, flight attendant, police person, musician, fashion guru, baseball player, asshole, movie star, custodian, high school teacher, landscaper, etc.). I was recently speaking with a recruiter and he asked me to tell him some things about myself that would not appear on my resume. I've been to a bunch of interviews over the past year or so and he's the first, and only person, to ask me anything like that. I ended up really enjoying that interview far more than any of the others I have had. I commend him for asking me that because there is so much more to people than what looks good on a resume. I just don't think people should define themselves by their jobs or careers, but rather by what interests them. Jobs and careers might contain some of a person's interests, but I don't believe that 100% of anyone's interests lies within the constraints of their job.
I should have worked more, it's the only thing I'm good at
Of course eventually I would like to have a successful career, but I want to achieve success in so many other areas, too. I still hold that Huxley's Brave New World is the most powerful book that I have ever read and I have no idea why I don't own it yet. I really do think that people are raised to love their servitude for the country and I thank Mr. Huxley for that idea. I strongly recommend reading Brave New World, that book would be way ahead of its time if it had been published today. I want to enjoy myself by doing the things that make me happy and surrounding myself with people I like. I could care less what my title is in the "professional world," I just want the ability to live comfortably while I have a good time.
That's all I have for right now. I really enjoyed putting this post together, hopefully it is serving as a harbinger of a string of good posts. I'm not quite sure what's in the queue for upcoming posts, but there will probably be something about Batman (the greatest superhero ever) and who knows what. Joe bless you.
