In case we don't make our next brithday

There's a fine line between caring and not caring when it comes to job hunting.

Sometimes you'll apply for anything. Project Manager for Asian Women's Club. Hmmm, better check the thesaurus that "club" doesn't also mean parlor or spa. Fundraiser needed in Kabul, Afghanistan. Yeah that sounds way easy, why not. I mean probably the hardest part of the job is staying alive, right? "Salary: depends on your performence." Well at least my performance will include spell check, so I should be good there.

Other times you are picky as all heck because in your mind it doesn't matter anyway. You're not getting any of these jobs that you apply for, so might as well only apply to the ones with high salaries that require 10-45 years of prior experience. I have about 10-45 years of experience sucking up, dealing with bs-ers, keeping my cool, and working my butt off without getting any recognition for it. Does that count?

An architecture friend of mine in my same desperate shoes, looking for architecture work up and down New York City, finally sucked it up and applied recently to The Container Store, in a last minute effort to try to afford something besides peanut butter and Ramen noodles for Thanksgiving. A few days later he got an e-mail saying he was great and all but NO JOB FOR YOU, LOSER! Muhahahhahahahah. When he called with the news, we weren't sure whether to cry or laugh. On the one hand, who really wants to work at The Container Store. On the other, REALLY?!?! I can design your house but you don't think I can sell plastic drawers?!

As for me, I got so desperate this week that I went to donate plasma. 6 hrs in a waiting room, a collapsed vein on one arm, my other arm sucked dry and $20 later, I felt like a cheap whore and just wanted to crawl back in bed and forget the whole experience. My mom said if I really needed $20 she would have just given it to me, but it was the principle of earning the money myself. Plus if it's your first donation, you get $40 the second time if you go in within 7 days, so I figured I'd go back today and at least make my $60 for 7.5hrs worth of time and two empty veins this week.

The way things are going, things will be getting much more desperate in the near future. Need a kidney anyone?

In case we don't make our next birthday, here's a happy birthday song to all of us desperately job hunting!

e+u

La la laaaaa

Watching this week's episode of "How I Met Your Mother," I was tickled to know that other people make up theme songs for what they are doing that moment in life. If you're not sure what I'm talking about, google 'Marshall versus the machines' and see if you can find a video clip.

Basically, sometimes I'll be doing an activity in life- doesn't matter what: walking downtown, going for a jog, saving baby seals in the Arctic... You know, normal stuff- and suddenly I'll start thinking about if my life were a movie right now, what kind of music would be playing at this very second. Or sometimes it hits me right away and I think things like, "man, the Space Odyssey theme song should definitely be playing right now," as it takes all of my inner strength to open my eyes, roll my legs to floor and pull myself up from bed in the morning. When I actually get to standing I sometimes think I hear a burst of applause, taking over as the theme song climaxes. It's before noon! Already a triumph for the day!

In fact sometimes I can pick the appropriate life-movie piece of music for a moment that I'm actually just imaging I wish were happening right now. Like on Monday. Monday I woke up and my soy milk was completely frozen in the refrigerator, so dry cereal it was for breakfast. A letter from the university's financial aid office and a doctor's bill waited neatly on the dining room table for me to grumble at and ignore. I started the job-hunt ritual and found something I qualified for to apply to. I then spent over 3 hours filling out ONE online application. Three hours!!! No wonder no one can get a job. We all have major ADHD because we've grown up in a technologically advanced and media bombarded society, glued to our computers, phone, tvs and devices that are all three in one, that makes our average attention span about about 20 minutes or less and so how on earth can anyone sit through an online application that is a million pages long? You should get the job just for still being alive when you get to the end of the horrid thing. I'm pretty sure one of the questions asked me what my parents would have named me if I popped out a boy instead of a girl. And don't get me started on having to write one more paragraph describing my "strengths and weaknesses."

So calling it quits on cover letter writing, I tried making my way over to the library to see if I could look up books on neurosurgery or some other useful subject matter that I might as well take the time to learn now. Good plan except apparently 2:23 in the afternoon on a Monday is everyone's favorite time to go to the library and so parking lot circling ensued for about 40 minutes, at which time I stalked someone walking back to their car and waited patiently for them to back out by providing a lofty amount of space. Of course my generosity was met by two teens in a car that pulled right in front of me and right into the spot I was so politely waiting for. They got out, gave me a smirk and skipped right on into the library. Well I know I'm not a floozy-looking 18-year old that can bat my eyes to get people to do things for but really?

Suddenly in my head The Blue Danube started playing and I couldn't help picturing me finding all the trash in the car that I could and throwing it at their back windshield. And then pouring my tea all over the car. And then screaming at the teens. And then biting my thumb at their terrified faces. And then ending the song victoriously by pulling a Fried Green Tomatoes move and ramming my car into theirs as they run in slow motion, knocking down old ladies with hands full of books and making a little boy start bawling after knocking a balloon out of his hand. Yes, Blue Danube would have really been most appropriate.

Unfortunately my life is not a movie, and things don't move in slow motion, and there is no music playing in the background. So alas, I just sat there for a minute in disbelief and irritation and then with my pride out the window, I left the parking lot to try and battle it another day.

A friend of mine shared this piece by Ratatat with me and I think it might make good life-movie background music. I'll have to store it in memory for the proper scenario it can soundtrack.

the beat goes on,

e+u

Grumble, grumble, grumble.

An argument for the solitude that I'm trying to avoid: "Solitude and Leadership" by William Deresiewicz.

Another Day, Just Breathe

Telepopmusik - Breathe from astute_class_submarine on Vimeo.

So yesterday I started the morning with three or four reject e-mails. One was from a job I applied to back in July. Nice of the them to let me know but really? It's October. I don't ever remember the company. I keep my hopes up on a job for about 6 weeks and then I call it quits, so I kind of gave up on this one ages ago. Nice to get the additional friendly inbox remember that I'm completely useless though.

Seriously, why bother getting up to just be slapped down every morning. That's why sometimes it's good to listen to this song by Telepopmusik. It reminds me it's another day and to "just breathe" and "just believe." I like to think it is telling me to believe that this mental hell will have an end. Yes, yes I realize there are way worse scenarios to be in and that people all over the world have it way worse than me. But there is a reason why people are terrified of solitary confinement. It means that it is just them left alone with their minds. The feeling of wasting a mind that you feel has so much potential and that you are wanting, nay- begging, to share with the world while it goes on completely satisfied ignoring you, can be so discouraging.

The worst is at night when I can't turn my mind off and it just goes on and on- worrying, calculating, arguing with itself. And there you are. Left in a sleepless misery of your own doing. I'm pretty sure my mind is my worst enemy at this point.
Then again, Helen Keller said that self pity is our worst enemy...

Getting back to this song- although I like it- what it should say is, "another day, just breathe, just get out of bed, and actually make the dang bed." Because never mind how hard it is to actually get up every morning with the feeling of why bother, I'm just going to do the exact same thing I do every day and rack up my millionth and one job application with no luck, etc, etc. But to actually MAKE the bed after you get up- hah! Talk about having the feeling of why bother! At the beginning of my job search I was so good about everything too. Setting my alarm at 7:30am to get up and be productive. Then 7:30 turned into 8am and then 9am and then 9:30am. And most of the time I only get up then so I can catch the 30min language learning program on PBS that comes on in the morning so that I feel like if I don't get a job then at least I didn't totally waste the day and got to improve my Spanish or learn more French or pretend to have a clue at all about deciphering German.

I think us educated + unemployed types should bond together and set up a calling system where we are each responsible for calling one person each morning in a similar state and making them get up, and then making them make their bed while they are at it. None of us feel like doing it, but at least if you had someone on the phone every morning reminding you that you should suck it up and get up anyway, you'd at least feel a little more guilty if you didn't. Maybe. Ok so who wants to go first and call me tomorrow and make me get up? Takers? Takers? Don't think I won't call your lazy butt at some god-awfully early time like 8:15am and do the same.

Oh ya, and now I am getting a cold too.

Great.

e+u

Not to be Debbie Downer but...

So not to be like Debbie Downer from SNL but I was watching ABC's World News tonight and they are doing a series on what is going on with jobs across America. Well today they were interviewing people living in Oakland and one of the men they interviewed was a 45-year old auto mechanic that lost his job in the current recession and even he had to move in with his parents since things are so bad in the job market. And he fixes cars! It's not like cars are breaking down any less these days. A 45-year old man moving in with his parents- well that makes me more optimistic. Not to mention that the more I listen to NPR during the day, the more I feel like they feature a similar story weekly of people (usually with at least one college degree, if not more) who have had to move home with their parents because of the current state of the job market. I love the constant reminder that 1. yes, this situation just plain stinks like a trash full of used baby diapers and 2. that nope, there is nothing I can do about it except keep on keeping on. Yay! Awesome. Totally encouraging.

Speaking of encouraging... so the highlight of last week was a pleasant surprise. And by pleasant I mean gritting my teeth as hard as possible in an effort to make some sort of face that relates to a smile. See, I made the mistake of checking back on the company that I first had a phone interview with and that had decided to go with someone else. It was a social media position and so I made the assumption (correctly) that once the new person had been hired, they would be introduced on the agency's social media outlets somehow. Sure enough there was a new video clip introducing the new hire. Well deeply interested in how talented the new hire must be to have more experience in a subject that I wrote my whole graduate thesis on, I of course clicked to view the link.

Hah! Joke's on me! The new hire is fresh out of undergrad with not enough serious previous experience on the subject to even mention any in the "mini" interview with her online. Her social media skills are probably just as fabulous as any other college student who knows how to check Facebook and Twitter 20 times a day and knows how to let other people know their current spending location on Foursquare. So glad they didn't decide to pick the most qualified/experienced/educated person for the position.
Silly me- why would a company want to do that?

They sure as heck better be paying the new hire half of what they were offering me!

RIDICULOUS

e+u

Welcome fellow pessimists!

Do you currently hold a college degree and yet have been hopelessly applying for jobs like crazy with no luck and really want to complain about it to someone who won't tell you that things will eventually work out and just to hang in there and don't feel blue, etc. etc., blah blah blah, bs bs bs...? Well then this is the place for you!

Since eventually I would actually like to get hired I am not using my real name, nor will I post the names of places of which I apply to or have unsuccessful interviews with. However for all practical purposes, I'll introduce myself as e+u, since "educated" and "unemployed" describe me much better than my name would anyway.

I graduated the first weekend in May of this year and although had been dabbling in job hunting since April, I didn't really get serious about it until about mid-June when I actually finished my last class of graduate school. So here we are. Let's do some numbers:

97- more or less the number of days since I started the massive job hunt
90- ballpark range of how many job descriptions I go through daily
50- the number of days I've felt overwhelmingly discouraged and frustrated
12- the number of times weekly that I feel completely useless
8- the average number of cover letters that I send out daily
5- the number of times I've broadened my criteria
4- the number of times a week that I have to remind myself to be less picky
2- the number of phone interviews so far
0- the number that represents the success I've had so far in my ambitions


Now, don't get me wrong. I am fully aware that some of you have been searching for far longer than almost 3 1/2 months. But understand that this blog is about venting about how unfair our mutual situation is and knowing the fact that if I am following in your footsteps, I'm screwed for a much longer period of time, DOES NOT make me feel any better.

Anyway, I go through enough frustrations on this massive search daily that I figured there must be others who know how I feel and would like to share their complaints with me about the insanity of having a college degree (OR MULTIPLE) and not being able to find a good, decent, real grown-up job anywhere!

oh bother,

e+u