Still alive!
Jan. 27th, 2002 11:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
robotech_masterHowdy. Well, it's been a while since I last graced these webpages with my printed word, but that's just how I am, you know. I write religiously for weeks, then skip a few days. At least I came back in the end.
I'm rather disappointed that neither of what I thought would turn into good part-time jobs panned out. The one I might have mentioned before, the 8-5 20 hours a week one, turned out to be nothing more than tech support--at a rate of $7 an hour, which is the same as what I'm making now at my retail store, and a friend tells me is about half the going starting rate for serious tech support. Bleah. I'm not going to get up at 7 a.m. and spend eight hours surgically grafted to a phone for a measly $7 an hour. They're wanting college students, anyway. Well, at least they said they'd keep my resume on file to look at again when they expand in a while. Yeah, "on file," right. Circular file, probably.
The other one, which promised work at home opportunity for just a SASE, turned out to be a "send us an SASE so we can send you a brochure asking for $27" thing. Bleah. If they're going to try to gyp me, it would be nice if they'd do it via the email itself, and not have me waste time, envelope, and stamp for them to do it in print. I guess there are no shortcuts in the jobhunting game, much as I wish there were.
I spent Friday afternoon papering the town's radio and TV stations with my resume and filling out applications therein. Applications. If there is anything more conducive to personal fear, uncertainty, and doubt than having to fill out a job application, I don't know what it is. I find myself wondering, "Will they not hire me because I can't recall the name of my supervisor from the part-time job six years ago?" I know, it sounds ridiculous, but it worries me. I don't have any experience, and it seems like most jobs want experience. I have two degrees, won't someone hire me?
I'm on a ticking time clock. If I don't get some kind of a job, and soon, I won't be able to support my continued existence in the lifestyle to which I am accustomed. I don't know what I'm going to do if someone doesn't hire me soon.
Speaking of working, those who have followed this chronicle for a while may or may not know that I have been a part-time cashier at a chain retail store as a part-time job to help me get through college. This store's name begins with a letter that also denotes a line of small economy cars General Motors came up with in the 1980s, and rhymes with "fart," and it is currently going through bankruptcy proceedings. (Just in case there's any doubt--I speak for me here, not my store in any way. You want a comment from them, you go talk to their publicity department. I'm talking about my life here, not theirs.)
It's been an interesting experience working there lately. It all started a week or so ago, when my customers started expressing their condolences. I was taken a bit by surprise, thinking, "What? Are we going out of business and nobody told me?" So next time I was home, I went to Yahoo and did a news lookup, and did I ever get an eye full. Financial difficulties, shuffling management, and so on. Our chain struggling while a competitor is thriving. Et cetera.
Then the chain declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and customers started asking me when the store was closing. From conversations with fellow associates and managers, they all seem to be having similar experiences. Some have even reported customers being indignant that we weren't having a going-out-of-business sale, the way the nearby Montgomery Ward's did last year when it closed down. Sheesh.
I think that a lot of people tend to associate "bankruptcy" with "out of business." They're thinking of Chapter 7, liquidation, instead of Chapter 11, reorganization. But as I keep explaining to them, the reason our chain declared bankruptcy was to stay in business, not to go out of it. They're getting rid of debts, not closing down. All the same, working at the store lately has been been a bit like attending a wake. I hope it passes soon.
On a more personal note, yesterday I had a friend come over and help me upgrade my computer's Linux partition. New versions of a lot of software, new kernel (I went from 2.2.18 to 2.4.17 in a single jump--whoopee!), and, at last, the genuine honest-to-goodness nVidia GLX drivers. Now I finally get the full effect of 3D acceleration in Linux, and Quake II looks really sweet that way. I can actually play DVDs in some useful fashion, too, thanks to the Ogle DVD player for Linux. I also added 96 more megabytes of swap via file to the 72 meg swap partition I had already; I had noticed some slowdowns earlier and I hope that'll resolve things.
I get a bit of weirdness from the nVidia drivers (such as having a rectangular patch of screen be colored weirdly when I first start X; it goes away when I run Ogle, though), but nothing that merits too much complaint. Now I'll have to see what other GL games are out there for Linux . . .
I'm rather disappointed that neither of what I thought would turn into good part-time jobs panned out. The one I might have mentioned before, the 8-5 20 hours a week one, turned out to be nothing more than tech support--at a rate of $7 an hour, which is the same as what I'm making now at my retail store, and a friend tells me is about half the going starting rate for serious tech support. Bleah. I'm not going to get up at 7 a.m. and spend eight hours surgically grafted to a phone for a measly $7 an hour. They're wanting college students, anyway. Well, at least they said they'd keep my resume on file to look at again when they expand in a while. Yeah, "on file," right. Circular file, probably.
The other one, which promised work at home opportunity for just a SASE, turned out to be a "send us an SASE so we can send you a brochure asking for $27" thing. Bleah. If they're going to try to gyp me, it would be nice if they'd do it via the email itself, and not have me waste time, envelope, and stamp for them to do it in print. I guess there are no shortcuts in the jobhunting game, much as I wish there were.
I spent Friday afternoon papering the town's radio and TV stations with my resume and filling out applications therein. Applications. If there is anything more conducive to personal fear, uncertainty, and doubt than having to fill out a job application, I don't know what it is. I find myself wondering, "Will they not hire me because I can't recall the name of my supervisor from the part-time job six years ago?" I know, it sounds ridiculous, but it worries me. I don't have any experience, and it seems like most jobs want experience. I have two degrees, won't someone hire me?
I'm on a ticking time clock. If I don't get some kind of a job, and soon, I won't be able to support my continued existence in the lifestyle to which I am accustomed. I don't know what I'm going to do if someone doesn't hire me soon.
Speaking of working, those who have followed this chronicle for a while may or may not know that I have been a part-time cashier at a chain retail store as a part-time job to help me get through college. This store's name begins with a letter that also denotes a line of small economy cars General Motors came up with in the 1980s, and rhymes with "fart," and it is currently going through bankruptcy proceedings. (Just in case there's any doubt--I speak for me here, not my store in any way. You want a comment from them, you go talk to their publicity department. I'm talking about my life here, not theirs.)
It's been an interesting experience working there lately. It all started a week or so ago, when my customers started expressing their condolences. I was taken a bit by surprise, thinking, "What? Are we going out of business and nobody told me?" So next time I was home, I went to Yahoo and did a news lookup, and did I ever get an eye full. Financial difficulties, shuffling management, and so on. Our chain struggling while a competitor is thriving. Et cetera.
Then the chain declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and customers started asking me when the store was closing. From conversations with fellow associates and managers, they all seem to be having similar experiences. Some have even reported customers being indignant that we weren't having a going-out-of-business sale, the way the nearby Montgomery Ward's did last year when it closed down. Sheesh.
I think that a lot of people tend to associate "bankruptcy" with "out of business." They're thinking of Chapter 7, liquidation, instead of Chapter 11, reorganization. But as I keep explaining to them, the reason our chain declared bankruptcy was to stay in business, not to go out of it. They're getting rid of debts, not closing down. All the same, working at the store lately has been been a bit like attending a wake. I hope it passes soon.
On a more personal note, yesterday I had a friend come over and help me upgrade my computer's Linux partition. New versions of a lot of software, new kernel (I went from 2.2.18 to 2.4.17 in a single jump--whoopee!), and, at last, the genuine honest-to-goodness nVidia GLX drivers. Now I finally get the full effect of 3D acceleration in Linux, and Quake II looks really sweet that way. I can actually play DVDs in some useful fashion, too, thanks to the Ogle DVD player for Linux. I also added 96 more megabytes of swap via file to the 72 meg swap partition I had already; I had noticed some slowdowns earlier and I hope that'll resolve things.
I get a bit of weirdness from the nVidia drivers (such as having a rectangular patch of screen be colored weirdly when I first start X; it goes away when I run Ogle, though), but nothing that merits too much complaint. Now I'll have to see what other GL games are out there for Linux . . .
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(no subject)
A lot of people also associate "bankruptcy" with "abused law", which is unfortunate. So far as I know, it largely isn't. :)
And how's Team M.E.C.H.A. coming along, or is that a really bad question to be asking?