robotech_master

Well, here I am again. Over a month since my last entry. I guess my determination to keep journaling frequently kind of went by the wayside.

So, what can I write about. Wracking my brains to come up with anything that's happened that's worth talking about. I guess I'll just start writing and see where the post goes.

Still haven't gotten that bike battery yet. Apparently my order happened right about when the bike company ran into some logistics issues and had to change its shipper over to FedEx. And there was a matter of paperwork to ship large batteries, which could be deemed a fire hazard. They got the paperwork in, but it remains to be seen when Fed Ex will approve it. So now I'm checking the order status page every day, and giving them a call once a week or so. Still no news. It's very frustrating, but I'm schooling myself to patience. It'll come when it comes.

Work has been getting really really busy, the last few weeks. It's just about back to as busy as it was during the end/beginning of year peak season, probably in part because when traffic dropped way off at the height of the coronavirus scare they laid off all the temp workers. I really hope they're working on training up a new batch. I hope things normalize, and/or they get a new batch of temps in sometime soon. It's getting kind of exhausting.

My Lemonbrat snow leopard cloth face mask arrived in early May. It's pretty comfy, though it is also a bit warm to wear (especially with a filter pad in it). But it's very handy for going out, and I think it looks pretty awesome. I've been wearing it while out in public, like shopping at Aldi. It's good to know that I'm not contributing to the problem, plus it's an awesome fashion statement.

Continuing to enjoy the Homecoming City of Heroes game. Have written several more guides over the last month. I'm really starting to build up a rather respectable library of them, and I'm amused that now other people on the Homecoming Discord are starting to share the link for that post to newcomers even before I can. Incidentally, if any of you want to join the game, and play on Torchbearer, I'll be happy to team up!

My regular bike got a flat tire. When I ventured out to get it fixed, I noticed a couple of interesting changes in the neighborhood. For one, a nearby wine store/bar has rebranded itself as a coffeehouse (while still also being a wine store/bar, apparently). Haven't had the chance to look into it yet; it's closed Mondays. Maybe I'll stop in tomorrow.

Also noticed that a call-ahead-to-drop-your-pet-off-at-the-door veterinary clinic has opened in one of the shops that I literally live just behind. Seems like this might be just the excuse I need to get around to taking my cats in for a check-up and some shots. Up to this point, getting them to any vet anywhere would have been a major exercise in logistics, so I really haven't had them out to one since I first got them some years back. (Goodness…have I really had them for nearly 12 years now?) Given that they're entirely indoor cats, I haven't felt the need to get them shots, because they never go outside or mix with other cats to be exposed to potential sources of infection. (How about that? Even my cats socially isolate.) I suppose I'm fortunate in that they've by and large been pretty healthy, all things considered. Going to see the vet might be expensive, but I suppose that's what savings accounts are for. I guess I should look up their webpage and see what their rates tend to be, then maybe make some plans to make an appointment.

And speaking of what savings accounts are for… To my annoyance, my Moto X4 smartphone is starting to give up the ghost. I suppose it's to be expected. As I discovered when I looked up my original review of it, I've had it for two and a half years now. Funny how time flies. Anyway, it got to the point where I had to factory reset it a couple of times, and it's still not quite right—a couple of times, it's refused to wake up from sleep, and I had to hold down the power button to cycle it.

I could have filed a device protection claim with Project Fi, since I pay the monthly fee, but they'd charge me $100 or so and just send me the same phone—or if not the same phone, some other model that I wouldn't have any choice over. On the other hand, since my phone does still power on and the screen isn't broken, I could trade it in for $38 in value toward a new one. (Or yes, maybe I could sell it for a little more than that in cash on eBay or wherever, but I'm not sure that I could in good conscience sell a phone that I know is starting to go out. At least this way I get something back out of it.)

Sadly, Project Fi doesn't exactly offer a wide selection of phones. I was going to go with a Pixel 3a XL for $350, and had even started to place the order—then I looked up a review and learned that the 3a only has 64 GB of storage and doesn't have any kind of SD card slot at all. That's not good, given that the Moto X I have now with that amount is starting to run out of space with all the apps I have on it. But the only choices were that, a much-more-expensive Pixel 4, or else the Motorola Moto G Power or Moto G Stylus.

After some deliberation, I decided to go with the $250 Moto G Stylus. It's got 128 GB storage, plus an SD card slot, a bigger screen, and a fairly amazing collection of cameras for the price point. Sadly, it's missing a couple of features I like on the Moto X—it's not waterproof, and it doesn't have NFC so I won't be able to use Google Pay to make credit card payments with it. But neither one of those things is really a dealbreaker, and given how much cheaper it is, it won't take as long to rebuild the chunk I'm taking out of savings for it. And it will be nice having a 6.4" screen again. And maybe in another couple of years something better will be available at a cheaper price point.

When I was glancing back at my Facebook, trying to see if I wrote about anything I was doing or experiencing that I could recount for this blog, I just found a whole lot of news story shares about the other big story that blew up in late May—the asphyxiation death of George Floyd and the protests it prompted. Really, it's been a pretty crazy last few weeks, especially coming on top of the earlier COVID-19 panic. And it seems like all of my conservative Facebook friends have gotten even more polarized and hard to relate to. I don't know if it's time to unfriend them, given that some of them are long-time fellow Robotech fans or other people I still feel some non-political kinship to. But maybe I should start putting a few of them on 30-day sleeps just to save my sanity a little. In times like these, sanity is a valuable commodity.

And I really should try to write more about what I'm doing at any given time. Maybe return to Tweeting about it, since my tweets are at least aggregated and posted to my LJ. So it would at least be one way of chronicling my life when I don't feel like writing lengthy posts here. Because when I try to rack my brains for anything interesting I did over the last few weeks, it's hard to come up with anything. It feels like I've kind of just been existing. Staying at home, working all day, gaming in the evening. Going out to shop at Aldi every now and again.

That's part of why I hope that bike battery hurries up and comes; having that electric bike back with that super-long-range battery will give me an excuse for getting out and about, ranging farther afield from my cramped little home. I'm really looking forward to it.

So, I guess I found a few things to write about after all.

Training has been going better, the last week or so. We've been working with actual systems involved in doing the kind of work we're going to be doing on the phones (though they're the older, more complicated system that most representatives don't use anymore, because the new one still isn't available to us yet), which has given us the chance to get a better idea of how the whole process works together. But perhaps more helpfully to me, I finally got the chance to sit and observe an experienced Utilization Management representative on the phone for an hour or so, and get a better picture of the kinds of things I'll actually be doing.

I think that hour of listening probably did more to reduce my level of stress about the new job than anything else. The systems she used might be unfamiliar to me, but they weren't anywhere near as complicated as the ones we've been training on. And if I'm not entirely familiar with the processes she was going through, I recognized the same sort of practiced efficiency I worked my way up to in prior tech support or customer service jobs, once I had the chance to learn my way around the systems and processes. Everything seemed like something I could learn to do myself, given time. And once the classroom instruction is over, I'll get more of a chance to learn by doing when I apprentice to one of those experienced workers for a couple of weeks.

There will probably still be plenty of moments where I'm unsure of what to do and have to yell for help in the instant messenger chat room, but those will taper off and after a few weeks I'll be most of the way to being a pro. And that's quite relaxing.

Meanwhile, starting Sunday when I went to see a couple of Roger Moore Bond movies in theaters, and carrying on all this week, I've been bicycling home in the evening rather than taking the bus. It was 8 miles from the Bond movies, and it's 5 miles home from work. The exercise is good for me, and I think the exercising may be helping me sleep a little better. (Though I do still get up in the middle of the night, and at the moment have had to dose myself with benadryl to get back to sleep by morning. But that'll pass, I'm sure.) I can also claim workout credit for it at the fitness center, and once I earn 17 credits I get the use of a locker for a month—at which point I might even try biking in, since I'll be able to bring a towel and stuff so I can shower the sweat off before work. Sadly, I'm not really saving any money that way, as I bought a monthly bus pass. In fact, I'm losing a little money by only using it one-way each day. But the dividend in health, and in convenience of not having to fumble for change every day, is probably still worth it.

I'm also keeping track of my blood pressure on a daily basis thanks to the fitness center. It's a bit high, and I'll be medicating for that once I can see the doctor after my Anthem benefits kick in in July, but I'm sure the doctor will be happy to see how faithfully I've been keeping track of the readings.

Speaking of sleeping, I should go ahead and get to bed. I'm glad to be feeling better about this job. Fingers crossed that the rest of the training goes well and the initial awkwardness passes quickly.

More life changes, but of the good kind this time. ( I got a job! )

So that's my good news, and boy am I ever relieved. I hope nothing goes wrong during the background check process. I can't think why it would, but you never know. I also hope my replacement Social Security card arrives by the 22nd, since they might want to see it.

I recently got word that my apartment house has been bought out from under my bankrupt former landlord, and received notice that if I have a written lease, I will be permitted to stay until the end of it, but otherwise, I'm going to be moving soon. (If I ever did have a written lease, it has long since vanished into the mists of time. I've been living here for twelve years.)

So, sez one of my brothers, you're going to be moving anyway. Why don't you move to Indianapolis, where your other brother lives? Oh, don't worry about the job thing, we'll help you find one. (I haven't heard how the other brother feels about this idea yet, and I can't even guess whether my parents will think this is a great idea or a terrible one, though I expect they will all soon let me know.)

Yeah, like it's that easy to find another job. If it were that easy, I'd have something in my degrees now, instead of making ten bucks an hour helping people with their TVs over the phone, and doing a bunch of paid writing on the side to make ends meet. Thank you, college, for saddling me with fifty grand in debt and still not landing me a real job.

It's so hard to tell whether this is really a good idea. On the one hand, it would be nice to live in a big city like Indianapolis, that much closer to where a lot of my friends are on the east and southeast coasts. On the other hand, Springfield is the place I know by heart, with the things I love in it. 

It would be nice to have a better job. Certainly the one I have now is easy enough, if a little soul-crushing, and I regularly receive high acclaim in my performance, but I have a dream of someday getting something higher-paying that only someone in my degrees could do, not something they could teach a high schooler off the street. I would guess Indianapolis has better prospects than Springfield for something like that. (Even if it's absolutely horrible to drive in. Seriously, Springfield traffic in no way prepared me for the rat's nest of multilane one-way streets that is downtown Indianapolis.) And we are just about to get into the insanely busy part of the year, so if I'm going to leave, this would be the time to do it.

I wish I knew what to do. This is the kind of decision that you can't turn back from. If I move, I've thrown out everything stable in my life for an uncertain new future filled with the agony of job-hunting and knowing I'm going to be a drain on my brother's resources until and unless I find one. If I don't, I've missed my chance and I'm stuck in Springfield for the foreseeable future.

Keep the bird in the hand? Or go for two in the bush?