Job Hunting

Pounding the Pavement

This time looking for a second job. This one provides all my needs, but it's going to cut very close, at least for the next couple of months. So an extra job, added to my 29 hours a week, won't be a hardship, and may help me get back on track with my finances. Up to the end of tour they were good, but now I'm living on nothing, with every paycheck from now until August more than spent on bills, bills, and loan payments.

So yesterday and this morning I woke up, got into a suit and nylons, and went begging for applications. Today I turned in one finished application and three resumes. I'm hoping that I will land the job working banquets at the nicest hotel in town -- I worked there one summer after my freshman year of college, so I'm sort of trained. It was the best money I'd made up until that point. And I applied at three drive through coffee places for the early am shift. I'm not good at mornings. In fact I find it difficult to be pleasant. But I'd rather work mornings and have my evenings free later. Though I wouldn't mind triple shifting through the summer just to be able to afford to go empty out my long awaited storage unit.

I've worked 60-70 hours a week before.

And if none of those places pan out, I'm going to try for the Greystone -- a very posh restaurant. For here. Dad has the in there, so I'm hoping he'll get the word out. Even a shift or two there once in a while would be a help.

And of course, I'm a workaholic if given the change. This is the longest I've ever gone working this few hours (or doing activities -- in college and high school). Four weeks. Whatever shall I do with myself? I have no idea.

Cooking up a Storm

Cooking up a Storm

It's so nice to have a kitchen again, after two years without. Unfortunately my grocery budget is limited (I splurged a dollar today for a week and a half's worth of top ramen), but the mission adequately provides us with staples and canned goods. And the occasional treat -- like Costco double chocolate muffins and Safeway Croissants. And milk came in by the gallon. Expired a week ago, but it's still good.

Tonight after Bible Study Nancy and I had to eat something, so I made Green Been Casserole. Then corn bread for the week. And now I'm making a second batch of casserole and baking an herb chicken. I may get back into my bread habit now that we have yeast. Perhaps tomorrow...

Portland

Tasha's Birthday

I drove to Portland Saturday morning for a belated birthday with Tasha. I pulled in in the afternoon, and she and a friend, Drea, were going running. So I got a nap. Then we all went bookstore hopping. They were trying to find Captivating, and I was looking for William Barclay's Commentary on Acts. Three stops later, it was at Powells. Hurrah!

At Powells we spent some time in the coffee shop. As we were there, a costume 5K marathon ran by. And one of those weird experiences began, where a formerly estranged body of people, for a moment, become a group. And we all laughed at the Darth Vaders, Napoleon Dynamites, and the two person horse. (And whoever was the horse's hind end, that must have been a long race) And Jesus, with cross in tow. Someone should let him know that he rose. But then, a random guy with a robe and long hair might be harder to identify at a run. After the race ended, we all went back to anonymity, but we'd had a moment.

That night the three of us had a Seinfeld and Friends marathon with our favorite men: Ben and Jerry.

The next morning Drea drove home and Tasha and I went to Imago Dei -- a youngish church in Portland. They had rented an old Catholic church, but were Evangelical, but had the iconography on their altar for communion, and sang rearranged hymns. A very nice blend. The pastor gave a sermon on giving joyfully. At the end of it he mentioned that a pastor they support in Africa was trying to start two business through microfinance (a great program by the way). One was for 200 widows who were starting a farm, and some disabled men were wanting to manufacture soccer balls to sell to local schools. They needed $4,600. The first service, made up of young marrieds, college and singles (it's a very young congregation in general, though there was overall a large variety of people) gave almost 20,000 (they announced that after communion -- presumably whoever was totaling the offerings from before had just finished). And we were at the second service. Pretty stinking cool.

Tasha and I finished the marathon over tomato soup and toaster cheese, and I drove home. Great weekend.

Happy Birthday Tasha!

Head to toe in Dust

Head to toe with dust

Today it was my job, as part of the larger overall job of organizing the craft room which just moved downstairs, to take 25 boxes, bins, bags, and barrels of assorted silk flowers and separate them by color. Well two days and ten hours later, it's done. And the wreaths are all on dowel rods hanging from the lowest shelf.

I still have the rest of the odds and ends to go.

I dusted the shelves and floor with my tushie. You can finally see what the floor is made of: (Concrete presumably, like the rest of the floor, but you couldn't be sure). The floor looks wonderful, my jeans less so.

Tonight my Sister is coming over to watch Princess Bride, which she has never seen. A crime against humanity, I say, and one we are going to absolve.

Painting

Covered in Windblown

I am head to toe covered in light blue paint. We're painting every room in the shop. One room at a time. So, take everything down, paint, put everything back up, repeat.

Today I'm painting broad horizontal stripes behind the register and the opposing wall. My lunch break to let it dry, et voila, filling in the in betweens with tan.

PS. I finished quilting my grandmothers flower garden quilt and added the scraps to my yo-yo quilt. Lots of quilting going on and movies to be watched since I have the benefit of my old VHS and Nancy's DVD collection.

Star Wars Episode III

War!

I finally saw the third one. I went in determinedly skeptical, but somewhere got sucked in. Poor Padme. All of the strength and fire in her is gone. And poor Leia - her best speech now null and void. And Obi Wan. Trying to be like his master but falling short. How hard to follow Darth Vader and destroy him. And Anakin. Pulled three directions. Used by all, and ultimately his attempt to mistakenly do the right thing is the very thing that brings him to allegiance with Darth Sidious.

What a graphic hunting down of the Jedi. I'm glad they showed it all. Even the children.

And Palpatine. What a way to show his disfigurement. How young must the actor have been the first time around. Yoda. Failed in his effort to bring Darth Sidious down and forced into exile. And Chewbacca -- really played by Peter Mayhew again! And James Earl Jones uncredited in the end.

And how cool how they tied all of the weaponry and ships together. Look at the tail end of Organa's ship and tell me what it reminds you of. And the X wing and Y class ships. Only, isn't it a bit early for the Death Star? (Nice cameo of General whatshisname)

Then watch A New Hope again. Are all the storm troopers clones? When did Darth Vader find out that Palpatine lied, and his son is alive? Leia got so close to Ben Kenobi. Only a few miles of atmosphere between then when she was captured.

Darth Vader's fall at the hands of Obi Wan alone redeemed the first two movies.

Change

?

Why does change, even good change, even change that you know to be right where you're supposed to be, feel a little bit like dying.

Au Francais

Au Francais

For some unkown reason, my adobe acrobat reader is all in french.

Sorry I'm so boring and all business

Sorry I'm so Boring and all Business

Whenever I get into a new place I start to blog, and then think: Who really wants to hear about my new decor, and my problems acclimating my cats, and what my new job is, and all of that. But then I realize this ranting sounds even whinier, so I'm just going to go ahead.

So here's everything up to date:

Living the Dry Life
Being on contract isn't bad. Austen has been giving me a hard time by phone and text message, but I haven't found it hard to not drink. I really don't drink that often. I don't. Or, at this point, didn't. Since I can't have any at all. Not that I'm secreting a bottle of Gran Marnier in my boudoir. I don't have a boudoir. We do have an empty bottle on display downstairs. I think we're rationalizing it as vintage somehow. On a dry campus it seems funny. Almost as funny as the bottles of margerita mix that were donated to the food pantry at the mission. What on earth are we doing to do with that. Turn it into punch, I say. No sense wasting it. But I hear it's being poured out on principal.

Moving In
I'm in. And unpacked. And working on getting everything pretty. I'm having two difficulties. One: There are no windows in my room. So I don't wake up to anything. Pitch black. Like sleeping in a tomb. And two: I wear earplugs so I don't have to hear my two nocturnal monsters roaming around at night. So somehow, even though I had no trouble waking up to my alarm with my earplugs in at mocks, I haven't woken up to it any day this week. Will become a problem tomorrow when I must get up at 6:00 for the 7:30 manditory prayer breakfast.

The Cats
Are adapting. Cai has stopped complaining. We've reached a compromise. When I'm in my ebay room working they can come and wander around in the big warehouse room. That has seemed to shut him up. At some point they can roam free in the evenings, but I haven't figured out how to find them when I want to go to bed. I don't want them tripping alarms and so forth.

The Job
I love it! I'm just in the right level of happiness. I'm authoritative enough that I can delegate some of the low stress jobs to the volunteers and part time employees (like sorting clothes and pricing things) but low enough that the buck doesn't stop with me. I have a lot of variety: sometimes I work the register, for the rest I organize, set up new displays, and once we get the craft room set up (partly me again) I can start taking the pieces of things and turning them into stuff to sell.

Church
I'm attending my old church for the time being. I know people, I know where I can plug in if I need more to do. And I'm not in the know enough to be bothered by politics.

Extracurriculars
At this point that's mainly decorating my apartment and getting the ebay store up and running. I do have a bible study on tuesdays, and the mission womens lunch on tuesdays. And I see my family from time to time when they volunteer at the mission or I run home to steal pepsi.

The Family
It's great to be home. I love being near enough to see them from time to time. Nearer than once a year post-holidays. And when I'm broke I can go home for meals...

Yakima
It's light out until almost 10. When I'm not in my cell I love wandering out and seeing sun all evening. The weather is hot and getting hotter, but it cools off at night. I love this valley. It's beautiful. And the train runs through our front yard such as it is. The train yard is my front door.

Tripping alarms left and right

Tripping Alarms

The motion sensor alarm sets itself at night, often while I'm still up and kicking around being crafty. It's the only downside to the whole arrangement. Sunday night we tripped it, and not only is it loud enough to wake the dead, but reconstitute the cremated. No worries about anyone trying to get in.

Cai is not adjusting well to being an indoor cat. He seems to think he needs to roam around and amuse himself by getting into stuff. Even if that were possible, I don't even want to imagine the nights that I don't find him before the alarm sets.

Today is the mission ladies lunch and then I work a few hours, then the tuesday evening bible study. We're working on Acts. Well, they are. This will be my first time going. And funny enough, the sermon at First Pres this sunday was on Acts too. Maybe God's trying to tell me something. On my own my goal is to read the Bible chronologically. I have the little guide now, so it should be fun. Of course, my cats may not appreciate being read aloud to, but my life makes their lives possible, so who cares what they think, right?