almost two months

Wow, I can’t believe how long it has been since I wrote a real entry.  I’m sorry, I really have not had a lot of time, and even moreso, I haven’t had much gumption to write.  Not that I haven’t had anything to write about, I just haven’t had the gumption to sit down and write it out.

Let’s see, where do I start?

Back in September, D, my roommate and I had an awesome talk.  I don’t know if I wrote about it or not, but basically, she told me that I needed to find another place to live sometime.  The best part about that is that it was a heartfelt talk, based on what she felt I NEEDED, not what she really wanted.  She explained to me that I had changed from the person she knew.  She told me that I had lost some of the spark that made me who I was, and she felt I needed to find a place of my own in order to get that spark back. 

In order to find my own place, I would first need a steady job.  So I really, really started sending out resumes.  Sent out resumes to jobs I thought I would fit in, jobs I thought I might like, and jobs that I thought they might hire me.  I sent out resumes to just about every listing I could find. 

With all the resumes I sent out, I got a whopping goose egg for calls.  Not a single callback.  This started to get me down.  So, I did what I knew I had to do.  I called the temp agency I had worked for back in the Spring, before I got the hairbrained idea to take the job in Iraq, and go get rich. 

The guy there said he had a few openings I might fit in.  One sounded awesome, not too far away, and like something I could possibly be hired full time for.  Then there was this other one, further away (again) but it also sounded great.  He called me to ask me about an interview for the one further away.  I said, “Sure” because I knew I needed SOMETHING!  I had my interview there on October 6th.  I was excited to be going on an interview, if for nothing else but the possibility of getting back into the interviewing process after so long.  I dressed up in my suit and tie, and drove to the interview.   As luck would have it, traffic totally sucked, and I knew I was going to be late.  I called the guy from the temp agency and told him that I truly didn’t think I was going to make it by 10, which was the time of the interview.  He called back a couple minutes later and said that it was okay, the interviewer understood and would be waiting for me when I got there.  He told them that I wouldn’t be any later than 10:30, which I had told him.  Of course, as luck would have it again, as soon as he told me I had some leeway, traffic eased up.  I made it to the interview at 10:05.  As I sat in the lobby waiting to be called for the interview, I was wondering just how much my being late would affect the outcome of the interview. 

Finally, a guy came up and called my name.  As we looked each other over, I thought, hmm, this guy is kinda cute!  We went into a conference room and sat down and talked.  We seriously talked about “situations” in the job, not necessarily about what I knew, etc.  Apparently he thought I gave decent answers, because he called down to one of the guys in the department and asked him to set up a computer the same way that he had done for him when he was hired.  Then we went walking down to the IT department.  He took me around and introduced me to the other members of the department, and then took me back to a back, corner cubicle.  On the desk was a computer, with all the components taken out.  Then he sat down and asked me to put it back together.  First I had a little bit of trouble getting the lid off the old, outdated machine.  After that, I thought, I had it made.  But then he sat there and watched me, like I was a model on a runway.  I didn’t realise that the power supply on this model flipped up so you could get to the motherboard underneath it, so that took me a little bit of time to figure out.  After I figured that out, the rest was easy, except that there was an extra cable.  I asked him if there was an extra cable, and he said, “If you think it is an extra cable, leave it out.”  So, I put it all back together, leaving the extra cable out, and told him I was done.  He called the other guy back over and asked him to look it over and see if it was correct.  (I shouldn’t have been so nervous about this, since I’ve been working in computers, taking them apart and putting them back together for, oh, I’d say about 16 years, but still, I was nervous) 

Finally, after looking it over, and putting the lid back on, the interviewer asked the other guy, “How did he do?” 

The other guy then said,”He put it back together better than it was when I took it apart.”  Of course at this point, I had to wonder what it looked like when he took it apart, but that was just a fleeting thought. 

So, the interviewer and I went and talked a little bit more.  He told me that he thought he would be taking a chance on me, if he hired me, because of my work history.  (Being out of work for two years seems to have an adverse affect on your employability)  After that, he told me that he thought I would fit in with the organization, and not to let him down.

After I got on the freeway to go home, I called the guy from the agency and explained to him the way things went down.  While I was talking to him, he asked me to hold on, because he had another call.  When he came back on, he said “Something must have really impressed them, they want you to start tomorrow morning.”  I was shocked, excited, amazed, apprehensive, and ecstatic, all at once!  I would be able to go home and tell D that I was starting work the next day! 

(Yes, it makes me happy to be able to tell D things that would make her proud of me.  I have so much respect and gratitude for her.  I truly do think of her as my sister.  After all, how many friends do most people have, who would do what she has done for me for the past couple years?)

I’ll continue this on another entry.