Colorado!

I'm excited to announce some of our summer plans will be spent in and around Boulder, Colorado, in May. My wife and I will be doing plenty of hiking and camping with my younger brother and his girlfriend. My only dealings with Colorado were the innards of the Denver International Airport waiting for my next flight. Then, in the air, staring down at the Rockies. I can't wait to actually be walking among them!

Temping

My most recent gig is working for Legal Counsel at a huge college in the city. I've been at it for two weeks. This is a quiet work place. I like that. I have a nice big, private cubicle, a flat screen pc monitor and all the Green Mountain coffee I want. The people are nice too! Hopefully, they'll keep me on permanently. The thing is is that I'm not really busy. Seems to me that this is the plight of being a temp in NYC. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, but, why do they temporarily need this position filled? I don't get it.

My very first temp job in the city planted my ass in an empty receptionist office that no one, I repeat, no one visited. The instruction given was, "If the phone rings answer it and direct all calls to this one extension". No one called, the position lasted three days. Very strange, indeed. The whole time I felt as if I was being filmed and any minute Alan Funt would walk up to me laughing...

I would gladly take on this current position full time if they wanted me. I could post blogs all day and quite possibly become the young Andy Rooney, who is what I feel like when I'm writing my blogs. I'd change my blog page title to "The Plight of Curmudgeonry". I kind of like the sound of that!

Rock Band

Creating a rock band takes money, time and patience. Eventually, the hard work will pay off, I'm told. The drummer and I have been going at it since August of 2007, feeling things out, finding and jamming with others. Around sometime in late September we found a guitar player to join the band. We were finally getting somewhere, molding the songs and figuring our sound out, finding our direction. The rug was pulled out from under us a few weeks ago. Our guitar player decided, (after five months of practicing), that he didn't want to be in the band anymore. I nearly broke down and cried. We miss him, terribly.

Presently, we're looking for another guitarist to join. Its been hard going. It's difficult to find people to play this kind of music we're trying to create. I've been posting on Craig's list with some luck. Not as much luck as we'd like, but, we are getting some replies. Before our guitarist quit we were starting to look for a singer. In a lot of ways that's even tougher than finding a guitar player. You would think in a city this size there would be a lot of talent itching to be involved in something different. I mean, we're not trying to reinvent the wheel, we can't, we just want people to hear us and think of music a bit differently.

I'm sticking to it, regardless, but sometimes, sometimes, I want to give up and quit. Its been worth it so far, creating something with people, working towards a finished piece of art that wasn't in the world before you made it. We will get there sooner or later.

The Survivor!

Here is one of my newest heroes, introducing Mr. Les Stroud. I'm addicted to this show. I can't help myself. Everytime I sit down to watch a little TV and I find that Les is on I can easily be entertained, non-stop for three hours, thanks to the frequently run marathons on Discovery. Pretty soon the guy is gonna run out of terrain. I actually think this guy should run for president, I mean shit, have you heard him play the harmonica? He's awesome! This guy has showed me a number of things I can eat in the wild if I'm in dire need. I've learned everything from how to drink my own piss to starting fires to making weapons; he's preparing me for the not-so-far-off apocalypse. He's the guy you want along with you in a zombie-infested world. I hope to see more seasons out of this "Survivorman" series. It's good, honest TV.

More Complaining...

Okay, yesterday, I complained about this job as a whole. Now, I'm here to complain about an individual co-worker that sits next to me. We're all out in the open here, that's right, no privacy! No cubicles. Some would think that a good thing. Think again! First thing in the morning my co-worker fills her face with dry cereal from a plastic bowl with no milk; and get this folks, with a spoon. Keep in mind, this is every single morning. This has bothered me to extremes lately, since I'm so worked up about being at work. I've decided to keep my headphones on throughout her wholesome crunching. It kills me! Every single morning! But, I'm feeling better already. I've taken the time, (my ever growing down-time), to write about what's troubling me. Blogging is the best place to complain. (Who knows who reads this garbage!) By writing this stuff on a post and putting it out there on the internet you're giving it away, thus taking that fucking monkey off your back! Thank goodness for blogging, aaah!

9 to 5 (for lack of a better word) sucks!

I'm back at my old job now for a little over six months. I hate it! Happily, I'm getting paid better than I was before, but over a period of time the result is always the same. Especially when it's slow, like it is right now, so slow I can post until my heart's content. Not only does the flourescent lights put me in a hypnotic-state, but the recycled air makes me feel as if I'm being embalmed. In a perfect world, if I had absolutely no work to do my boss would tell me to go home. I know, I know, I should thank my lucky stars they called me back to work for them. One day I'll look back on this and laugh. For now, I'll just settle on whining for fuck's sake.

Temping in the Big Apple

My newest position started last Monday at a well established, fairly large, accounting firm on the eastside in midtown Manhattan. Supposedly, when we actually start working, I'm to help them track down some lost assets for one of their rather gigantic corporate clients. Well, for the better part of last week, we did absolutely nothing! I'm not complaining. On this particular assignment I'm making well above the newly proposed minimum wage increase. If they want to pay me to sit in the break room, drink bottomless cups of free tea, read my book and talk to my fellow colleague—I'll let them. Gratefully, I will collect that money as if I have worked my ass off.

I know an individual has to first be qualified to get these positions through a temp agency and second be reachable and available for the position. But why so much pomp and red tape just to be hired to sit in a break room? We all know that America’s priorities are—for lack of a better description—fucked up. The humanist in me wants to give my paycheck away to the first homeless person I see. If this city weren’t so expensive to live in I would. I’m not making this argument to get brownie points or exercise my ideals, but getting paid a full week of pay for a total of maybe two hours of work is wrong. People do not have their shit together. Instead of paying someone to sit around why not send them home until the job arrangements are ready and give that money to someone who really needs it?

Jobless Again

Fortunately, my last temp job lasted close to six months. It came in a time of great need. Helped me pay for school and the move into our new apartment back in August. Presently, the temperature is finally dropping outside and I'm writing this blog on a new Mac in our extra room—my music room—looking forward to starting another english class at the end of January. However, unfortunately, I am jobless again. I've put my feelers out and I'm optimistic. Something will come up. As to any of you who care I made an A- in my first college class. I don't mind telling you all that I'm proud of myself. I actually enjoy the school work; wish I could say the same for the student body. I wanted to share an excerpt of an essay I received an A on. The essay is about a description of a photo of myself as a younger man out in Oregon. I named it, Unsettled Dust.

"The deafening quiet could be heard just by gazing at the black and white...as quiet as fresh fallen snow the stark landscape uneven with rock and rubble, languid hills sparsely covered with vegetation, the unseen pond casting its haunting unto its seated viewer. This is the outskirts of (omission); God's country. I'm 23 years of age in the photo sitting on hallowed ground with (omission)'s foreboding shadow spilt over me while taking the picture. I was a serious person back then, perhaps much as I am now, but I rarely cared or thought much of the consequences of my own actions; today I've grown into responsibility. The picture tells a story—much like any other picture—but it also signifies a time in my life when I had no responsibility and felt free from the routines of life's reality. A moment in time, deeply appreciated and fondly remembered, when I floated on the fingertips of a breeze..."

What do you think? The prof loved it. Well,, I better do more job hunting before the day ends. It felt good to drop this into the soup, its been a while. Hope everyone in the blogworld is doing fine. Maybe you'll hear from me a little more frequently now that I'm jobless. Wish me luck!

A Night Off!

Hello folks!

My temp agencies finally came through, I'm working again! But along with school in the evenings I don't know how I'm going to find time to write on the blog, only time will tell. This evening I get a break from school—because of train delays—thank you MTA. The E,V stations were packed to the walls at 5pm, all trains coming through were just as packed, so I played hooky. My schedule right now only allows 7 hours sleep, this is insane! What am I getting myself into?

This schedule is going to kill me!