| Oye, conjito, tu estas muy gordo y delicioso... |
[04 Dec 2009|08:26pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 restless |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
The White Tie Affair - Allow Me |
] |
5 out of 10 pages now! Whoo!
Man, I'm so bored though... I'm having, like, full-on, one-sided conversations with my rabbit in Spanish because I can only sit here for so long without getting unbearably restless. He seems to enjoy them except that when I call him bonito he starts looking for food... not sure why.
Man, my sister won't be home for, like, 3 hours... I'm going to go crazy waiting! Why is no one home tonight?
|
|
| I think I can, I think I can, I think I can... |
[04 Dec 2009|05:39pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 accomplished |
] |
I want to note officially that I hate mandalas and Harold and Maude. I'm sorry, they're both stupid and annoying and I just want to chew my way out of my apartment cuz I have to make/watch these. I am going to be so happy when this is done!!!
On the bright side though, I have both apple and pumpkin pie and some seriously delicious turkey burgers (guess I got my Thanksgiving a little late this year, ha ha).
I'm about 3 pages into my 10 page paper and going strong... somebody cross their fingers for me that it stays this easy!
Also, apparently somebody told the girls at work that I'm leaving. Don't know who it was (probably Virginia). Don't know how I feel about it either... I don't really want to have to tell them, so maybe it's good, but at the same time, way to steal my thunder!
|
|
| Take a number, stand in line.. |
[03 Dec 2009|07:23pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 tired |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Rise Against - Survive |
] |
So this is day 3 of 15 of the last of my days at McDonald's. Yesterday was just awful - I almost cried a couple of times though mostly for non-work related reasons, but still didn't do much for the ambiance - but today was pretty nice. I did a lot of running around, but not a lot of actual "work" work (like shift running), and I always like those days. Shakin' up the norm and all that.
Also, I learned today that my boss turned in her notice right before she went on vacation, so she's leaving on the 10th. A lot of times I was really disgusted with that woman, but I have to say I also pity her too. I put myself in her shoes and I can't say I blame her for being like she is. She was actually vaguely self-aware when I was talking to her about it today (not, like, "god I was such a bitch, sorry" kind of self-aware, but at least "when they put people under these kinds of conditions, don't they realize we're going to be too stressed out?" self-aware - understanding, but not really applying it to herself). In some ways I'm glad, but at the same time, now I feel bad that both of us are leaving at the same time, especially since I know Gil is thinking about leaving too. There's going to be a lot of shaking up in the next month at the store. All of the stores, actually, from the sounds of things. Oh well, won't be my novela anymore, eh?
Had school on Wednesday night (and skipped out on the salaried mgr Christmas party to go to it too) only to discover that next week is the final actual class and the week after that our final is due. I also discovered that next week I have two assignments and a 10-page paper I was unaware of. Yikes. I've gotten one of the assignments done tonight already, and I have all day tomorrow and part of Saturday and part of Sunday to do the bulk of the work. The thing that makes me sad is that I got back my midterm and got an 85% on it, which, if you consider the fact that I've been to less than half of the classes and wrote the whole 10-page midterm in basically two days, isn't that bad, but I wish so much that I could have given him 100% work. I always strive for the best and he is a fantastic professor, so I think he deserved my full attention, but I had none to give. Oh well, if this is the only B I get in college, I'll be a happy camper. I've never been one of those "the worth of my existence is based on my grades" kind of peeps, so I'll live.
It started snowing today, so I guess winter is here now. I love snow and I love the silence of winter. The cold I could probably live without though, ha.
You know, Virginia said something I thought was odd. She told me Sherry told her I was "not really a morning person" and would do better on nights. I was sort of offended, actually, cuz I'm the most morning-loving person I know, but I realized that she meant more that I do better in the McDonald's night setting rather than morning setting and I think, in a lot of ways, she's correct. At McDonald's, a good morning manager has to be all about pushing cars, pushing people, pushing numbers. At night, a good manager needs to know how to work with their crew to make things happen - like cleaning, stocking, etc. I think I can do both, frankly, but she's right that I'm better that working with people than pushing them. Night crew is smaller and has to be more motivated, more able to act independently, whereas in the morning you have a ton of people and need to make them all do their one job with precision, not question authority, etc.
So, anyway, before this gets any longer or more mundane or more self-referential, I'm going to go to bed.
|
|
| Two steps back. |
[27 Nov 2009|06:12pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 anxious |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Ellegarden - Stereoman |
] |
So I broke it off with Garrett today. It was a hard decision, but I think I've known for awhile that this was slowly disintegrating and we tried to fight it, but between mismatched schedules, mismatched need levels with communication, his refusal to come see me or let me see him on any but the designated days, and my tendency to cut painful emotions (like loneliness) to the quick, it just died. I spent most of the day and night thinking about it and I finally realized that even if it was worth saving, we weren't in a position to since things aren't going to change schedule or willingness-wise any time soon.
On one hand, I really liked him and what we had, when we actually got to see each other, and I'm sad both for him and for me for what we lost, but honestly, I barely feel anything emotionally. I've seen him so little and gotten so used to not being with him, not talking to him, etc. that it really doesn't make a difference in my life. Love is like fire, you have to keep feeding it, otherwise it dies.
I don't know what I was expecting would happen when I told him, but he didn't even fight me. He just said "I can't talk you out of this, can I?" like I was going to say "oh, sure you can, give it a shot" or something... I hate that. I hate that no one is willing to fight for things anymore. And I hate that Corey's right and I make guys take me for granted. I hate knowing I'm going to have to play that stupid game. But I guess that's life. Corey was actually right about a lot of things, surprisingly, I think sometimes people don't give him enough credit.
Yeah, so last night, Corey and Ger came over (to the store) and brought me Thanksgiving food, so I went over to his house after work to say thanks and ended up staying there talking till basically 1 am. He's a nice kid, even if he is a total redneck. I think after I leave McDonald's, I'll stay friends with him.
So I'm "off" today, work overnight tomorrow, "off" Sunday. I think I open Monday, but I don't remember. It doesn't really matter. Same thing every week. I haven't heard back from the other job yet, so I dunno whether to write that off or not. Being "inexperienced" sucks.
I wish I knew what's going to happen with this whole job thing cuz I really don't want to even think about the new semester without knowing what my work schedule's going to be like. How can I possibly fit actual 4-day-a-week classes around my awful, rotating schedule?
Basically my life is back in neutral right now. I feel stuck in my old job, I'm single again, I may not be going to college next semester again, etc. etc. Lord, one step forward, two steps back. I know it just feels that way and that I'm actually making some forward progress, even if it is only slowly, but it's still frustrating.
Also, the combination of talking to Corey and then Eusebio made me realize today that I need to stop being so damn giving and nice to people. Not, like, general nice, but, like, uber nice, overly giving nice. Just because I can, doesn't mean I should, and people don't value what they are given. I'm just making myself be taken for granted - at work, at home, with friends, with family, with relationships... I need better personal boundaries.
|
|
|
[25 Nov 2009|10:59pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 bake-y |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Anberlin - Breaking |
] |
Man, this thing says I last posted two days ago, but I swear it was yesterday... ah well, today was about the same as every other day, but I got to work with a lot of my favorite people, which made me realize how much I do still love to be the center of attention. I thought that part of me was long gone (since I read as "introvert" 99% of the time nowadays), but apparently not. I have just parred down the audience. I think everyone enjoys the thrill of being someone's world and all that, but I'll settle for just being the center of a conversation. I've become a socialite, ha!
I was talking to a friend of mine with whom I had a very brief relationship (like 2 weeks, I think, maybe a month) and who remains the only man who has ever choose another girl over me (but didn't cheat - subtle difference), and I was just saying how I miss him and stuff and he sort of randomly said "I'm sorry I couldn't be what you needed me to be" which is quite a conversation stopper. I still don't know how to take that exactly... Was he thinking that before we started talking? Or was it something I said that sounded like I was thinking about that? Cuz I wasn't... I just meant like "gee, haven't talked for awhile, I miss (talking) to you!" It drives me crazy not to know what people are thinking! SCIENCE - invent telepathy already!
Oh, and I decided to make cheesecake for Thanksgiving. It seemed a fair compromise - last year I made an entire dinner and everyone was basically just like "oh, that's nice" since our traditional Thanksgiving foods are extremely foreign to them, after all, so I rethought my strategy and now I'm only making dessert. Everyone loves dessert and Mexicans loooooove cheesecake, so this should go over better. I was on the phone with Sophi while I was baking and she was saying "oh, you bake so well" and blah blah and I was wondering when she'd ever tasted my baking/cooking and then I remembered how often I used to bring in stuff when I worked at GE before Sophi left. I can barely believe I ever had the time to bake that often! Good grief! I did the same thing at Cascade for the first couple of months, but no one seemed all that appreciative, so I quit. I did start again when I first started at McDonald's (I used to make my own "breakfast burritos" too and eat them on the way to work even), but I just work too damn much now to feel like doing anything creative when I get home. Meh.
So when I finally manage to snag a new gig, I solemnly intend to bake at least once a month and go to the gym at least once a week. I'm also going to make it a goal to get my sewing machine fixed so I can start quilting again. I think what's missing in my life is crafting, honestly. I used to be so creative! Baking, cooking, sewing, writing... man, and now I just sleep and work. When I have days off I feel like I'm forgetting to do something and I think that's what it is. (Plus if I could sell my stuff on Etsy or someplace similar maybe I could make enough to pay for my addicti- I mean, the "supplies.")
Also, I friggin' HATE nutella. Uck. I have never liked nuts particularly, especially hazelnuts. Even the way it smells makes me want to gag. I wish the girls had never bought it. Bleck bleck bleck. The whole house smells!
|
|
| Turkey Day approaches... |
[23 Nov 2009|08:15pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
tired |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Shinedown - If You Only Knew |
] |
So I got a 'call' back (it was an e-mail actually) from the job I really, really wanted, and they turned me down. I kind of knew I wasn't going to get it cuz all I had going for me was charm and looks, but no experience, so if I was up against someone with experience, I would lose and that's the look of things. Oh well.
I am still tired from yesterday - 14 hours of work. It was great. I was scheduled for overnight with three crew (till 1 am), so I could do food cost, but then one didn't show and the gal I got to replace him didn't know anything (like literally), so I worked my butt off all night doing everything myself and then did food cost in the morning. Not a big surprise that my numbers were god awful. Bleh.
Tomorrow I open, Wednesday I open, Thursday I "close" (9am-6pm since it's turkey-day), and then Friday I'm off. I'm thinking about going out with some of the guys from work Thursday night since I have nothing better to do - Boo and Jaz are going to her grandparents' house and I don't get off in time for dinner, so I'm not going to go. I wanted to go see Eusebio, but he has to open at 3am the next day.
Also, the girls are watching some really weird show called Solitary... I keep forgetting what I'm typing because the people on TV are yelling and hollering. It's distracting. :/
Oh, but I have a brilliant idea for a new website look! It would look like my phone - which is beautiful, no one can deny. I wish I had more time on my hands....
|
|
| Why is it that all trashy women love tweety and tigger? |
[20 Nov 2009|02:30pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 contemplative |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Something Corporate - I Want To Save You |
] |
Back from my second actual interview. I think I nailed this one, but I dunno if I actually want it or not. It's a guaranteed 40 hours and it's in Mt. Prospect, only a 15 min drive, but it's overnight and $10/hr. I'm okay on overnights now, so once I've been at it a couple of days, I'll get the swing of it pretty fast, but it'll flip-flop my whole life. Instead of working during the day, class in the evening and sleeping at night, I'd sleep during the day, have class in the afternoon or evening and sleep during the mornings. I mean, it's not a huge deal, but I know how rough it is on a person's social life (not like I have one anyway).
Plus, and probably more importantly, it's only $10 instead of $12 because I don't have medical transcription experience. That's $320 less a month I have to figure out. Of course, with half the drive time, I'll probably gain some in gas, but I don't know how much. Also, this is not the secretarial kind of job I was hoping for. I know I could kick butt at it though - the chicks they had all looked like the ones I've worked with before - low class "casual" dress, smokers, too much makeup, etc. and I can do whatever they can do in half the time, experience or no. It would be a static schedule finally, too.
Also, the guy was saying they have another option for overnights where you work 4-10s and have three whole days off. That might be better cuz then I would have one day for laundry, cleaning, etc., one day for homework and one day off.
If I don't hear back from the first job, I'm definitely going to take this one because I know how bad my resume is and how slim my chances are with anything else, but I'm still holding my breath on them... the first one is exactly the kind of job I want and the kind I would be amazing at, but I don't know who my competition is, or the pay (he was vague about it). It's further away (30 minutes approx.) and there wouldn't be any 4-10s, it'd be M-F 8-5 or whatever. I'd have two whole days off, but they'd be weekend days and those are useless to me.
Either way, I'll have to budget... ugh, and tell my boss. God, how I'm dreading that. The first job said 2 weeks was fine, but second one seemed to be indicating they'd want me to start earlier, so I dunno how that'd work out.
It's going to be so hard to say goodbye to everyone. I've only been there 6 months, but that's actually a surprisingly long time. Gah, nothing good ever comes without some kind of downside. Life, you are such a downer!
|
|
| Titles go here. |
[20 Nov 2009|10:12am] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
awake |
] |
So yesterday was interesting. I have the power back now, yay. I went to that interview in the morning and it was good, but I don't want to get my hopes up too much, so I'm not even going to talk about it. Suffice it to say, I really want that job and I think I might be in the running.
I also went to work and that was okay. Boss lady complained that I didn't tell her the construction was over - I didn't know! She was like "how could you not know? all the lanes are open." Yeah, but they still had the construction cones on both sides, I thought they were... resting.. or something, I dunno, it just never occurred to me that they were finished. Sorry.
Also, I think I may have injured my toe. I stubbed it hard twice the night before last and once at work and now it hurts pretty bad. I thought it had gone away this morning, but when I flex it, it started hurting again. Boo. At least I'm off today and work overnight tomorrow, so it's got time to heal. Plus I gotz booze, so it'll all be okay in about 20 minutes (kidding).
One of my friends that I hadn't talked to in a long while (because of circumstances) called me last night to tell me about how his drunken behavior may get him kicked out even though he quit drinking about two months ago, then while he was on the phone with me, a cop came over and gave him a ticket for illegally parking in a handicapped spot and he started flipping out because he thought this would be the thing that got him expelled, etc. He was up all night giving me updates about how he was doing (I slept through a lot of them) and then called me again this morning. It turned out okay, which is exactly what I told him over and over, but now he wants to come stay here on his way home and I dunno if that's a good idea because of circumstances. (i.e. he is my roommate's ex.) I have a feeling this will all end in super dramatic fight scenes, DBZ-style where they take several days to actually go anywhere, if I'm not careful... joy.
Oh, and because the power was out, a lot of the meat we had (steak, expensive steak, hamburger, etc.) started to get a little less good, so Boo and I cooked it all up and are going to freeze it cooked so it doesn't go bad, so now my house smells like steak and my freezer is full of meat.
:( Man, my foot really hurts.
|
|
| The lights aren't on, but everyone's home. |
[18 Nov 2009|09:12pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
distressed |
] |
Oh my lord, today was CRAZY. SRSLY. First off, I had to do the bun order, which I'd never done before, plus the coin order, plus everyone and their mcdog was calling to borrow buns. And it was not busy at all, and I'd just gotten 2 lectures on how labor must mustmustMUST come down, no excuses, so I started sending everyone home, which meant that instead of doing manager-y things, I was running and taking orders, etc. so I was tired all day (on top of being lethargic from it being 'that' time of the month).
And then Rob called and said he'd gotten kicked out of his house and he sounded upset (not surprisingly), so I asked if he was still wanted to come to work and he said 'well... Cathy, if you really need my one arm (he broke it recently), I'll be there, but...' and I was just so touched because I had been expecting him to say no (and had only asked so he would spit it out cuz I had customers), and I knew the only reason he wasn't saying no was because it was me who picked up (you could kinda tell right off he was both happy and unhappy about me answering - happy because he knew I would be reasonable and unhappy because he didn't want to let me down). So I had to call and call to try to find someone to take his place since he was the only order-taker scheduled and it ended up the only person I could get was Peter.
Now, Peter is amazing, I wish I had 4 more like him - intelligent, friendly, driven, well-spoken, great work ethic, fast learner, but he's brand new and had never been in the drive-thru before, which I didn't know because I haven't worked with him that much (and if I had, he would've been in dt long ago). Unfortunately, I realized this was not going to work about 10 minutes after he got there and my other 2 OTs had left, so I was stuck in the back booth with him, basically taking half the orders and walking him through the other half. Then I realized that, since Peter was now the only OT, Gris was going to be stuck up front taking FC orders and running for DT, which meant there was no way she could do the truck by herself and no way she could make it through peak, so I had to call Abraham, who had just gotten home, and make him come back to get them through peak.
Then, while I was unloading the truck, my sister texts me and asks if I paid the power bill because the power was out. Now, I've been living at my apartment complex for basically 2 years now and there is only one utility I have ever paid, so I call them and confirm that we're paid in full (which we were), then call the office to see what's going on, because Boo said the lights in the hallway were on, just not ours.
Well, it turns out, long story short, that I was supposed to be paying ComEd for my electricity for the last 2 years, but, being as I was completely unaware for this, I had never even started an account. The reason I never had to pay my electricity at my old apartment was that my neighbor had previously lived in my apartment and forgot to change over her account, so was paying for our electricity the whole time. She only found out when they shut off HER power, by then we ended up leaving before they realized we weren't paying. And then my landlords forgot to say anything about rolling over the account when we moved, or I would've been like "what account?"... So yeah, we have no power. They said it might take up to 3 days to start service. (I'm writing this in panera on my phone, btw, because it's the only internet access I can get.) Yeah. I have an interview in the morning, too, that I had to trade shifts for, but no heat and no power. omg, I am so angry and tired. There's more, but I don't even feel like writing it.
|
|
| "Interview" II |
[17 Nov 2009|09:01pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 sleepy |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Law and Order |
] |
So, went to what I thought was an interview, but it was just filling out an app in person. I didn't even see the boss. The two receptionist chicks looked like clones - both blonde, both skinny, both Russian or Polish-ish, both wearing the same sweatshirt (apparently they have a uniform, albeit a very casual one). It was actually a rather creepy experience because people would come in and the two girls would give the same super friendly greeting in unison and usher the client into the back, you'd hear the doctor greet the patient and say the same thing every time "we're so glad to see you, !" Then there'd be silence for a few minutes and the person would come back out and the girls would schedule an appointment for them for the very next day and the person would agree and leave.
I know a lot of chiropractic procedures are short in duration and need to be done frequently, but I think I've been watching too much V or something because I couldn't help thinking they were aliens giving out either giving out drugs or, like, hypnotoads or something... It was creepy.
I feel gypped though cuz I got all dressed up (heels and warpaint even) for what I thought would be an "interview" and nothing. I took a shower, but my eyelids are still covered in tiny gold sparkles from the eyeshadow. It looks like I got smacked in the face by a fairy. -_-'
Very tired now. Need sleep.
|
|
| INTERVIEW |
[16 Nov 2009|04:43pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 ecstatic |
] |
OMG I THINK I GOT AN INTERVIEW. I just saw the e-mail... it says "to fill out an application and see us", but it was off Craigslist, so I guess I can see why they want to be cautious. Also, it's for a chiropractor's office, and I don't really believe in half that voodoo-that-you-do stuff, but it would be a job and I would be a receptionist/secretary which is a foot in the door and it's much closer than Cary! (14 mins vs. 38 per yahoo maps).
I wonder how much they pay... I wonder what I should wear... oh oh oh!
|
|
| Thoughts on meaning |
[15 Nov 2009|09:54pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
contemplative |
] |
First of all, I'm writing this from my phone since my sister is on the computer and I don't want to kick her off, but I feel the need to express this, so apologies if there are glaring typos - it's dark and these letters are so tiny!
Anyway, want I was wondering to myself, as I lay here, trying to sleep, is what exactly qualifies as a "successful" life? As an (almost obsessively) goal-driven person, I wonder what "successful" means, in terms of being able to look back and say "this was good; I am satisfied." I think the ultimate goal of life is to be happy as possible, to do what makes you happy, but there are so many things that make me happy, how can I pick the best or the right one? Some bigger happinesses require sacrificing other possiblities. How does one know which happiness to choose?
I think everyonw is born with (or grows to find) issues they need to deal with - self-esteem, self-image, confidence, etc. - hurdles they need to face, but I feel, though it's probably hubristic of me to say, that most of mine are external rather than internal problems.
I guess this is all just a fancy way of saying I don't know what I want to do with my life. I know that, at my age, this is an almost universal feeling, but that doesn't make it any less poignant for the individual facing the decisions. I know I don't have to know instantly and forever more, set in stone, but I feel each day as more a loss than a gain in the time I have remaining. Today, for example, I worked,, accomplished some menial work-related tasks, basked in the love of my underlings, then came home and slept for 8 hours of completely dreamless sleep born of sheer exhaustion (the kind where you barely remember laying down, were not aware you were sleeping, but awake to find it dark). Then I read part of a book, eat dinner and attempted to sleep again.
Was this really a 'day'? Or just a passing of the time. What did I gain? Maybe some things for the short-term, but in the long run I have netted myself nothing. I will not look back on this day and say "this was a good day". Of course, I realize not everyday can be momenteous (or momenteous would lose meaning), but shouldn't most days be worth something?
|
|
| We The Living |
[14 Nov 2009|01:31pm] |
"It's very beautiful, this music, Kira," he whispered, "why do you look like that?"
"It's something I liked ... long ago ... when I was a child.... Andrei, did you ever feel as if something had been promised to you in your childhood, and you look at yourself and you think 'I didn't know, then, that this is what would happen to me' - and it's strange, and funny, and a little sad?"
- We The Living, Ayn Rand
|
|
| Choices |
[11 Nov 2009|05:13pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 disappointed |
] |
Off today. Woke up first at 5, then went back to bed and slept till 1:30. Spent most of the day applying for jobs. Then I started reading We The Living and now I'm annoyed.
It was talking about how the characters were going to go to school, like it was just some simple choice, and the unspoken reason they were going was to learn the skills they would need to be able to get 'good' jobs.
I realized that education has come to mean nothing. College education is the 'expected' course, not the enlightened one. So many kids in college are only there because their parents want them to be or because the alternative is a job at McDonald's since almost every job, including many entry-level positions, require a Bachelor's Degree. They see college as only a 'get out of jail free' card, they have no wish to better themselves. No drive to succeed. I know from looking at so many jobs that a Bachelor's Degree no longer gives one a ticket to a "high paying" job - many jobs I've looked at and couldn't apply for because they require an BA are $12/hr jobs, not $20 or $40. If most people are having to take out student loans just to attend college, then get out and the jobs they can get are $12/hr, we are going to be facing a serious financial issue nationally in not too long. People think credit card debit is bad now...
And, worse in my opinion, is the stark reality that college is just a pre-requisite now. College is required for entry-level jobs. It has become so worthless that the only use it has as a guideline for prospective hirers is as a gauge on whether you understand the rules of the game. The only real measure of worth they have is job experience. Yet no one is willing to give anyone a chance because everyone feels that they are entitled to a "better" job, so they are not applying as a request, but a demand, and everyone lies on their resume, so you cannot trust anything they say. When employers (McDonald's for example) refuse to give any information except years of service, the next company cannot possibly know if you were any good or not. They only know how long the previous company chose to keep you, or how long you chose to stay. The more years, the better you must have been. Education means nothing. Nothing means anything.
College education is now the SAT of the working world. There are so many problems, so many cheats, so many cheaters, that it means nothing, except if you didn't pass it. Passing itself means nothing.
I mean, of course it was mostly inevitable. In a world where we do not value personal success, but rather superiority over others (social status, etc.), the prestige of a thing in people's minds will be it's value, not what the thing itself stands for. It is having titles and not the work that one had to do to receive them that will captivate people. This system does not so much make us all equal as it makes it impossible to tell who is best by destroying all manners of testing them.
It makes me angry to realize that I may be working the next four years only for the privilege of being allowed to work another four years to get where I want to be. I, naively, thought that succeeding in college would somehow be the test which, combined with my willingness to work and my intelligence, would be the ticket to a 'good' job. I think I knew better, but never had the heart to really look at what I was doomed to. I wish now that I had been stable enough years ago to start this damn fight. Almost everyone I know will be graduated before me. I'm struggling just to find a job that pays me enough to live and still lets me take classes.
Really this is all just too much.
|
|
| GAH, I say. |
[06 Nov 2009|10:41am] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 frustrated |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Hellogoodbye - Baby, It's Fact |
] |
God, I should not be trying to do anything while I'm sick. I drove half way to Panera to drop off a resume before I realized I forgot to print one out, went to the library then remembered I forgot to send myself an e-mail so I could print anything. Egads, I'm doomed. It's already 11 o'clock and I haven't eaten or gotten much or anything done and I have to be in Cary at 3pm for some stupid meeting thing.
GAH.
Edit: HA. And I finally got everything put together and ready to go and then everywhere I apply, they tell me they only accept applications online. MOAR GAH.
|
|
| Up too early... |
[06 Nov 2009|07:19am] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 kinda sad |
] |
Just woke up from what was not really a 'bad' dream in the traditional sense of a scary or gory dream, but it was a 'bad' dream in that it was negative and sad. When I wake up from a scary dream, sometimes it takes a couple of seconds to shake the feelings of terror, but it always dissipates once I realize it was a dream and my life isn't that scary, but when I have sad dreams I find it's much harder to shake the depressing feeling I wake up with. I think it's because there are sad things in my life and when I have these dreams it's a reflection of my mind dwelling on real-life sadness and frustrations.
Either way, I can't seem to get back to sleep. I've been getting up at 4:40 in the morning consistently for enough days now that I wake up at that time automatically and then every hour or so afterward if I try to lay back down. C'est la vie.
I feel much better now than I did a few days ago, but I'm still sick-ish and not enjoying it. Mostly I feel tired and achy and my nose is stuffy, but it's at least livable. What surprised and then gulled me yesterday (when my boss's boss was there for "com day") was that my boss actually told her boss "Catherine's still sick, but she's looks sooooo much better than she did a few days ago. She looked just awful. She was really sick." and then Sherry (boss's boss) said "She still looks pretty bad," So they both obviously knew I was very sick, BUT there was not a word of "I wish I could have sent her home" or "you need a day off to rest" or anything like that. So they care that I'm sick and feel bad about it, but not enough to actually do anything? It's like they just take for granted that we have to work through being sick.
And the other thing that got me was that Virginia flipped when this new kid started doing the lobby with one towel (you're supposed to use one for the tables and one for the seats so there's no cross-contamination from peoples bottoms or shoes with where the food is placed), but she doesn't care that half the staff is sick enough to be sneezing and coughing all over the place. It's not just her either - all the McDonald's I've worked at are like that (plus I know plenty of people who work at other fast food joints and they're all the same). It boggles my mind.
|
|
| Self-Analysis with Bronchitis |
[31 Oct 2009|05:44pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 sick |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Enrique Iglasias - Tired of Being Sorry |
] |
Managed to finish three of my five essays even though I feel like somebody ran me over with a semi. When I woke up this morning, I could tell immediately that I was going to have a bad day. Last year about this time, I went through the same thing, spending weeks at a time sick and barely able to function. This kind of sucks...
I really wonder if I'm making a big deal out of nothing, but then I remember that when I go to the doctor, they freak and give me the strongest meds available, and I think that counts as a fairly objective opinion. I wanted to go today, actually, but since I'm not super sick yet, they wouldn't give me anything (unless they knew my medical history, but they wouldn't), plus this isn't like Cali where there are walk-in clinics every third block.
Someday I hope to be healthy enough to just get sick for a couple of days and be over it.
Writing these papers, I started thinking about where I would place myself in the spectrum of neurotic-ness. I definitely fall under Horney's "moving away from people" category, but I think I actually turned out fairly healthy - I am the picture of Adler's "striving for personal success" instead of superiority over others.
Jaz's friend/boyfriend James is here with us this weekend (and daaaamn, he's tall - got a foot on Jazmin even, and when he hugged me and picked me up, my feet were, like, two feet off the floor! I feel like a little kid around the two of them) and he was abused as a kid too (different, but along the same vein like all abuse is). He's really laid back and we were swapping stories about random stuff last night and you could tell from the way he talks that he has a strong sense of right and wrong and feels the same urge to do the right thing. I wonder what it is that brings that out in people like us. Is it that how we escaped insanity? By telling ourselves that what was being done to us was wrong and saying we would never do that? It kind of seems to me like Freud's reaction formation - that we took the anger that we felt and the only-human wish to hurt like we'd been hurt and, knowing it was wrong, suppressed, turning it into the exact opposite - telling ourselves we would never, ever be like that. Is that really neurotic or just a reasonable coping mechanism? And even more I wonder why that happens in some of us and others turn into killers and psychopaths.
What is it that makes a person moral instead of accepting what is done to you? I feel like it has to do with whether you are introduced to an alternative. My dad, for all his faults, never hurt me and always showed me that we had to be responsible and right and loved me (even if I realize now that it was more extended love-of-self than genuine love). Even while Lynda was arbitrarily inflicting pain and punishment, my father would lecture me for lying and spank my sister for misbehaving. I think that it gave me a system of morality to cling to and view my world through.
And so I wonder what would've happened if my mother had instead been someone who loved me or was just neglectful instead of abusive... Would I still have such a deep love of 'doing the right thing'? Would I still have such a strong mothering urge (which now looks like another reaction formation to the anger at not being provided motherly love)?
It's silliness to wonder what might have been because you can never know and it leads to madness, but I wonder anyway because I want to know that my children will someday be good people, made in my image.
I guess I can only hope that Adler and Horney are correct and that "genuine love and healthy discipline" can in fact instill the same social interest in a person that my experiences did for me.
|
|
| I HAVE SYRUP ON MY CROTCH! At least you'll smell nice, bitch! |
[29 Oct 2009|06:49pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 angry |
] |
Today sucked. I was alone in the store from 6am to 3pm, which is frickin ridiculous in the first place because we are BUSY on Thursdays, especially in the morning, and you need two managers just get your butt off the floor long enough to do skims. To start, I kept waking up over and over last night, so I barely slept, and ended up saying "screw it" and just getting ready for work early since I couldn't sleep, and then first thing I walked into the store and the shake machine is down, Lupe is trying to fix it. He finishes in about two hours and during the middle of breakfast rush, explains to me that he can't make it work, so we have to call a tech. So I have no shakes or ice cream, plus I have to somehow make time to track down the number for some guy named Andy and call for service.
Then the coffee machine stops working, so we have only one coffee machine and this happens during the middle of breakfast rush when 12 out of 10 orders have coffee and you go through a pot and a half while the machine fills one, which means we're parking cars left and right and people are pissed and it's busy and a mess, then this lady comes in, furious because ZOMG!!11!! we gave her a packet of syrup that was cut (???) and she got it all over herself and her car. OMG, her 40 thousand dollar car and yell yell yell, she's pissed and I try to call her down, offer to do stuff - we can give you a towel for the moment to help soak that out - OH NO, NO WE CAN'T because her car is so super fucking special that it has a "coating" on the seats and we'll ruin her seats if we try to clean it. Why the hell would you pay to make your car uncleanable?! What is the point of that?! And she yells "AND I HAVE SYRUP ON MY CROTCH!" and I have no idea how to deal with that comment, and she has to go to a doctor's appointment, she doesn't have time to wait for me to fix it, but she certainly has time enough to yell at me, and so I do what I can and take her name and number and let her go with a refund, and then Virginia calls me and wants to know what's going on with the shake mach, so I'm explaining and telling her about the lady and how we should probably tell her we'll pay for the cleaning and the phone rings and it's angry lady again, except she's even more angry now because her husband is angry too (omg, we've ruined their brand new car) and he wants our corporate number or she's going to call a lawyer (for what? she's going to sue us for giving her food? why do you eat messy food in a brand new car?), so I tell her hang on, talk to Virginia, talk to angry lady again, offer that she can bring us the bill for cleaning and we'll pay for it, but OH NO, NO, she's not going to "shell out" any money for us! Ho ho, NO, weour fault, and something is always wrong with our store and we always get her order wrong and bitch bitchbitch, and what am I going to do about it? I tell her hang on, I don't know what number she should call that won't get her directed back at us to deal with , so I call Sherry and she doesn't want to deal with this lady either and tries to pawn it off on Virginia, but quite frankly, if she talks to Virginia, there will be a minor nuclear explosion because Virginia has the tact of a six year old with Asperger's on several liters of Mountain Dew, so I lie and tell Sherry that I couldn't get ahold of Virginia and this lady wants this dealt with NAOW, so she gives and I hang up, knowing full well this will come back on me.
Then I see Abraham and he's coming to tell me that my boss's boss's boss is here... and she went through the drive-thru... and they think she's coming inside. Oh fuck, because she wasn't supposed to be here till tomorrow, and I'm not even on the floor which is a huge no-no. So I run up front right as she's coming behind the counter and I must've been making "rabbit in a bear trap" eyes because she's like "what's wrong?" so I have to tell her and she doesn't even know what to do, but at least informs me that her DT visit went well. Then she just stands there like I'm supposed to say something, but I forgot my lines and apparently nobody is in the wings, so I say "did you need anything else?" and she's like "... no..." and stands there for awhile again and then leaves, and I'm like ??? okay..
And then it gets smoother, but I have send people home because labor is high and so is drama because somebody was supposed to babysit somebody else's kids, but didn't tell me and agreed to stay late and now somebody2 is pissed at somebody1 plus me because her husband is pissed because he had to deal with his own children, dramadramadrama. And somewhere in here Sherry calls me back and tells me angry lady bitched at her for 15 minutes about our service and we're going to pay for detailing her precious car and her dry cleaning... wait, come again? Dry cleaning? Lady was wearing sweat pants... sweat pants... and we're going to pay for her to dry clean them? Seriously? And I get to listen to my boss's boss tell me how we need to do a better job of service and I think to myself, if you would make me the store manager, our service would be so frickin stellar we would be slammed all day and night and have to shove people out to close the doors at night, but instead of keep Virgina around whose idea of a constructive criticism is "how many do I have to tell you to SUGGEST OF SELL [sic]?!" and whose thinks it's okay to tell a customer "it's not my fault, I don't have any good employees."
And then it gets slooooow, so I send more people home and then try to work on getting somebody to repair my machs because if we don't have them for the weekend, there will be hell to pay, and while I'm doing this, one of my employees who has been here long enough to know better screws up the DT royally and I come up front just as the other manager, who is early for once in his life walks in and sees me looking like an idiot, and all my customers are pissed again (god, how I miss my nights now - do I really have to re-education an entire new day period of customers about how to be human beings?), but eventually it's detangled.
And then I move on to doing cash and realize I'm missing $150, which just gives me heart problems because I know it's here somewhere, but I can't find it and I'm counting and counting and recounting and then I realize that the bulge in my pocket is not my phone, it's $270, but that's not right.... now I have $120 extra, which is just as bad and I'm recounting and recounting and double checking and discover that the manager before me wrote the wrong daycode on her drawer, so the $120 is from that, but I have no way of correcting it, so I have to try and explain this to the other manager, and then while he's counting my stuff and I'm watching his floor it gets SLAMMED and every order is $20+ and the cars are wrapped around the building and I'm doing buns, and pulling chicken, and I'm running out orders and I see the clock and it's 6pm, which means that I have officially been in the store for over 12 hours. And the other manager asks me what labor is and I tell him 22, but it doesn't matter because we're at 24 for the month, so we're screwed anyway and Virginia knows it and he looks at me and says, yeah, but she'll probably make us work 6 days next month. I look at him, realize he's not trying to be funny, and feel like screaming.
So then I drove myself home and made a stiff drink, so apologies if this reads funny, but I'm so fucking over this job. If they make me work 6 days a week next month, I don't care if I have another job or not, I will quit right then and there. No job is worth this kind of shit. Fuck it, all of it. McDonald's isn't important enough of a business to be worth this. We're not curing cancer - hell, we're probably causing cancer - and even if we were, I still wouldn't put up with this. I am so fucking much better than this job. Customers tell me all the time how amazing I am, I'm every employee's favorite manager, even my boss won't yell at me because she knows I'm the only one she can count on.
Fuck loyalty, fuck personal codes of honor, fuck wanting to do a good job and feeling obligated. This is all bullshit and I am so done.
|
|
| “A man falls in love through his eyes, a woman through her ears.” - Woodrow Wyatt |
[28 Oct 2009|09:24pm] |
| [ |
mood |
| |
 happy |
] |
| [ |
music |
| |
Silversun Pickups - Catch & Release |
] |
So I originally wrote a whole long entry about how much I disagreed with the packet I had to read for my psych class, but I didn't finish writing it and I went to the class and what I really wanted to talk about changed drastically. First off, Professor Johnston is amazing and very insightful and honest and if I ever get a chance to take another class under him, I would do it in a heartbeat. He has this amazing ability to cover things he himself may or may not agree with without belittling or arguing with it, but reminding us that everything is a product of its time (especially the authors) and taking what is useful, intelligent and relevant and encouraging us to think about it.
Secondly, I think the main issue with feminist psychology is that it, as responses to social issues have a tendency to do, has swung too far into backlash. However, it does have many important, intelligent points to offer. For example, it is, from my experience, very true that women are focused more (but not solely) on building relationships and developing people, while men are more focused (but not solely) on individual achievement and success or failure of the individual. I see this in training all the time - male managers will tell you what to do, then see if you succeed or not, then correct; female managers will tell you what to do, why it's important and walk you through it to be sure you do succeed. In my experience, the problem with the first method is that many people who might succeed with help will fail because of lack of support. The problem with the second is it takes a lot more time, and some people who won't do a good job in the long run are babied along into succeeding in the short-term, wasting time and resources that could be used to greater advantage on others.
My prof mentioned also that just before he got divorced for the first time, his wife said "the problem with our relationship is that it isn't going anywhere" to which he replied "well, where did you want it to go?" She, of course, was upset and he still didn't understand, so he went to a friend and asked what he thought it meant. His friend told him "men marry women for who they are, women marry men for who they could be." I find this to be a fairly accurate way of describing how men and women view relationships - men love women who are (right now) sexy, funny, intelligent, etc. while women look for those things too, but put even greater value on things like earning potential, fathering potential, likeliness of fidelity, etc. It makes sense when you think about it in terms of what each gender is looking for biologically from the relationship. A man wants to find the woman who can best produce and rear babies that survive and prosper, producing babies almost any woman can do, and the traits that are necessary for raising 'good' babies are going to be there right from the start - intelligence, maternal instinct, etc. while a woman wants to find a man who can produce babies (almost any man can) and provide for her and the babies - traits that may develop over time. A husband doesn't have to be funny or sexy to provide for you, but he does have to stick around!
Also, one of the girls got upset when we started talking about gender-typing and said we should do everything we can as a society to get rid of it because women shouldn't have to feel guilty for not wanting to have kids. I agree personally that only people who want children should have children, but I also agree with the other girl who said we don't want an army of androgynous kids marching around either - it's not a feasible goal anyway since some of those things are nature - there is some usefulness to having gender.
One of the other interesting things I noticed about the whole thing was who chose to participate in the discussion and who remained silent. My class has 17 people in it, including the professor, 7 of whom are male. The entire evening's conversation was, as you would probably expect, dominated by women, but the men who did speak up were the older, married men and the one rather effeminate man (I don't know, but I don't think he's gay, just effeminate). The younger, stereotypical males said not a word and seemed either confused or embarrassed by the entire discussion.
It makes me wonder just how oblivious inexperienced, uninitiated men are about what women want from relationships and, more importantly, why they want those things...
|
|
| How well do we really know each other? |
[28 Oct 2009|05:19pm] |
'Borrowed' from ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) shadr0 who ninja'ed it from somebody else...
The problem with the journals: We all think we are so close, but really we know nothing about one another. So I want you to ask me something you think you should know about me. Something that should be obvious, but you have no idea about. Ask away.
Then post this in your journal and find out what people don't know about you.
|
|
| navigation |
| [ |
viewing |
| |
most recent entries |
] |
| [ |
go |
| |
earlier |
] |
|
|
|
|
