13 posts tagged “unemployed”

Once upon a time when I had a job I hated Mondays as Monday meant the start of the grind again. Now that I am one of the GREAT UNEMPLOYED I actually look forward to Monday. I get the house back to myself and I get some quiet time to set my own schedule - which often means do little but potter!!! Guilty pleasures.

I was a stay at home Mum for over a decade but that time was dedicated to my children, and there was no time to sit and think. No time to sit, full stop! Now they are grown, and though some still living at home, when they leave for the day, my life is my own.

I  could get used to this really fast. If we didn't need money....I would stay home forever. But we choose to want things, things such as travelling to see the world. And retirement money. We intend living long lives so need a little money to maintain us in the style we choose.

Two more weeks and I take up the student life so I guess Mondays will change again soon. For now I am enjoying the luxury.

test driving our new car

I am exhausted.

We spent the day shopping for a new car. I have been living this day in man zone. What is it about the sight of a new car that brings out that glint in a man's eye only seen previously when he is seeking to discard his virginity?

Currently we have a large 6 cylinder "family" sedan, which I drive 95% of the time, and then only shopping, or once upon a time when I worked. We want/need to downsize. Well, we had talked about it for some time and thought we would take the car on our 7,000 klm trek to South Australia/Victoria, which we did in September. It was fun. Now, however, we don't need a large car, need to reduce costs, and of course would like to cut back on our carbon footprint etc. I also wanted a smaller car to park in those ever decreasing shopping mall car park spaces.

So off we went. I thought we were "just browsing, thanks" but apparently we actually had an appointment with a dealer rep for 10am. Mr FD told me at 9.20, and we live a good half hour from the car dealership. I was ready in 7 minutes. AND LOOKING GOOD, thank you very much! He was not ready. It was a chanc for me to remind him what a perfect wife I am. Then he got us lost on the way over, so we arrived about 25 minutes late....we left the dealership at 3pm. We drove several differents cars, even the ones that I said "in your dreams, buddy!" We negotiated, we pretended we were tough, we caved. I hit Mr FD several times, as he kept wanting to upscale and I had to keep reminding him that it was actually MY car as he has a large company car. No, I didn't need the sports pack. Or blue tooth - I don't believe in talking on the phone while driving - driving is driving, it kills. Yes, we used to have a sun/moon roof that only our son ever opened when he borrowed our car - a bald Mr FD does not need a SUN roof. I can turn my own lights on thank you...I can even turn my own wipers on. I have had all that with our present car and I am over it. A car is a money loser. The minute you drive it out of the car yard it starts to devalue. It is a tool not a status symbol to me. Like all men Mr FD thinks that the size of your car equals the size of your penis....we settled for a mid sized car. No comment. 

I will be sad to hand over the old car. We have had it just 3 years and it is a lovely car. Great to drive. Times have changed and our life has changed, so time to move on. Funny how a car starts to feel like a member of the family though. It isn't - it is tin and plastic and metal and cloth and oil. But it is still like leaving behind a trusted friend.

New car smell though! About next Friday.

I went to THE UNIVERSITY yesterday to hand in forms for obtaining a blue card (checking that I don't have a police record so that I can work with children) and my preferences for what regions I would prefer for prac work. I also got a couple of my text books. I can't get my id card until Feb 16th - time to shed 5 kgs at least!

Unavoidably I met many people from my previous existence in the Basement of Discontent and despite my trying to keep a low profile - I know impossible for a Flamingo Dancer- I had to do an almost presidential meet and greet. Human curiosity, aint it grand? What are you doing? Student. How are they going to manage without you? Don't care. How am I going to manage without you? Sorry, but where were you when we needed supported to stop all this? How are we going to obtain..... Talk to the hand.

They were universal in saying how great I looked - and how tres beautiful my hair is. They all mentioned that I looked younger and more relaxed! I question their eyesight on that one. I have noticed that I have perked a little. And yesterday, and this will sound strange, but I have always been the type of person who will tear up over a dog food commercial and I am not all that keen on dogs! Yesterday ,I teared up during Obama Day listening to some of the African American people tell how much having a black president meant to them. I also teared up over a commercial. It was then that I realised that I hadn't done that for some months. Actually many months.

Silly isn't it? Somehow, I lost touch with some simple emotions. I guess stress, anger and uncertainty will do that to you. So in what will be my 51st year I am learning to be me again. Yes, it is frightening times, and we are close to personal  financial meltdown, but by picking myself up and shaking myself off and starting AGAIN, somehow I have opened parts of me that had shut down.

You can't help what happens to you, but you can try and make it happen the best you can...I will not let the bastards get me down.

p.s. OF COURSE MY MOOD WAS ENHANCED TO HEAR THAT THE OUTSOURCING HAS BEEN A COMPLETE DISASTER AND EVERYONE IS TEARING THEIR HAIR OUT. revenge, in whatever form it arrives, is sweet.

Mr FD leaves to hit the business road again

 Feelings of guilt made me rise from my bed and cook a hot breakfast for MR FD as he is going away on a trip for the rest of the week. He rushed around finding and forgetting things and then we had the excitement of discovering that yet again our ensuite shower is leaking and water has been dripping down into the rumpus room below...will need to contact building contractors to come and fix AGAIN. So MR FD had the fun of decimating the downstairs bathroom instead.

After MR FD left (kiss kiss hug hug on the driveway to entertain the neighbours) I stood in the kitchen and once again decided that all the bloody birds were soon going to drive me mad with their tweeting, chirping, cooing and screeching, so I went for a walk. It was just after 9 by this time, on the cusp of the time for any civilised lady to be out in the heat, but it was either that, or to start collecting stones and hurling them at the bloody birds, whom strangely I really enjoyed the first couple of days this week...

We live in a very quiet suburb, but today, I guess because everyone had already left for their JOBS, it was even quieter than normal. I saw one young Mum with her toddler and pram baby sitting in the playground two streets away. No doubt she was enbarking on the exhaust them early in the morning so that they will have an early nap trick. Good luck to her - never worked for me.  I also noted that sun shades have been erected over the basketball court and the play equipment at the park. Good work!

I was treated with great suspicion by a strange burmese mix cat in one street. Once it decided I was not to its liking it scurried off home. It had the strangest tail, all stripes like a tiger, or a lizard tail. I didn't want to make friends with it either so was not insulted. I suspect it was not a well liked cat.

A mother having an early morning meltdown echoed from one house. Ah the joy of school holidays, I am sure that anyone passing our home in years past would have heard much the same...to think of it, they probably still hear the same now. Mr FD and I have a way of speaking to each other from different rooms, and oft have to repeat our point because someone is not listening.

Daughter 2 called to say that she had picked up the 2 cds on sale at Borders that I wanted, but when she got home she discovered that she had been charged $5 too much for one CD. Bad Borders as now she has to go back and ask for a refund and she charges clients hundreds of dollars an hour for her time, and I hope she doesn't charge me... I hate it when stores make a big splash about their sale items and then don't have the right info in their computers and their staff don't know what items are on sale. Never happened when I managed bookshops....(and look where that got me in my career!!!!)

Have checked my email - no one loves me. Have been deemed to have met the minimum requirements by one University that I have applied for, but my first preference is still processing me. Offers go out on Jan 15th....time passes slowly. Still no jobs appearing - wake up world!

Daughter 1 rose from her bed at 10am - ah the joy of teacher's on holidays- and we debated the conflict in the middle east for a few minutes. Sad situation all around. The things we do to each other...Huxley said that "Maybe this world is another planet's hell". I think it is often our own hell. Couldn't we just blow a whistle, stick the cornflakes box between each group and say, "You there, and You there, and if I hear a peep out of either of you, you will both be sorry. Don't make me come back here!" ?

Full life isn't it? Remember that old airline jingle where they sang "come fly with me"? It is rattling in my head but my mind has altered it to sing "Come suffer with me". See it as your civic duty, I am your charity case!

James Taylor made my heart wake up today. I watched one of his concerts, recorded in 2007 on the Ovation Channel at lunch time today and it made me realise how music, how words and sounds can make your heart wake up and make all the grey clouds go away. No matter the mood, it enhances your emotions and sharpens your feelings. Not that I didn't know this already, but in the hurly burly of our daily life we often forget these things, or lose touch with their power.

We went to the James Taylor concert when he was in Brisbane a couple of year ago and so enjoyed it. Mr FD was less of a fan than I was - he is more a child of the 60s music where as I am more of the early and mid 70s, but he was won over by James Taylor's live performance and wonderful sense of humor.

It was a real joy to stop and watch this concert today, it brought a shine to my day. Mr FD dropped in on his way between meetings and was able to watch a little with me, so we shared a joyful moment.

When the FD flock were young and I was FD at home, Mr FD would come home for lunch everyday that he could, or if he couldn't he would phone me from the office at some time. Just to see how the day was going. Then the flock grew older and I became FD at work myself, so that all came to an end. It is amazing how fast we have fallen back into that since I have be unemployed. Mr FD has taken to trying to schedule out of the office activities so he can squeeze in lunch at home with me, or if he can't, he usually phones early afternoon to check if I am still breathing and not contemplating hanging myself upside down, by the toes, from the clothes line (if you spin the Hills Hoist really fast, you can get a really good head spin, but you have to be careful that your body doesn't spin out too far and you hit your face into a tree trunk or prickly shrub in any gardens near the clothes line. Hey, it passes the time when you are unemployed ). He also phones when he is in the car on his way home from work. This one often irrates me. Like I know he is coming home sometime - does he expect me to wait by the door with a martini in hand? If I did, the drink wouldn't be for HIM! In my book, just come home - he works 20 minutes away, and it is not like I have to lay in a wilderbeast or anything. The marching band does not wait for him.

So thanks James Taylor,it was nice sharing lunch with you and MR FD....not saying which one of the two men was my favourite today,,,,you can guess

... the back 40 inches of yard that is! I planted my punnet of bok choy out into a larger container. The pot was suppose to contain 6 seedlings, but with a bit of division I got 8 - bonus! Now I just have to hope nothing eats it before I do! Nasty pests like grasshoppers. Crush, kill, destroy - maybe I can find an outlet for my killer instincts hunting the pests down.

I need some MR FD help to clear out the dead, dead, deadist kaffir lime tree as I have decided to plant the rosella plants there. I have mulched some of the area with sugar cane mulch and also need MR FD to help me retrieve some nice composted dirt from our compost bins. Times like this I get angry about my back injury, but I have more time to work on that now too.

I think planting my"crops" is a positive way to start the New Year. I think I am just starting to unwind from the past and all the unemployment mayhem, and while I am still marking time waiting for everyone to get back to their offices and satrt helping me craft my new life, I am becoming calmer. I am also starting to form plans for some much needed tasks around the house - cleaning out the pantry, my closets, and Mr FD's study (he has to participate in that one, I am not the type of wife who takes over his space).

Being unemployed means that I may actually have to do these things, instead of just thinking or TALKING about them...walk the walk and not just talk the talk. I would rather just do the talking, but sometimes one has to step up to the line.

I just wont draw the line in too clearly yet...I need some more down time. One can never have enough down time!

The phone, the phone!

It has not stopped ringing this morning and it is fast driving me mad. I have a low madness threshold. Now that family and friends now I am home they keep phoning me. I hate answering the phone. As noted previously, I find being nice so exhausting. I guess nice comes naturally for some, but not for others, and I must be one of the other.

We have also been having internet issues, something to do with routers, or rotors, or small furry animals I don’t know, but it is frustrating me all the way to my whatoozie. Son is on the case, but Son works on SONTIME and that timeline could be any time between now and Easter. Or when I threaten to sit on his bed and talk to him nonstop until he fixes the issue for me. That is probably going to be within the next ten minutes when he may become the outlet for all my frustrations near and far. A perk of motherhood- victims always at hand, even if long distance.

I think I am suffering from people overload. Christmas is all about people and as much as I love them all, after a couple days I need a very quiet day where I don’t have to do what they want and I don’t have to talk unless I choose. I guess it is a recharge day. I need them frequently. Well, maybe one day a week, or at least one evening a week.

I need to get my head straightened out and start this job search in a more professional manner, and less chaos theory manner.

Lord – the phone. Mr FD’s friend is coming over New Year’s Day... more people.  This one used to think I was sexy back in the day. If I ever wore my jeans tucked into long leather boots he would always comment on how great I was looking!  I have told you previously that I had, and still have, the perfect butt, the rest might now be saggy baggy elephant but the butt still has it. I don’t have the boots anymore....he will have to live on his memories. Heaven knows I do!

P.S. Son fixed the internet issue! Most of the time he speaks in gruntese or mummblese, but I just said to him that "I am really going to annoy you over the next few weeks aren't I? and he answered in the clearest and loudest "yes" I have ever heard him utter. I replied that, all those years when he wished I was a stay at home Mum, now he will know how lucky he was!  He loves me deeply....

P.P.S. Another 2 phone calls -I never got this many calls when I had a phone and a desk and an office. I can't take all the attention!

Taking the reins   http://www.flamingodancerblog.com/

In the beginning -  http://www.flamingodancerblog.com/

The company taking over our organisation phoned and declined my expert services. Basically, they said I was over qualified for the job...my own job that I have been doing for over 3 years!

I suspect that the truth is that they only want to pay peanuts, and even though I was willing to sell myself cheaper, they are going to go for the monkeys...

{old saying : pay peanuts, get monkeys]