It’s Been a While

It seems like forever since I’ve posted. Life has been very busy, and, as always, things have been changing very quickly. For instance, not to long ago my sister-in-law and her fiance weren’t sure if they were going to graduate from college, but that has since changed to at least my sister-in-law graduating, most likely. We don’t know about her fiance yet. He has been accepted at a college in Boston, so, as long as he graduates, they will be moving out there. We will miss them, but we also are supposed to get there apartment, if all things work out as planned. We’ll see what happens, this is a big life change for them, and would require my sister-in-law to move away from family and friends, which is something that she is struggling with, understandably.

The front in Montana has been changing quite a bit as well (my family is currently located there). My sister, who is 16 – almost 17, has a new boyfriend, has been going through a lot of challenges with family and friends, and now my family might be moving back to NY (although at one point it was just going to be my Mom and possibly the two youngest children). They have been having her work in their newly opened butcher shop (which, according the they Child Labor Laws of Montana is illegal), and she has been struggling with it because of her cutting history/long hours. So we really have no idea what’s going to happen there.

As far as my job goes, everyone seems to like me, and I’m learning fast. The job itself is really nice, but this past week has been somewhat stressful. I took my first hotline call, and the person was in a near panic attack when she was talking to me; and then I had some other people call the office that were either having panic attacks or were frantic. My job also requires me to read a lot of articles regarding sexual assault/rape/domestic violence, which, when it accumulates, can be difficult to deal with. It has even been affecting my sleep, which in turn is not helping me deal with the things that I am exposed to day in and day out. Any suggestions on how to deal with this job stress?

Spring = Rain :(

This is the one unfortunate thing about spring – rain. Although, it doesn’t make me feel so bad about being cooped up inside all the time. I’ll be even less happy when everything is warmed up enough that everything gets coated in mud. Oh well.

Well, I have some good and bad news on the apartment search front. My sister-in-law and her family are going to be moving in the late summer, not sure exactly where yet, but most likely Boston; and, the good news is… they’ve promised us that we can take over their apartment when they leave. Bad news is that we won’t be able to move until the summers over, which means getting harassed for about another five months or so. Yuck! The bad news is also that my sister-in-law and her family will be moving so far away. And with gas prices the way they are, it will be difficult to see them ever.

Job’s going really well. I just finished taking the Rape Crisis Counselor class this last weekend, so now I’ll actually be able to have a weekend on a regular basis (hopefully). Oh, yesterday was the first day here for one of the guys that I used to work with at McDonald’s. It’s kind of funny how it happened. Apparently, right after I quite McDonald’s and they were making a big to-do about it, this guy got the job (the day after, to be more precise), and gave his notice. As you can imagine they weren’t to happy. Oh well. We’re both improving our lives and helping our community, which is what really matters.

Tomorrow is my husband’s, dare I say, 25th birthday! I’m so happy for him…and for the dinner we are going to be having. We’re having lobster tail, steak, and bacon wrapped asparagus (you should try it it is really good) for dinner; and chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting, and peanut butter cup ice cream for desert. Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? I can’t wait!

It’s Almost Spring!

I can’t believe it! Someone in the office reminded me that tomorrow is the first day of spring – and I couldn’t believe my ears. I wasn’t expecting it, it really snuck up on me this year. And to think – Easter is this Sunday and I am so not ready. Oh well, Easter isn’t here yet.

So, this new job. I’m taking a class called the Rape Crisis Class. It will certify me to help people in very difficult situation, etc. It’s really been very helpful. The job is going wonderfully. I couldn’t have hoped for a better place to work. Although, my poor husband is jealous of me because I have contact with adults, a good job, and events and such to go to. It’s not that he doesn’t want me to have those things too, he’s just been trying so hard to get those things, and it just hasn’t happened yet. That may be because something better is out there for him, in my opinion anyway. It could be that his painting will take off, and he’ll live his real dream. We’ll see what happens.

This job has been very good for me. Even though I am still adjusting to working during the day, I am not depressed (or at least not as much), but I am still definitely tired most of the time. Yeah coffee!!!

More later…

In the Past Month…

… we have gone from no interviews, or possibilities thereof, to my having three interviews lined up within a matter of days, and another possibility; and Matthew finding job opportunities that he can apply to, as well as advancing his work on selling paintings. During the beginning of the month, I signed up with Manpower (a local temporary placement service) to hopefully find work. They also do permanent placement, just in case you are wondering. Well, to start that off, they had me take two assessments. One to measure my data entry skills and another to measure my Microsoft Word skills. I placed as a “master” in both. They were very happy about this, and immediately hired me to be either a temp or permanent employee; although they did not have any jobs to place me in at that moment. They apparently forgot to have me to the Microsoft Excel assessment, and so brought me back to take that assessment after I had an interview set-up with them because the job required the use of spreadsheets. Well, I took it and received a “master” grade in that as well. While this was happening, I got a call from the local JcPenney and Opportunities for Otsego, for interviews; and also came across an ad in the local paper from the company I used to work for before I had my son. They were advertising for an Executive Administrative Assistant, which is exactly what I went to college for. They said that they would consider me, and when I called to confirm that they had received it (I sent it via email), she said that she had forwarded it on to the “powers that be”, and would let me know if she heard anything. So we’ll see what happens there.

I think it would be really cool to work at my old workplace, since I already know the people and the business is thriving and they are local. It would also be really nice to work for Opportunities for Otsego as well, because they help local people and helping people is important to me.

I’ve also been working more on self improvement lately. I’ve been reading books on language self-defense (specifically for work situations), communication, finding joy in everyday life again, decision making, and reading body language. I’ve started the self-defense one, but haven’t gotten very far yet. I’ve also started relearning the piano.

Financially right now, I need to get one of those jobs. We were forced to take food stamps so that we could feed ourselves, and even that isn’t doing much for us right now. We only get $115 dollars a month to feed my husband, myself, and our son. Our son also gets WIC for things like formula, baby cereal, and juice. So at least he does get some nutrition. We’ve decided that we have to cut meat out of our diet for the time being and eat beans instead (cheaper sources of protein). On Sundays we normally go to my parents-in-law for a family get together, and normally have meat then, so we will get it once a week. I’m hoping that if I nail one of these jobs here soon, we will be able to eat more nutritiously again.

Stress and a Good Book

Strange title, I know. But it makes complete sense to me. Lately Matthew and I have been going through a lot of stress lately. You know how it is, dealing with family (mine is currently moving out to Montana), finances, work, and everything else. I just got interviewed for this job the other day, and the interviewer told me how much I would make, what the uniform is, what shift I would be working (or a general idea thereof), asked if I would be willing to do another part-time job, and told me that she was just going to check my references and give me a call on Tuesday (the interview was on Friday). Well, Tuesday came, and she didn’t call and didn’t call. So I called her right before I had to go to work and she said that she hadn’t been in the office most of the day and would call me on Thursday. Thursday came and went. Nothing. So I called her Friday afternoon, and she said that she was busy at the time, but would call me back in 10 to 15 minutes. Well, over an hour and a half went by and she never called. So I called her back around 3 p.m., and the receptionist said that she was in, but for some reason I just got her voicemail and have not heard from her since. Now, she doesn’t know this, but I really needed that job, both for financial, emotional, and mental reasons. See, the job that I currently have, well, the best way to say this is the nicknames of the people I work with most often are as follows: Crazy, Creepy, Perv., and Stinky. Sad isn’t it?! My husband says that I have a case for workers comp. and a sexual harassment case. Only thing is, I can’t really prove any of it. I’m just hoping to get out of there as soon as possible, but employers are not exactly helping. Why is my work so awful? It, in short, is mostly because I am a woman, and all of the managers that work at night are men. In fact, I am the only woman working at night, except for once a week, and I never work with her. I have had a reaction to the chemicals that we clean with for a couple months now, and I have spoken to my managers and to the store manager, and none of them care. They say “buy your own gloves then”. There’s only one problem with that. Because they pay me such a pitiful wage, I don’t have money to purchase gloves. Oh well, that is enough ranting for now. On to the good book…

I am currently reading Mansfield Park by Jane Austen. It’s actually very good, if you can comprehend the older English. Somethings have been rather interesting, such as when one has a headache, one is “knocked up”. Funny, isn’t it? Anyway, I won’t give away the story, but I do identify with some of it, and the scenery it paints is just wonderful.

Well, got to go for now.