Yesterday, I received a forwarded copy of this email, sent to my superiors, from the subject of a story I did last month:
I was really pleased with the way the article on us turned out and I wanted to write and express my appreciation. It surpassed my expectations.
I was especially impressed with the job Erin did on the text. She was able to weave in everything that we wanted and do it with a beautiful style. She really has a gift for writing.
Yay! 🙂
Argh. Frustration abounds.
I work two part-time jobs as I search for a full-time teaching jobs. My first job is 28 hours/week writing for the Catholic paper. My second job is tutoring.
When I started the tutoring job, I was averaging 10 hours a week. This was a sufficient supplement to my piddly income.
Lately, though, things have not been good…scheduling changes and no-shows have led to cancelled shifts and seriously diminished hours.
I was scheduled for 13 hours this week. I’m ending up with five.
And next week? I’m scheduled for ONE hour and a half shift. I’m hoping that this is due to the holiday, and is not going to become a recurring thing.
I can’t do this…I’m not sure what I’ll do. I don’t have enough serving experience to get a decent waitressing job. I’m not sure if I want to go back to retail, though I’m pretty sure the store would take me back.
Oh, and I contemplated selling some stuff on half.com. Turns out none of my crap is worth anything. 😉
Anybody out there want to hire me?
I’ve often said that job interviews are like dating. And, this shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who knows me well, I’m not terribly fond of either.
You get dressed to impress. You put on your best face, make sure to say the right thing, use the right body language, smile and nod in all the right places. At the end, you part ways and hope for a phone call.
And you wait. You hope that they don’t meet someone else that they like better.
Or sometimes, it just doesn’t feel right, and you actually hope that they don’t call at all.
To take the analogy a little bit further, job searching while you have a job feels a little bit like cheating, doesn’t it? Secretive phone calls. Vague excuses for your whereabouts. “Oh, I was…at an appointment.”
And when you leave a job, it’s kind of like breaking up. Getting fired, for instance, has a lot in common with getting dumped. Quitting voluntarily is like saying “It’s not you, it’s me. I’ve outgrown this relationship, and I need to move on.” And on rare occasions, both parties involved mutually agree to part ways, and the split is amicable.
More than once, I’ve run into someone I knew from a job that “dumped” me, and it was every bit as uncomfortable as running into an ex-boyfriend. What to do…do I lie, and tell them all about my fabulous new job? Do I say nothing, just smile and exchange pleasantries and be on my way?
All of this pondering was inspired by my interview this morning. I think it went well. It’s certainly not “the one,” but it could be a decent start to my teaching career. Freshman and sophomore English. I got a copy of their summer reading list…could be more to add to my ever-growing list! I started “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead,” so as to form my own opinion of it…and I still have to read “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds,” not to mention the five other books that Jen has that I want to read! I need a few more hours in the day…
I have an interview sheduled for a long-term sub position (one year) at one of the Catholic schools this Thursday. Yay!
It was a very strange thing, as they sent letters to those people with resumes on file, asking us to call them if interested in interviewing. Weird. But anyway, keep your fingers crossed for me!
Sorry ’bout that, blog fans. The life of erin-go-blog has been a wee bit hectic this week. I started my new Catholic reporting job…which is fine, but for the $. (It’s actually less than I thought it was going to be. A mistake was made. Sigh.) And I’m still doing the tutoring thing. I should be fine, once I get adjusted to some kind of normal schedule.
I was surprised to learn that there is a stylebook (much like the AP Style Manual) specifically for Catholic reporting. Most of what’s in it has to do with titles, terms, etc….but then there are those annoying bits of Catholic doctrine. Anyway, I had no idea there was a need for such a thing. It’s about as thick as the AP manual, too.
If you’ve been keeping up with all things jen, you know that we found an apartment. Yay! This is exciting, and I think it’s going to be a good thing. However, it does mean moving at the end of the month. (boo!)
Why TV execs are stupid
Wonderfalls cancelled? Already? Sigh. So I’m a network executive at Fox. I pick up this great quirky little show for 13 episodes. What to do with it? Hmmm…I know, I’ll put it on Friday nights. In the kiss of death slot. After two episodes (which have been well received by critics), I decide to move it. But where to move it? Ooh! I know. I’ll move it to Thursday nights opposite the wildly popular CSI AND The Apprentice.
Really, what is this all about? Why, oh why, do you murder a show in its sleep before even giving it a chance? It makes a viewer wary of even watching a new show, for fear that it won’t survive. What do we have to do to keep good shows on the air? Make sacrifices to the Nielsen gods?
And while I’m at it, it appears that TV execs aren’t the only stupid ones. The viewing public is also stupid. Really, why are there so many craptastic reality shows on the air? (Fear Factor, Joe Millionaire, American Idol, Who Wants to Marry My Best Friend’s Millionaire Midget Cousin, etc.) Because PEOPLE WATCH THEM. Gah. Honestly, I’m not sure how ANY good shows survive in this environment.
And now, I’m going to lament the loss of Sports Night. Again. Some more. Somehow, it was on for two seasons, even thought the network had no faith that it would find an audience and messed with it to the point that the people who DID want to watch couldn’t remember when it was on. Let’s hope that Fox doesn’t mess up Arrested Development, too.
Okay, rant over. 🙂