June 21, 2011

Epilogue to the previous entry

I was making a chocolate-chunk banana pancake for dinner tonight, and the new spatula couldn't keep up. I had to use fork to flip the pancake.

Karma

June 20, 2011

Rejection Ethics

- refusal, spurning, dismissal, elimination.

Getting rejected sucks. Having to reject someone else...well, it also sucks. It's easy to tell someone you're not interested (hell-fucking-no, or the like), but how do you do it nicely? And is it okay to lie to spare someone's feelings?


This past weekend, I realized that I was without a decent spatula. My mom had given me a 20% off coupon to Bed Bath & Beyond (beyond what? nobody knows), so I decided to put it to good use. As I was leaving the store with my purchase, some guy asked me "where's your stuff?"


"Right here," I said, waving the spatula.

"That's all?"

"Yes. I had a coupon."


End of conversation, or so I thought. About 5 minutes later, as I was wa
lking to my car, a few blocksaway, I heard someone yelling behind me. It was the guy, and he was running after me.

"Look at this coupon!" he yell/panted triumphantly. On his receipt, someone had hand-written '20% off total purchase,' (apparently it was a manager).

"Wow," I said, in a tone that attempted to hide how un-impressed I was. He didn't know that I knew that you could use multiple '20% off any single-item coupons' in a single purchase. I guess I did a good job of feigning interest, because we proceeded to have an unnecessarily long conversation about coupons.

After the a
wkward coupon-related chatter ended, in which I assured him that my mom would send me more coupons and I really didn't need his, he interjected with "you're so beautiful. We should hang out. What's your number?"

Shit. Put on the spot, I gave it to him (mostly so I could go free and not have to reject him then and there). As I was walked away (quickly- I didn't want to be caught up with again), I brainstormed about how to reject him nicely. He seemed perfectly friendly, just not my type (probably in his early thirties, and wearing sweat pants with a denim button-up shirt). I decided the best plan was when he called, I'd tell him
that I had a boyfriend, but was so startled by his running after me that I hadn't remembered to tell him.

I immediately felt guilty (the downside of being a jew) about my plan, because there were two major moral problems:
1) If I had a boyfriend, I'd be a horrible girlfriend to 'forget' and let guys hit on me.
2) It's not true, so I'm a liar.


When it comes to rejection, being mean or blunt is easy. Being nice is an art--an art which I have not perfected, w
hich is why, when the guy called tonight, I didn't answer my phone. He left a voicemail. I probably won't ever listen to it or call him back. And he'll probably think I'm a bitch.

I honestly do feel guilty
, but how much must I compromise myself to spare others feelings?


[The rare and elusive coupon that started it all.]

June 16, 2011

Week 2: Loud, followed by very quiet

Week 2 has come to a close (I don't work on Friday, so I'm referring to the work week).

The week started out tough--since I was switching to the 4-day schedule, Monday was my first 10-hour day. On top of that, I had to work an extra half hour (more on that later). Not going to lie, it was a long day. I ate lunch while working at my desk so I could take a nap in my car during my official lunch break. Tuesday was a little better.

Yesterday, the office held an open house for it's clients, so the staff was all sent home at 4. We were only given 1.5 hours excused time, so we had to make up any extra work missed on other days (and that's why I worked extra time on Monday). Today, there was a TON of leftover food from the party. From what I overheard, everyone at the party got super drunk. I heard the receptionist complaining how hungover she was. College lives on!

I really like my job. I like the work I do, I enjoy the people, and, for this week at least, work has been my only social interaction. Roommate 1 went home for the week (his PhD summer classes don't start until next week), and roommate 2's school year just ended (he's a teacher), so I've been completely alone (other than trips to the supermarket....and people inside the television). It's weird to spend 11 hours surrounded by people and things, and then come home to....silence and stillness. Come back roommates! Please?

June 10, 2011

iLived

I have officially survived my first week as a contributing member of society. Overall, it wasn't bad! As I have no problem with the people I work with or the work itself, my biggest survival issue at this point is getting run over by crazy LA drivers.

June 7, 2011

iWork

Okay, so maybe iWork is already a trademarked apple product, but whatever.

In case you couldn't tell from the title, I work! (Regular 8-hour days this week- then next week I switch to AWS (alternative work schedule)--four 10-hour days per week. NO FRIDAYS EVER!).

It's tiring, but I really like it. Most of the cube-people are not too much older than me (the older fat-cats get offices).

I'm on the SAG (Screen Actor's Guild) team, so I audit the pension plans of actors, stunt people, and dancers for movies, commercials, and TV. The work is challenging (there are 10 million steps to prepping an audit, and each confidential database has a different password), but interesting. I have access to a lot of confidential information....

(I don't how much more I'm legally allowed to say about what I'm working on, so I won't, just in case.)

Later.

June 2, 2011

Not Ideas About the Thing But the Thing Itself

Moving tomorrow, and starting work on Monday.

I've been thinking about my first post-college job for a long time, but now that it's four days away, I have absolutely no idea what to think. I'm trying not to have expectations. A historical trend analysis would show that my expectations are usually inaccurate.

So, for now, I'm keeping "the future" off a pedestal and going into the real world with a clean slate.