Going to end the psychologist visits today. She's not helping me and I need that nearly $300 a month elsewhere. Am I resentful? Yes I'm resentful. Because I'm paying $70 / wk for answers and all she's doing is nodding like a bobblehead. So enough of that. I need that money for real solutions.

The postal service will be laying off between 120k and 200k people soon. We'll be insolvent by October. Due to not having any seniority, I'll probably be laid off soon. So yeah, looking at having to make a decision re the magazine project sometime soon. Do I go ahead with it, damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead? Or do I scuttle it again in favor of survival? I'm sure my mother will go for option #2. And would find Kickstarter the devil incarnate.

Could use some people in my corner since I seem to have the backbone of a single-celled organism when it comes to standing up to my mother. Oh well.

Huntsville made the Top 5 list of Geekiest Cities. Maybe I could move there?

I have ConStellation coming up in September, less than a month away. Feel like Wile E. Coyote feebly waving a flag as he's falling off the cliff again.

I have to learn that my first reaction to fear should not be to pull away even further into my shell, but to keep trying to connect. Even if doing so ends up exactly as I fear it will. Correlation does not equal causation.

So as a result of the recent therapy (on the fence about whether it's helping or not), I decided that I need to do SOMETHING even if it appears to have little chance of making a living. If I just sit here, nothing's going to happen anyway. If I go on the criteria that whatever I do must result in making a full living, I'll never get anywhere because I have no viable options.

BUT if I remove that from the table, then I have more options available. I arrive at a place where I can do something that I want to do with the criteria that it could possibly EVENTUALLY make a living, but it's not mandatory. If the criteria is, "what can I do that I could spend 40 hrs a week doing and feel as if it meant something to me", then the answer was immediately clear.

So I'm resurrecting the sci-fi novella magazine project that I was going to do just before we were told the REC was closing. It's not going to be "The Terran Conspiracy", but it will be the same project under a different title. Since I actually did file LLC paperwork and had to scuttle it, I think I should change the names so as to avoid confusion. Instead, I'm planning to call it "The Sidereal Times."

This time, I'm actually going to try to do a business plan. And I've ordered new desktop publishing, website making and photo editing programs that look to be somewhat more capable than MS Publisher. I've bought a new computer.

I've been here more than a year now in Jonesboro. I'm honestly tired of not being able to plan for the future, and I just said the hell with it. I'm tired of my life being on hold, so I'm going to assume that I'm going to be here a while and get on with my life. If I'm not, if I get excessed next week or a month from now or whatever, oh well, change all the addresses and carry on. This superstitious thing that the minute I put down roots they'll be ripped out has to stop.

In light of that, I've also put in for a week off in September. I'm going to ConStellation. I'm done with fafiating. I'm going back to fandom, and I'm going to find new friends.

Well, so I've been sick for much of the winter. A cold around Thanksgiving, another cold middle of December, then week before last here I caught the flu. We had the snowstorm ("Snowpocalypse 2: Ice Road Boogaloo") and I was home for 2 days before my guilt and fear for my job got me out of the house. Work that day was all right, but then when I got home the ice on the pavement of the driveway made me fall 3 times. I dinged at least 1 rib, and was afraid I'd broken it. This happened right before I got the flu, so while I was coughing my head off with the flu my ribs were killing me. But I went to a walk-in clinic and got some Tamiflu, and I was off work for 5 days. But a couple days after I went back to work I felt healthy again.

Well, except for the downward spiraling. But I went back to listening to the brainwave entrainment as I fall asleep every night and it acts like an anti-depressant for me. It's weird. It's like I'm on Paxil again but without having to take any pills or risk the whirly-head and barfing when I go off it.

I'd been feeling pretty down. Being sick so much, then not being able to get away from the facts that I'm at a dead end. My job is a dead end, my life is a dead end. I was going to file a grievance but when my union rep at work would go off on a tangent whenever I asked if she'd filed it yet. Then after talking to our new postmaster (new new postmaster, 3rd one at Stockbridge since I've been there), I realized why: Because she can't file a grievance, there's nothing to file about. Yes, I really have been put into a dead end job. I can't get out. I can't advance because there's nowhere to advance to. I've hit the wall. My life, essentially, is over. I'm just waiting to die. So I quit asking about the grievance, and quit talking pretty much at work. There's no reason to. Just take out the garbage, clean the toilets, and wait out my meaningless, pointless life.

Think how it's going to look on my resume -- 16 years and counting at the same employer, and I've never advanced but have in fact been demoted. I was fired and then re-hired after six months. If I was an employer, I'd conclude that I was a troublemaker and / or had absolutely no ambition at all. Another employer isn't going to care nor even care to know that there was nowhere to go in all my jobs with the USPS -- they'll simply ask me why I didn't job-hop within the organization until I got into something where I could advance. So I'll never be able to get a job outside the USPS now. If the lack of education didn't damn me, this would.

And anyway, I'm a janitor. No one's going to hire a janitor for anything but being a janitor.

Part of me wishes I could sue the USPS Human resources department for putting me here and claiming there were no other jobs in the Atlanta district. For one thing they didn't give me even a quarter of the money I should have gotten for back-pay from when I was out of work. For another, they've put me in a situation that is hurting my career advancement. But no lawyer or union rep is going to take that case. I can't even blame anyone, or get back anything for this whole clusterfark.

The whole thing is crushing me. It's like a physical weight pressing down on me. I can't think of anything else sometimes. The brainwave entrainment is helping, but it doesn't do anything to solve the problem. I'm out of ideas and options.

I don't know what to do.

Time for an update.

With regards to WoW: This one's complicated. Okay, so back here a few weeks ago I'm hanging in Desolace being bored, because that's about all you do in Desolace. Desolace = Desolation. Anyway, fortunately I was at the Inn at that particular moment, when suddenly I get a notify that Kill is online. FRAGGING WHAT?! He LEFT! He wasn't coming back! He was quitting WoW! So yeah, kinda shocked. I ported back to Stormwind, ran out to Elwynn, there he is. Same old Rogue pimp he always was. Almost first thing he sez is "You left the Guild?" So I had to explain yes, left the Guild, they were being horses' patoots toward low levels, but I'm good, I'm leveling, see? Anca's much higher than when you left -- At which point he yells for the new Guild leader to meet us in Elwynn. By that time other old Guildies started showing up, there was a crowd, the now-leader of NO shows up, Kill starts giving him the what fer, Drama ensues, I'm wanting to sink into the ground.

I left of my own free will. I believe in voting with one's feet. You don't like a situation, leave. I'm not so dependent on a Guild that I can't hang on my own and be happy with it, though fending off the other Guilds trying to recruit me is a pain and a half. I didn't want to be a club to beat somebody with. Owl, Anca and Skya are just fine.

So. Anyway. Kill starts another guild. I joined. It's now as big as NO ever was. Though I must say the gbank is a bit better quality than NO's was.

Cataclysm is about to drop. I got a silly Gnome pimp that sometimes scares off annoying Taurens for me and tells me I'm amazing for no adequately explained reason. I am back to the situation of two posts ago.

Sometimes I log on to Skya just to escape the pressure of leveling. Just to play the game, not to feel like I've got to go clean out half of Tanaris.


Regarding the Day Job: Grievance has not been filed yet, researching what exactly they're in violation of. Got told again by the PM that I can't be put on the Maintenance register because we're an associate office and there's nowhere for me to advance to. In effect, I have no future in the PO and yes, I was handed a bill of goods with this dead end job.

Frag it, I was happy when I was unemployed. I played WoW ten hours a day and I was happy. I thought I'd never have to deal with the PO and all it's crap ever again. The future was dim, but it had possibility. I had a vast, empty road ahead of me and a world to explore.

Why am I doing this again?


This being the holiday season, there is the usual angst about how isolated I feel being me in a family of ultra-conservative racist homophobes. Honestly, I'd be much happier staying here at home for Christmas. Alone, in the quiet, playing WoW. Being me, without being afraid to do or say anything that would offend anyone or embarrass anyone or ... just not have to deal with anyone else's idea of who I am.

I'm fragging tired.

Okay, so I have a deposit in on a rental house in Jonesboro, GA. On the drive back the other day I saw a structure on the side of GA 85 that had some distictive architecture. I know there's a Hindu temple somewhere in that area and when I got home I checked on the net and sure enough I passed by a real Hindu temple. This will require investigation in the future.

So now it's packing, getting a moving company set up, and waiting for the money to come in. If it doesn't come in on the next paycheck cycle I won't be able to get said moving company, and the vast majority of my stuff will be stranded here until the money comes in. Meaning I'll have to keep paying my landlady here for this place AND pay rent on the new place. Or else Mom will have to help me pay for it all, which I simply find unacceptable. She's already paid off my car, it's not going to snowball any more. I'll live in Jonesboro with my computers and the air mattress again if I have to, and cart my books, kitchen stuff and clothes down in the car. I lived for almost 3 months here in Gainesville like that before my stuff got delivered here, I can do it again.

I've tried calling the Labor Relations manager for Atlanta twice to ask when I can expect the money, she hasn't called me back. What's the use of giving me your phone number and saying call if you have any questions if you don't answer when I do?

In the midst of all this, my neighbor at Radio Free Ross-a-Noodle who is trying to buy the house told me that someone had broken into the house there. Also the usual disconnect between GMAC, the realtor handling the case and real life -- the realtor not getting on GMAC's short sale system, lady at GMAC I had been working with now not answering calls, someone else in GMAC Loss Mitigation answering the calls, my neighbor worried that the house will go into foreclosure even though she's had her bid in for it on the short sale for WEEKS. And of course in the midst of all that, I'm going back to work in a new job and a new place with new people.

Considering I didn't expect my job back at all, I'm still trying to get my head wrapped around that one.

Am I happy? No. It's one thing after another and I keep waiting for it all to go away. My patience is wearing thin. I have no idea how long this job will last, and as I'm starting at the bottom again I'll be the first to go on the next round of cuts. I'm fragging tired of being told either you take this one option we give you or you're out of a job, and the options always seemed designed to screw me over and I'm expected to smile, say yes, and be grateful that my life is being disrupted like this. That's like being raped on the edge of a thousand foot cliff and thanking your rapist for not shoving you over and while he's at it feel free to do it again. Even when you're making close to $50k a year you have no control over your life.

So the "arbitration" was today.

I use the word loosely because the "arbitrator" didn't bother to show up. A couple of ladies from the PO's HR division did show up, and we reached a settlement. It wasn't what I was expecting.

They gave me my job back. But not as a window clerk. As a custodian. In Stockbridge, Georgia.

I have 3 weeks to find somewhere to live down there, pack up, and move. I report for duty again on July 3rd.

I'm getting $4500 in the settlement, which will cover the move.

3 weeks.

I'm getting my job back.

I'm not sure what to think about the whole thing. Other than OMG WTF 3 WEEKS TO PACK UP AND MOVE?!?!

I'm already worrying about Fuzz, but I guess that's to be expected.

I don't know why I haven't put this on here til now, but arbitration for my grievance cases with the Post Office is set for June 9th.

Also have signed up to take 2 Excel continuing ed classes at Gainesville State. One day classes covering basic and intermediate. I know how to use Windows apps, I just need the specifics for Excel. That at least will allow me to put Excel on my resume.

gOS working out well on the netbook. Will play Pandora, YouTube, etc. It's finally turned into a good little machine instead of a problem child.

Have been posting a fanfic I'm writing for WoW on Fanfiction.net and had 2 people favorite it so far. It's only been up about a week. So I'm kind of bemused by that. Wondering if history is going to repeat itself. Waiting to hear "Are you a professional writer?" on the reviews. This time, though, I don't think I'll get delusions of grandeur.

Well, I thought I had a job. And I did, for all of 5 days.

One week ago today, I got a call out of the blue from a local rep for Kelly Services. She asked if I'd be willing to take an assignment with a company in Dawsonville. Shipping and receiving. The Kelly rep thought it sounded much like what I'd done in the postal service. This was at 11 AM. I was in the Kelly office at 1 PM. I was told to go take a drug screening test then report to the job. Hours were 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM, Mon-Fri. Okay, fine. I did so, and off I went.

The job was physically demanding, but other than my feet feeling like hell from the brand new steel-toed boots (could hardly walk after 2 PM every day they hurt so much), I felt I could learn the job given a week or two. And by today (Friday) at the end of work I felt like I was getting the hang of it. It wasn't so bad. My immediate boss was something of a hard-ass, but not nearly so bad as the PM in Cornelia. I stayed out of her way. I'd been told at one point that if there was nothing to do, to sweep the floors, dust the shelves in the inventory, etc. The which I did, when I wasn't filling orders, packing them up, and preparing them for shipment.

So I was on my way home tonight when I got a call from a Kelly rep from Athens, subbing for the rep from Gainesville who is apparently sick at the moment, telling me that the company "doesn't need your services anymore".

When I took the job last week, the rep mentioned the last girl who worked for these people stayed there 2 years. The job was "indefinite" but I was under the impression that it was going to be long term.

Thank the Force I haven't ended the unemployment yet.

Anyway, I'll have to talk to the Kelly rep on Monday. If she can't find me a job in less than 2 weeks I'll have to end that and stay on the unemployment, because that at least is stable. At least for the next 3 months or so.

I'd like an explanation too but that's probably going to amount to "sorry, I was sure it was going to last, but you know how these things go" (with a nonchalant shrug of disclaimer thrown in).

Well, I can't rely on "sure things" that turn out not to be.


I'm vaguely angry. When I talk to the Kelly rep on Monday I'm going to ask if she knows the MBTI (she ought, since it's such a big part of career counseling and placement) and tell her to find me an INFJ job or a boss who can work with INFJ. Because I'm tired of getting bludgeoned by the whole damned world.

Anyway. Mom said to take it easy this weekend.

And honestly, I've missed reading fanfic on my phone in the middle of the night.

DoL decision went my way. Postmaster failed to prove by predonderance of the evidence.

Of course she can still appeal that decision. I would assume since I can appeal, so can she. But we'll see.

It appears she did this mostly out of spite. The Post Office has one unemployment account for the entire service, not individual accounts for each office. And anyway, it's not coming out of her pocket, we all pay into unemployment. So I'm not exactly sure why she did this except for spite. Oh well. I don't see much use in that myself, but...

Went to Norcross today for a job fair at the Gwinnett Cty unemployment office. There were supposed to be 3 companies there. There was 1, and they weren't prepared for all the people that showed up. But I got info for the US Census and Clear (he WiMax company putting the network up in Atlanta), and will see what I can do tomorrow with that.

Will be going to Chattanooga on Friday-Saturday.

The thing with the DoL could go either way. I did my best. They'll send the decision in the mail.

The job training thing may actually be a legitimate job. They're sending me a check to buy a computer, a barcode printer, and 4-in-1, and a bunch of software. That's fragging scary, but it makes me think it's legit. So for the moment I'm tentatively hopeful.


My emotions are all over the place and I can't stop worrying. I wish I had someone to talk to, but there is no one. But that's why I've started doing this blog again. Because if I don't put it somewhere, it's just going to bounce around in my head like a super bouncy ball shot out of a rail gun into a raquetball court.

Maybe I'll finally open that "Mythos" DVD box tonight. I need something to make me think and get my mind off everything. Who better than my guru?


If it all goes to hell, maybe I'll go out west. I'd like to see the Milky Way from the desert before I die.

So last week I got a notification of a hearing from the Department of Labor. Apparently the post office is appealing the unemployment benefits.

Yes, apparently the employer can appeal the unemployment benefits. And if the DOL finds for them, not only do the benefits get cut off but I have to pay back everything I've already gotten. No, I can't pay it back since I've been living on it. Mom can't help me anymore.

So two of the three reasons should be easy enough to deal with -- I have no control or even influence over when the post office turned in the paperwork to the DOL. I have no idea why my benefits would be cut off for something I didn't do, but it's listed on the hearing notice. Also, I didn't accept a lay-off for lack of work nor did I quit, I was fired. I have a notice of removal to prove that. I didn't quit, I was fired. The third reason will take some doing, but I've got it covered. The exact wording is "discharge or suspension of the claimant was for failure to follow orders, rules or instruction or failure to perform the duties for which employed." I was fired for failing to qualify for the position of SSDA, not for failure to follow orders, rules or instructions or failure to perform the duties for which employed. I plan to explain how on my shift there was no way I could have done the 30 hrs. required Distribution for the job to be considered SSDA, and therefore I shouldn't have been required to learn the scheme. That basically I was fired for something that shouldn't even have been part of the job. Also planning to mention the grievances, and how the PM and the supervisor have had past grievances filed against them for harassment. And that I've got grievances pending for violations of the contract in several instances.

I wanted to get a lawyer to deal with all this but after talking to the state union steward she called one of the union lawyers and they said that it's frowned upon to call a lawyer for these things. That the DOL wants to hear from the claimant personally. Personally, I think if whether or not you're going to be rendered not only jobless but homeless is the kind of case where you should ALWAYS have a lawyer present your case, especially if you're nervous and having to confront a couple of psychos intent on destroying you.

They already fired me. I think appealing me getting unemployment pretty much clinches the "harrassment" issue.


I guess I've just got to have faith.

I've got to do something.

I need to write all this down if only for the keeping track of it. I just saw that I haven't posted here significantly since the summer. Before I got transfered to Cornelia.

The bare facts:

In August, I got transferred to Cornelia Post Office. Things didn't go well there. Maybe it was interpersonal conflict with the postmaster and the supervisor. I dunno. I ended up losing my job on November 20th, 2009. I've been out of work 7 weeks now. I dunno how much I should say here since I expect somebody to find this blog - yes I'm paranoid, this is 2010 and people lose jobs for posting pictures of themselves on Facebook and complaining about their boss on Twitter. It involved not passing a qualification for a function that wasn't supposed to be part of the job anyway since with the schedule I was on didn't and couldn't have 30 hours a month of distribution work, and if they wanted that job to do distribution at all they'd have to repost the job anyway. Anyway, I've filed several grievances with the Union, all of which are now at the regional level. I don't expect anything to come of them. I don't expect I'll get my job back.

I've filed for unemployment but there've been delays. I have a suspicion the decision will go against me and I won't get unemployment. If that happens, I have about $100 in the bank and that's it. By the end of February I'll be out on the street. Homeless. Jobless.

Mom paid off my car for Christmas. I'm not proud of that. If it all comes down to it I'll insist we sell the car and I'll pay her back. I'm not going to leave debts behind.

And today I canceled out of the podcast account and the CafePress account. And somehow that hurts worst of all.

I'm not in a good place to look for a job. I have no real skills except typing and writing. I'm 40 years old. There is a program I could use to go back to school to learn social work, but I'd have to have some way to live while I'm doing it. I've been out of the job market for 15 years, I don't know how this works anymore. I've done a resume and it makes me sound like a loser.


So not feeling so hot right now. There doesn't seem much point in going on.

In one of those dizzying reversals the computer industry is known for, my new Dell Vostro A90 is due to arrive today. It was listed as "in production" until this past Saturday (5/9) and scheduled to be shipped on 5/19. Then boom, it suddenly changes to "shipped" without the least warning. So it's slated to arrive today. I imagine I'll play tag with FedEx for a couple of days, but still, a week and a half ahead of the date they gave me. O.o

Note this is NOT a complaint. The peanut gallery on Twitter is probably thoroughly disgusted by my going on and on about the "Shiny Shiny" like Golem over the Ring.

Job news: Have been asked to delay the relocation until sometime in June due to short-handedness. So I'll be living here for another month with only the bare essentials. And three computers. And a GPS. Given this, I may go ahead and buy a cheap microwave and some more cooking stuff and some storage things for my clothes. And possibly go ahead and get the dryer and get the washer hooked up. I just have this suspicion that I still won't be moved in by my birthday. *sigh*

Doctor appt. on Friday. Think my BP meds may not be as effective now that I'm moving around so much rather than sitting like a lump all day. As you may expect, this is troubling.

Still no word on what I want to be when I grow up. I may need to consult an outside paid opinion for this. Just that the term "life coach" makes me wince.

Project 2230 now has 3 posts. www.project2230.net

Had to wrestle with the mortgage co. yesterday because I'm a glutton for punishment. How many times can I say "no, I can't pay you people" before they get it through their thick barely English-literate heads? So am spending most of my time now at varying levels of depressed about that. Oddly, being at work provides a sort of escape from that since I can't think about much else at work but work.

Well. Must call Dr. Jones' office and see if they can send my records to the new doctor.

I ask myself lately what I truly value in life, and what do I really want to do with the rest of it. What am I drawn to, what do I love, what matters to me. Yes, I am about to turn 40.

I work in a decaying history, at a job that is detailed and intricate and requires me to interact with a lot of people every moment. It requires a lot of physical activity. It is not a job that is suited for my temperament. While it may have a future now, I don't know if that's the future I want. I'm pretty certain it's not a future I want. It just seems treadmill-like. Every day come in, sell stamps, scan packages, issue money orders, deal with worried, harried, impatient, annoyed people. I like the people I work with, they're good people. But the job itself -- what do I have to look forward to? Thirty more years of this? Of the same thing over and over again for years on end? What does it accomplish? It's just running to stand still.

So I need to sit down and really think about what meaningful work means to me. And how do I get myself into something that means something to me, that allows me to live in all senses of the word.

I want to work for that future worth living for I'm always talking about. I want to see more of the world than the American South. I want to make things people want to read or watch or listen to. Even if I don't live to see it, I want to know what the future will be like. I want to see it with my own eyes.

How close are we to that world of 2230, Xyl and Jodo's world?

My own dreams are the only guide I have.

Migration2009 -- I am back from the on the job training. I had thought that being on my feet for 8 hours a day would be the biggest challenge, but oddly it was almost a non-issue with the help of Tylenol. The biggest challenge was in fact the psychological aspects. Lately I have become really averse to the retail attitude, so to speak. I've found myself wishing Hutchins, Wallace, et. al. in the new media community would stop with the selling and just be themselves on Twitter. The constant sales pitches drive me nuts. This became an issue during the on the job training due to the push for revenue generation. I suspect it has to do with the Feeling aspect of my INFJ type. As I see it, people don't come to the Post Office to hear a sales pitch. They come in to mail something, pick up a package, what have you. They want to get it done as quickly as possible and get on with their day. I respond to sensing this in people by trying to be as efficient and non-annoying as possible. Being required to give an unwanted sales pitch that annoys people when they're already annoyed at having to stand in line for 1/2 an hour goes against all my Feeling instincts. The job is telling me to do one thing, my INFJ instincts are telling me to do another. There was quite a bit of disagreement with my instructor on this point and I spent half a night unable to sleep until I figured this out. It doesn't help that I could lose my job due to my objections to this. And of course I resent being threatened in such a manner to gain my compliance rather than trying to talk it out and understand what's going on in the situation. When confronted with such things, INFJs just get stubborn right back. That whole "this type cannot be successfully coerced" thing? It's real.

But I got soldiered on, talked to my instructor about it, she assured me she understood but I still had to stick with the script, and I still feel bad about it. And not at all certain I can handle doing this job.

Then yesterday, Friday, my last day in Athens, my instructor got in touch with the postmaster of Gainesville to try to find out for me when I'm supposed to be there. And the other shoe drops.

It seems that the PM of Gainesville didn't post a window clerk job. He has no idea where I got that posting and asked me if I knew where the REC got that posting. I sez I don't know, that's what Mr. McCollum offered me, he had a list when he offered it to me, that someone else before me had won that bid but took another bid and I was offered it after that. I accepted, and here I am on my last day of training... but they don't even HAVE full time window clerks at the Gainesville PO. I'd have to come in as an SSDA instead of an SSA, I'd have to learn a scheme, or do something else altogether. The bottom is dropping out of my mind at this point, because I just spent $1700 to rent a house in Gainesville, I've got a house here I'm looking at foreclosure on, and a job I thought was a done deal suddenly vanishes out from under me. The second time this has happened, if you're keeping score.

To his credit, the PM of Gainesville seems like a really nice guy. He said we'd work it out, he understood my situation, that he'd find something for me to do in Gainesville. So Monday I'm going in to the REC to bang heads together again, and there will be a conference call with everybody in the room. It may be a small satisfaction to watch McCollum squirm when he's asked which orifice he pulled that SSA posting from, but I'll take what I can get.

And on top of all that, finally got the voicemail from the relocation people.

And my cellphone started acting screwy last night, and I can't determine if it's the phone or the AT&T network.

So I have quite a bit to do this weekend. Groceries, vitamin store, etc. And packing, of course. Further bulletins as events warrant.

So now I've had 2 days of orientation at the GMF. The second half of today was very weird for me. Mostly it was about revenue and how to make it and how to keep it and selling and ... I was suddenly shown in stark detail the reality of being an INFJ in this materialistic world.

I wanted to say "I'm not your shill, go find somebody else to pimp your warez," but of course I can't do that. The whole SELL SELL SELL REVENUE IS YOUR WHOLE FOCUS SELL SELL SELL attitude just completely turned me off. I own a total of 2 t-shirts with corporate logos -- one is for Ubuntu, and one is a Star Wars shirt. I believe and love Ubuntu enough that I feel completely comfortable as a human billboard for them (probably because it's completely free, non-profit, and open source). Star Wars is because I fragging love George Lucas and would jump in front of a train for him. Outside of these two things, I flatly refuse to be anybody's billboard.

Yes I know the Postal Service is a business, I know they're in this to make money. Fine, good, whatever. But a great deal of my brain just recoils from this kind of thing. This is because I am an INFJ, and our entire mindset is geared toward the spiritual and the creative -- the very antithesis of the down-to-earth bread and circuses of the corporate world.

It also doesn't help when you're a contrarian INFJ and you can see the 500 lb gorilla of the Internet in the room when all around you are blithely ignoring it and going on about increasing revenue opportunities and elevator speeches and how to pimp all the various kinds of package delivery. Everyone pretending that everything but package delivery is going to be gone in probably less than 10 years. And when 40% of your revenue comes from first class postage...

I was watching the people feeding the sorters yesterday during the tour of the plant and thought how much happier I'd be feeding mail to robots than dealing with irate people as a window clerk. All the whirring machines. But for some reason people think I'd be good as a window clerk. Me. The Introvert. Who deals with people with an auxiliary psychological function and deals with the real world with a nearly-non-existant tertiary function. I can see the train coming around the mountain and the crash will be spectacular.

Okay, so it's going to be Gainesville GA after all.

I'm going next Monday to look at a rental house.

Further bulletins as events warrant.

When your brain is racing around like a rabid caged possum, it's time to stop and think.

As Thufir Hawat once said, the first step in avoiding a trap is knowing of its existence. Look at what is happening to the newspaper business. It is failing because (a) it's expensive to produce and doing so online allows infinite page views with exponentially less cost than printing more newsprint (bandwidth being much cheaper than ink, presses and paper), (b) competition from other media, not the least of which is blogs and other online news sources, see (a.) above, and (c) the decrepit attitude of the old news establishment that won't let it adapt fast enough to this changing market.

It boils down to this -- online news is more up-to-the-minute, can be filtered to the user's specifications, and can be delivered right to the user's computer at no cost through whatever form of content viewing the customer demands. RSS, website, podcast, streaming media, Twitter, whatever.

This principal can also be applied to any form of personal communication in this day and age. Bills, catalogs, shopping, e-mail, taking the place of paper bills, catalogs, mail-order, letters and cards.

I make a prediction that in ten years there will no longer be a Postal Service. Between the 'Net and FedEx/UPS/etc, our functions will be completely taken over by cheaper, faster and better alternatives.

So maybe it's time to think about the future beyond just this job transfer. Like, changing careers altogether.


So I've been thinking this lately in between the times when I was being worried about the job transfer thing and mentally chasing my tail about the house. As I've been doing some pretty heavy Jungian stuff lately I decided to put it to my subconscious as a problem to solve. And the thought came to me first that I would have to go back to school. Again. Which on the surface of it I can't do, because I was thinking that I'd have to go back and finish the Creative Writing degree.

I was reading the type description for my type in Gifts Differing again. One of the things my INFJ type is supposed to be best at is counseling -- there are apparently a lot of INFJ psychologists, career counselors, and such. One of the people who follows me on Twitter is an outfit that specializes in teaching and certifying people to administer and interpret the MBTI. I figured a person would have to have a psych degree to even get in the door. But Twitter being what it is, I fired off a question about whether one had to have a college degree to take the certification program. They sent back that no, you didn't have to have a degree, and yes it was common that people made a living off this kind of thing. Cost for the first level certification program is around $1500 and takes 4 days. They're based in Gainesville FL and run the programs there every month and in several other places around the country.

This certification could qualify me to work in Human Resources for companies, in colleges or high schools doing career counseling, team building and employee retention. I could even work in child counseling, helping parents understand how their kids' minds work and what style of learning will help them learn best.

I don't have to stay with the Postal Service. If I go on to the higher level certifications (which I would anyway) I could probably make more money that I'm making now at the REC. Especially if I take certifications for the other assessment types they offer as well. There is another way out.

It can't be that easy. I need more info. Now is not the time to let my tertiary Judging function take a hike. Preferably before I do something rash. But now I have more reason than ever to ask for a Florida posting.

We have yet to find out any details re the REC closing.

I'm bumming out at the moment. I've got to dismantle the LLC and go close out the bank account. Put the remaining money back in my savings account. Because I might actually need that $390 in the near future.

My usual method these days of dealing with major depressive incidents is to go buy something fabulously expensive and electronic, and I know exactly what I want. I even have an excuse, getting my usual Christmas present for myself. With that $390 I could even get it handily, as it's about $320. But of course I can't do it. And that's aggravating me no end. Strangling people doesn't solve any problems. Neither does buying an EEE PC 901 with 1gb RAM, 16gb SSD, and Linux. (They use Xandros. I'd have to locate an external CD drive and burn a copy of Ubuntu Netbook Remix and install it before I could use the EEE without holding my nose. But that's a small consideration.)

Oh, and I looked up how much they're selling the Merakis for these days, and they've inexplicably trippled the price of their standard indoor model. So that was one instance where being an early adopter paid off in spades. So guard those $50 Merakis with your lives, cats and kittens. Worth their weight in platinum, at least. (smishes Meraki, you make my life complete and wireless all at the same time!)

JCF RoundTable tonight, and I have no idea what to talk about.

It also bums me out that I was only just acquiring a life and now I've got to up sticks and start over somewhere else. The JCF, the magazine... then somebody somewhere hit the reset button. This too makes me want to strangle people.

Oh well. Not much I can do about it, or even think about it until I have some answers. Like where I'm being posted, yadda yadda.

The REC is closing April 21st.

They told us Wednesday morning, the 19th. I still don't quite know what to make of it. There are people panicking, of course. But me? I'm not.

We still don't have details yet as to where us careers are going to end up, though it's almost certain it won't be here in Chattanooga. There's nowhere to put us here. So far, the only REC to offer to take careers is Salt Lake City. I wanted to go to Glendale, AZ. But hey, west is still west, just not as far west as I would have liked. It means I'll have to pack up the house, somehow get the house sold, and move across the country with an 11 year old cat who's never taken a car ride longer than 20 minutes. Get someplace to live out there. Move in. Get settled, somehow. All the million things that were overwhelming when I just moved across the city, nevermind across a country.

Mom, of course, thinks I'm throwing away my life. She was yelling so much that she didn't give me a chance to tell her this may be the only option I have to keep my job and all those great benefits in the midst of our failing economy. You'd think she'd be glad I still have a job instead of moving in with her and not working for a year or two.

Well. If she's going to act like that then I have no time or use for her anymore. I only have so much energy and patience and time, and I can't waste any of it on things that aren't helping me do what I have to do.

Until I have more details, I can't say anything for certain. That's all there is to it.