Saturday, May 29, 2010

Waiting with bated breath

There is a chance I may soon be gainfully employed.

Monday, I saw an advertisement searching for a "technical assistant." Looking at the job duties and requirements, I felt that I was well-qualified for the position, so I submitted my resume for consideration. The next morning (Tuesday), about half an hour after the office opened, I received an email in reply stating that the job was 45 minutes away but if I was still interested, they would like to schedule an interview. A 45 minute drive is a cake walk for me, so I emailed back and asked if the following day (Wednesday) was too soon. An email in response informed me that the following afternoon was convenient for the interviewer if it was convenient for me, so we set the meeting time at 2 p.m.

I rushed around like a crazy person looking for my suit and other interview paraphernalia and mapped my route through Google maps. It would take 45 minutes in good traffic and I knew there was construction, so I planned to leave at 12:30, an hour and a half before my appointment. It turned out to be a very fortunate foresight.

Within a half mile of my merge onto the first of 3 main highways, I was in at a dead stop behind a long line of traffic. I attribute the slowdown to two things: first, heading in the opposite direction, there was an oversized load that was stopped underneath an overpass and as it was straddling both lanes, no traffic could pass. I believe this distraction caused drivers on my side of the highway to slow down and rubber-neck. Further impeding my progress was the sudden decision on the part of the state's department of transportation to close one lane in my direction of travel, thus squeezing the already sluggish traffic into a construction-induced bottle-neck. It took me thirty minutes to move the three miles to my exit. At this point, I was understandably panicked. For while I had allowed myself twice as much time as I thought necessary, my expected delay still lay ahead.

However, once I exited the first main highway, the sailing was smooth and even in the corridor where I had anticipated a hindrance, there was no hint of any trouble. I arrived a full 20 minutes early and at the behest of the receptionist, I sat down to fill out the required application.

Once that was concluded, I was received by the interviewer. To make a long story short, (too late) I feel the interview went very well. About halfway through I was surprised and delighted when my interviewer mentioned that the more she spoke with me, the more she was convinced that I would actually be a good candidate for another job that was so new that it hadn't even been posted yet. She deduced that, with my degree in English, I was very detail-oriented and probably very concise. I confirmed that I am. She stated that there was a manager who was looking for an assistant who could work independently, as he was frequently out of the office, and who was very accurate, as some of the things this assistant would be preparing would not be viewed by him until he was in front of a client. I told her I was very interested and she printed out a copy of the job description for me. Upon reading the description, I became very certain that I want this job.

She concluded the interview by saying that she would be in touch in the next week, probably not until Tuesday, at the earliest, due to the holiday weekend, but that she wanted to set up an appointment for me to meet the manager who needs an accurate, self-starting assistant. She would keep me in mind for the other position, but that with my skill set, she felt I would be a great fit for the manager's assistant.

So now I wait, with fingers crossed, for an email or a call and another interview with a man who will hopefully become my next supervisor.

Saturday, May 08, 2010

Such fun

To add to the confusion inherent in living out of hastily-labeled boxes, I found this on the door yesterday:


Thursday, May 06, 2010

Well, we're all moved in and I know exactly where everything is

--in a box in the basement. This house is quite a bit...cozier than the last house, so space is at a premium. I'm currently trying to only keep the essentials in the main part of the house and repackage the non-essentials for long term storage in the basement. I'm taking great care to label the repackaged items so as not to end up spending hours looking for something a few months down the road.

Hopefully this will be the last move for a while.