Nope.

Nope, no cigar. Going after job was interesting, three tests, two of which I passed with flying colors, a week of time, and ten gallons of gasoline burned. Then there was a week of paid work I gave up. One can get a little bummed after this. Going to hit the libraries for some good reading.

Later......

Job hunted some more.... Arrgh. Just not my week.
While job hunting, the router up and died. So I got a new one of those.

It may be time for The Handyman Can biz to get going. My fee is twenty-five (wish it was Euros) an hour, no minimum, and free estimates. Just need the biz license and insurance. Hey, I'll hire me.

Even Later.......

Someone's been scraping the public resumes again. This time, mine at Monster.

Hi, My Name is Deleted. I came across your resume while doing a field search. And everyone else's. Sometimes they screw up and give an "offer" several states away.  Your resume matched my search criteria for a sales and leasing consultant's position at Local Car Dealer. Search criteria .....NONE. .(Edited a paragraph out for brevity) All the while, making friends, and helping people! Smell fertilizer...fresh. For us, car sales is about building relationships, value, customer satisfaction and personal wealth for our family, and future! Fertilizer deeper. In addition, we'll help you get off to a great start with cutting edge training techniques that will apply to many aspects of your life, not just sales.  All the tools you will need will be turned over to you this week. BUT, you have to get through this first interview for the doors of opportunity to swing open.

You will receive dynamic training, medical benefits, guaranteed training salary*, additional monthly bonuses, 401K, fast track management program, and paid vacations.

Name of local car dealer here is a family owned and operated business that believes secure and happy team members will exceed their patrons' expectations. Along the same lines by company policy they maintain professional and respectful work environments. They are not your average car dealer.

I will be conducting interviews in the Brand here New Car Showroom on Monday October 1st and Tuesday October 2nd ONLY from 9:30 am to 5:30 pm.

No appointment is needed. Please show up dressed and ready.  If you have any questions you may call my cell phone at Deleted, or Email me at Email deleted.  Otherwise, I will see you at the interview. I look forward to meeting with you soon.

INTERVIEW LOCAITON: Spelling bee runner up?
Local Car Dealer
Brand here New Car Showroom
123 Main Street
Raleigh, NC Zip here

If you need directions you can go to the dealerships web site at Deleted link or mapquest.com

Sincerely Yours,

Deleted Name


P.S. If you are curious how much the AVERAGE employee makes at a dealership in North Carolina.....money hook here..... multiply that number 50 weeks, and you'll see what I mean.  Here is the link.  See you at the interview!

Link 

*Unit/Performance Based Net Commissions

Did I get it?

In a little while, I'll be either employed or still looking. Long test today. Can't describe it except to say, harder then one thinks. Just in case, applied for yet another job via internet.....

Go here to learn about the wonders of unemployment.

www.dvorkin.com/essays/unemben.htm

Some caustic but wonderful observations about having more free time then one wants. Other good stuff too, some astute looks at job scammers and whatnot. I bookmarked it of course.

I'll know in a little bit.

Third Time's the Charm......

Third evaluation coming up at the new "job". Those of us that made the cut in the second evaluation were like me, older, still in shape. The younger ones were sent away to try again, . . . . a year later. The place is going to do well, going to ship a lot of heavy machinery thanks to the softer dollar. Start at O-Dark on Friday for the third evaluation. Looking forward to steady work and income. Also really nice not to do the quarterly thing anymore. That's a bite if not planned for. If I'm in, going to stay there for quite awhile. Real estate market won't be back until summer of 2009, if then.

Green boss was unhappy that the younger workers just don't have it. Some of em' do. The smart ones stay in school. See a lot of young polished office staff and managers these days. There used to be quite a few that wanted to do houses but they take one look at the housing market and the surfeit of illegals in the biz, and say, "Forget it!".

Got to move my medicine cabinet around in the front bath. It's a bit too high as I tried to give plenty of clearance to the faucet. Going to hide the holes with trim. Painting primer on my remaining replacement siding for today.

Later.....

Didn't paint board one. The front bath is hereby declared finished though. No more touch ups, no more tweaking, and no more hardware. Also a few weeks off until I clear out the back bath. That has been given back to the cat for the time being.
Art is needful in bathrooms. Something to look at while meditating, so to speak. The medicine cabinet is a bit small mirror-wise but it beats rummaging through the vanity drawers for floss. A little off center to the light. The light stays where it is though, to move it would require official sanction.

Latest most pessimistic word on real estate, is that it won't be back at par until 2011.

Multiple Choice? Wowza!

Hot Dog! Good day at the new "employer". Blew through the test in record time. Well, multiple choice.......I can beat anyone on the planet. Not smarter then most, just I have the widest mental download bandwidth that I know of. Just means I can screw up faster then light......

Friday, they see if I can screw stuff together. Out of nine of us, they kept four.

To celebrate, I threw caution to the wind and stopped at Lowes. Nice new medicine cabinet in keeping with the faux period look of the room (Greek Folk Revival), complete with cornice. Pretty decent for the money, i.e., 98 bucks plus tax.
Image is from Lowe's online catalog. No flowers, let alone roses, in my bathrooms.

No work on the chimney today.....just too hot.

Money Runs In, Money Runs Out

What can I say? Holding my own? Yep. Kinda. Sorta. Was hoping to get up enough scratch to get the tank-topper and the medicine cabinet for the front bath but the water bill, the phone bill, the other phone bill, and two gasoline fill ups for the Subaru ate most of that up. Add in the next tankful of gas and the new belt to be, uh, formal, (Why I do this for the HR types? So I impress them? Wished it work.) and I'm back to square one. Don't owe anyone anything but it would be nice to be able to finish off one damned room at least.

Nice road trip to Loudoun. Gentle rolling hills of McMansions as far as the eye can see. Same horrible traffic in Leesburg. Best friend was back in hospital, apparently getting warranty work done.

I was watching Extreme Makeover with the sound off. No shot over five seconds, lots of cuts, and product placement like crazy. OK, so they do nice things for unfortunate people, but does everyone need a huge house that looks like it was decorated for theme parks?

Heard someone say that the inflation rate was two percent. Uh, try to build a house recently? Price of twelve foot long sheet-rock just jumped by two dollars.

Big day at my prospective employer. Things I now live by.

1. Don't fall in love with the job.
2. Don't expect it to be steady.

I'm also starting up the biz. If it gets going well enough......

Water Water Everywhere, but Where?

My water bill was waaay up there. 3280 gallons of water? Last month it was high too. I'm thinking it was the back bath toilet before it was repaired. Oh well, since the old overflow pipe is the last original part in the thing, it's been shut off until the back bath gets repaired and refreshened. Navy showers and flushing only when needed now. See if I can get it under a thousand gallons for the month. For every gallon under a thousand, I'm going to award myself a cent toward frivolity.

Back at the Garage House, helping out the boss. He's gotten the Carolina Cold, a nasty regional cold. I had one two years ago, sneezed so hard I'd get nose bleeds. Sprayed insulation. Nasty stuff....air one can see. The place needs doors and trim and finished floor, then done.

Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, road trip. Then Tuesday is an evaluation day at my prospective new employer to see if they like me. The job is going to be 80 miles round trip but if it's the only game in town.....I'll do it.

Strange offer from a health insurance agency, googled them and looked at their website as requested.Nothing in relation to my resume and the only openings were sales. There were no openings for claims personnel, customer service representatives, mailroom, adjusters, underwriters, and other functions that any insurance company has. Decided to pass. Another one from someone looking for car salesmen. We call these guys, resume scrapers. Basically, they scrape public resumes off of sites like Monster and Careerbuilder and make questionable job offers.

Kick out flashing

Job hunting like crazy. If no response, I keep on sending and sending, pushing hard. Road trip to Fuqay Varina today. Also got to fix up the business application and get that done.

The chimney got some attention yesterday. The flashing is much better on one side and it's got some new cedar siding, back primed and painted. Other side to be repaired today, then cutting out old caulk and scraping and painting. I found out that kick out flashing is needed if a roof stops alongside a wall. The water gets diverted away from the wall instead of running down it. The gutters were also full of acorns, including shells and fragments. Messy eaters those squirrels are.

Much heavy editing on the blog. Just too wordy, so snip! Sometimes a word, sometimes a sentence, or whole paragraphs.