Steady Work?

It’s been a year since I moved to Oakland and although I love it, I’m so tired of looking for work. Do you know how many W-2’s I’m going to have when I fill out my taxes next year?

I went to a job fair yesterday for a teaching position. I don’t have my credential yet – am paying to get it because that’s basically how you get credentialed – you throw some money at the state government. Anyway, I was under the impression that I could apply for the job while I waited for the application to go through. Nope.

I was kind of led on and now I’m kind of annoyed. Still waiting to get my credential and when I do, then I’ll send in my application

In the meantime…I’m trying to think of things I can sell to bring in some cash.

Still here

It’s been a long time since I’ve been on this blog. I blame this on my instructor asking me to write about my crazy job experience this summer. I’ve been writing that instead of writing this. The good news is I have an amusing currently 70 page story almost ready for submission. The other good news is that I quit that crazy job last week.

I also started a new blog dedicated to my short short fiction at http://32wordstories.wordpress.com.

I’m also working on getting my website up and starting an online publication. Whew. I think it’s nap time…

I actually…

clicked on the Oakland Police Department website to look at their job listings. The pay is better than I’ve had.

Did I mention Monday was my last day at the job I got two months ago? Company closed.

I love Kim Chee

I have always loved Kim Chee. Spicy, garlic, pungent. My CSA box has been sending me Napa Cabbage. It’s crazy big and not much else to do with it but stir fry as far as I know. I thought about making Kim Chee but have always intimidated. Then I mentioned in my ESl class that I love Kim Chee. The next day, a student brings me some. Today she told me the recipe. It sounded so easy, no measuring of course – but I figured I could handle it. It needs a few days to ferment. I’ll let you know how it goes. So far, it’s a little salty!

I thought I’d add this poem that I wrote. Completely unrelated to my recent culinary adventures…

The Warriors of Spring

Connie always wore
Her swimsuit over panties
White, dotted with tiny flowers
Bulging underneath lycra
And out through leg holes

I never understood why
But never asked
Because asking is telling

I told myself that she already knew
And I liked going to her house
Having her teach me scales on the piano
While her mother made Kim Chee

I was nine when I learned
I can rescue you if you get hurt
In the water
I know how to hold you and swim you to shore
And I can save myself
By letting go

Simply drift and wait

I was out sick the day school tested our survival skills. The following week I floated, deserted, for an hour in a roped off part of the pool. I would have been easily spotted from above, dark hair snaking in warm aqua water while the others jumped and screamed and splashed five feet away.

As I hovered over the deep end
I thought about Connie
Uncomfortable in thick
Cotton soaked underwear
Then I imagined myself
In the middle of the ocean

All alone
Hoping

I swim now, twenty-some years later
With more or less fear
I can’t tell

Being weightless
Reminds me of childhood
I let the blue and white tiled path
Lead me to the other side
Then back again
As though I need to be guided
Still
Chlorinated chest high water

Connie cried
When two boys saw
Her sitting on the toilet
In the church bathroom
One held the other up
To peer over the stall

It doesn’t matter
What could they have seen?
I said

But it didn’t matter
What
I said

If you find yourself stranded at sea with no boat and no life vest, remain calm. Hold your arms out in the shape of a U with your face under water. Lift your head only when you need to breathe.

I wish

I felt like this right now.

Bummer

I just spent the last hour putting together my resume, cover letter and references for a job. Then I refreshed the employer’s website and the listing was gone.

Definition

So I’m putting together some vocabulary definitions for my ESL class. I get them from the Mac Dictionary because the meanings are fairly simple. Tonight I looked up “equipment”.

I don’t think I’ll be giving my students this.

(informal) used euphemistically to refer to a man’s penis and testicles.

talkin’ ’bout people

Have you ever had the experience where you felt that if a person said less they would come off as being competent/intelligent? But the more they go on and on and on, you being to think…’what an idiot.’

Adds a twist to keeping one’s mouth shut.

Resolutions?

I normally don’t do the New Year’s Resolution thing. I mean how can you stick to something you wouldn’t normally do for an entire year? That being said, I did go to the gym today after many many months. But I was kept away by financial constraints as opposed to my laziness so it doesn’t count as a New Year Res.

So I’m beginning to think about trying to live within my means. Is this even possible? Can you live within your means when you are in a whole lotta credit card and student loan debt with 4 jobs that barely pay the bills and going to school full time? (job #5: catering has been inadvertently dropped. They stopped calling me when I turned down one gig and then bailed on another.)

And what does that really mean ‘within one’s means’. I have kept myself in check out of necessity more than lack of want. No new clothes, no going out for drinks, a dinner out here and there. Maybe I have been doing ‘it’ this whole time without realizing so…

Can’t wait to get my student loan check so that I can buy something. Anything! I need tea, a water hose, anchovy paste, dare I say – new bras, oil paint medium, etc. But I’ll show some restraint – out of respect for my budget, the New Year and all the peeps who think that this is the year they will change.

one week left

ok ok, i haven’t been blogging as i should. but there was the holiday and now i have one week left until the end of the semester. i’m working day and night to finish an art book. pictures coming soon…