Working 9 to 5.

...It's no way to make a living.
I warn you, this might be a long and rambling post.

It starts easily enough: I was fired from my job on Monday morning. The reason? My selling of books to school and libraries (which was meant to be 25% of my time, but thanks to a tragedy in the family of one of my bosses, became all of my job for the last three days of last week) was under par. I had sent out 25 books, and made one bulk sale in one week. They felt that I should be sending out 100 books or more and making 2 or so sales in that time. So I was given a warning talk on Friday that told me I need to get in gear, and when I came in on Monday, in gear and ready, I was fired and told to get out.

I was not happy. I let them know this. Words were said. Sarcasm flew like darts.

I called Tanja to tell her the bad news. This is how that conversation went:

Me: "I've been fired."
Tanja: "AGAIN!?!"

Thanks, love. [rolleyes]

Anyway, the next morning I dashed off an angry, spiteful blog entry, but held off posting it, just in case. I procrastinated on it for a while. Tanja thought I shouldn't mention termination on a blog, just in case, but I felt I wanted to vent on it. But it didn't get posted.

That night, we met Sarah, Ted, and Craig at the Australian Youth Hotel's Nude Bar (not an actual nude bar, but a bar with cool pictures and a sort-of Georgian-Edwardian setup) to see Gary Eck do stand-up. It was great fun. He's really a clever comic, and he finished off with what he referred to as "the Knob Game".

The Knob Game is thus: It involves taking movie titles, and substituting the word "knob" for a key word. I instantly brightened up, as we had played a similar game to this, but with the word being "vagina", when I was at Uni. So he went through a few, and then opened it up to the audience. I shouted "Crouching Tiger Hidden Knob!", then "the Passion of the Knob!" and then we all started rallying like crazy. Tanja managed "The Knobfather", Craig "Knob Wars: The Phantom Knob", Sarah "My Left Knob", and then I delivered the clincher. Happily, he didn't hear me the first time, and the room got quiet, for me to triumphantly declaim:

"My Big Fat Greek Knob!"

Bwa ha ha. He cracked up, and then said, "You're going to get all cocky now. I can see you going home and saying 'yeah, the show was alright, but I was AWESOME!'"

And he's right. I am. Heh.

Anyway, I was talking to Tanja on the way out about how I have to Blog about this, but then I realized that I hadn't posted my angry "I'm-fired" post. Then it hit me that I felt mad at my ex-employers not just for firing me, but for restricting my continuing happiness. It might sound like an overstatement, but it was true.

So I started looking for work again on Seek. I checked out a few things. Then i get a text from Craig saying that a spot had opened up where he works. I applied online, and they called me the same day. They wanted an interview. I went for that interview this morning, and they called this afternoon. I've got the job. It's in-bound telemarketing for Telstra BigPond Internet. What I'll be is the guy on the other end of the help-line when you call about your bill. And the money is great. Way better than CareerFAQs. Plus, the workplace is all about the "work hard, play hard" dichotomy, as I am.

The week has come full circle. Fired on Monday, New job by Friday. Things are looking up.

(A brief aside here: I got me a set of drums. After three uncompfortable hours with precious precious lugnuts, Ted and I set it up at his mum's place (which hereafter shall be known as 'the Studio'). We've been practising, and it's all coming back to me. Also, Sarah has a gig at Sol's Deck Bar on Oxford St. She and I started talking about t-shirts to sell, and my brain started sparking overtime. I made some lightscribe CD labels, and photocopied some inserts, and mentally sketched out some ideas, which I spent most of yesterday putting onto fabric. Tanja remarked that it seemed I had more enthusiasm for the shirts and CDs than I did for finding a new job. Huh.)