sooooo Hot!

I want to update you on what's been going on, especially with the abrupt end to my last blog but it's 103 degrees and we have no A/C and I can't even think. I'm just going to lay on the floor and die. I will tell you that when I was updating last week I was suddenly over come and I decided to drop everything I was doing and drive down to medford that minute to spend the weekend with Brian.

Tears for Fears

I'm often torn on the issue if whether or not it's wise to share you're most intimate thoughts on a place so publicly accessible as the Internet. My mother has always warned me against airing my dirty laundry and she has been right on many occasions. I'm not so good at keeping secrets and I've told quite a few to the wrong people, only to have it come back to bite me on the ass. Regardless, there is still something liberating in putting it all out the for the world to see. It's out in the open, for better OR worse, so deal with it.

Last night my husband and I had a fight. As you know we're separated. Not in spirit, we're still married and we've still trying to stay that way but he's in Eagle Point (southern Oregon) and I'm in Portland, which if you don't know is about as far north as you can go in Oregon.

This fight of ours, I know I instigated it. I don't think I meant to consciously but subconsciously I must have known how he'd react. I was complaining again about how I wanted him to leave our apartment in Eagle Point and come here to Portland to be with me. The whole thing is really rather complicated and fuck....I gotta go

The 4th

I think I've started to compartmentalize my life. I'm not really sure if that's a good or bad thing. More on that later.

The 4th of July was a bit of a mess this year. Brian and I had planned to meet in Dallas, Or (just west of Salem). We have some friends that live there and we were all going to go camping in Astoria, OR for the weekend. Sadly, whoever's job it was to book us a campsite failed. Our friends were determined to camp wherever they could and ended up driving up to Washington. We decided we didn't want to drive 4 and a half hours to camp so we ended up staying in Dallas, essentially house sitting for our camping friends. It wasn't so bad really. Brian and I got some nice quite time together.

We decided to Drive up to Portland on Saturday for the fireworks. We parked the car at my sister place in Beaverton and took the Max downtown. It was quite the adventure. We don't often take mass transit. I'm certainly glad we did though as downtown was a nut house.

We found a nice patch of grass on the waterfront and ate subway while we waited for the fireworks. Good times were had by all. After the fireworks we headed back to the max. When we arrived back in Beaverton we realized we'd missed the last bus to my sisters. Lucky for us it was only about a mile and a half away so we could walk. All was going well until we hit a quarter mile stretch of pitch black road with nothing but woods on either side of us. It was a little spooky. And of course right in the middle of it some sort or rat or squirrel jumped out and nearly gave us a heart attack. Brian pulled out his pocket knife so fast I could hardly believe it.

As luck would have it, we made it back safe and sound to my sister. We hopped in the car and headed back to Dallas so we could sleep on a real bed and in the morning we got up and had a fantastic breakfast at a little place called Tatters. After that I left Brian to wait for our friends to return and I headed home to Portland.

Can I interest you in some office supplies?

So I’ve been in Portland for a few weeks now, looking for work. AS you know I’ve been staying with my sister and her boyfriend. They’ve been kind enough to offer up their spare bedroom to me. I’m pretty sure I owe them for life.

Brian and I are stuck in a lease in our apartment in eagle point. Brian has opted to stay there until he can find someone to take over our lease or until the lease is up in November. So once again we are separated.

I’ve been looking for work like a mad woman. I think I mentioned in my last post, I thought for sure this was going to be easy. I have tons of admissions experience and there are tons of schools here. I just knew the first interview I went on would be a done deal. Unfortunately this was not the case.

Last week, out of desperation, I interviewed at a places called Maxis. I had a bad feeling about the place from the get go and I wasn’t surprised to learn that the job was selling office supplies door to door. Like I said, I’m desperate, so I took the job. I had to dress business professional and walk around town from business to business for close to 10 hours a day for commission only. I don’t mind a little exercise but this was ridicules. I'd have bailed the first day but my Trainer was a really awesome guy and I had a lot of fun hanging out with him so I tried to make it work.

Yesterday they told me they wanted to send me to Utah for a week and I’d be leaving Sunday morning. Well, they didn’t really tell me directly, they just mentioned in our morning meeting that they were sending a team to Utah and they rattled off my name on the list of people that were going. At first I sort of thought I’d misunderstood but later that day I asked my trainer if I’m heard correctly and he said, “Yes, aren’t you excited?” Uh, no I’m not excited. I have plans for the weekend and I just started this job. I don’t really want to go to Utah (a place I don’t care much for to begin with) with a bunch of people I don’t know. Especially when so few details have been supplied to me, such as where I’ll be staying, who is paying for this, what I will be doing while I’m there, etc.

To top it all off, the whole place is just a little too cult like for my taste. Every morning we get to the office at 8am and have a little Powwow. We all stand in a circle and one of the team leaders suddenly starts talking and the whole team turns into a bunch of cheerleaders.

The boss says "are you ready for a morning meeting?"
and everyone responds (about 30 people) in unison - AHHH OHHHH!
and they keep going, making this sound, until he makes a motion with his hands to stop
Then he says, "today’s announcements” and they all say BUM BA DA BUM!

Then we break into groups and run drills, practicing our pitches. It’s great fun….not really. Then we hop in our cars and drive to our territories to pound the pavement until 5:30 where we then drive back to the office and have an end of the day Powwow. This consists of everyone getting back into a circle and whoever made their sales goal for the day, goes out to the middle of the circle and grabs a cow bell that they clank the fuck out of while everyone cheers and they run around the circle giving everyone high fives.

This was all just a little too much, even for me. After about 3 days I was over it. Last night after talking to my mom about my concerns, I did some research online about this company I was working for and others like it and I can’t say I was thrilled with anything anyone had to say about the place. I went to bed pretty sure I wouldn’t be returning.