WanderingAmylessly 2.0

I will readily admit, this is going to be the blog post equivalent of one of those emails you generally hate -- the ones that someone's niece's friend's cousin's coworker's stepmother's sister forwarded from her best friend's boss's daughter's baby-daddy. You know, the ones that the person forwarding says is "just the funniest damn thing I've read all day." At any rate, my friend's husband -- who unfortunately leans distastefully to the right but nevertheless writes himself a first-rate blog -- recently shared an email that had been forwarded from his nephew. After my recent spate of job applications and interviews, this struck me as knocked-on-the-ass funny. But maybe it's just me. I'm weird that way. McDONALDS APPLICATION FOR EMPLOYMENT NAME: [Redacted] SEX: Not yet. Still waiting for the right person. DESIRED POSITION: Company's President or Vice President. But seriously, whatever's available. If I were in a posi...

Remember this date: April 27, 2008 Someday, it may be a prominent entry on a timeline in Henry's biography -- the day he competed in his first bike race. Now, Tim insists he does not want to be "one of those dads." The ones who relentlessly push their boys into their own sports obsessions, reliving glory days or hoping to live out the dream of a lifetime. But hey, if the kid expresses a genuine interest... Henry was entered in the kids' competition of the Old Capitol Criterium, a series of bike races that draws seriously competitive cyclist-racers from across the country. In the 3- and 4-year-old division, he was up against a field of at least a dozen other preschooling cyclists, on every type of maneuverable object from a traditional bike with no training wheels to a pimped-out Big Wheel. He started a bit slowly but poured it on at the end, pulling out a fantastic second-place finish in the one-and-a-half-block race. I'm mixing up my sports references here, but H...

I hesitate to say anything about yesterday, for fear of jinxing myself -- carrying along that hoodoo voodoo superstition theme. I will mention that my interview was held during a TORNADO WARNING. Bad omen or good? I cannot say. The department's leader and search committee member noted, "When we see a funnel cloud, that's when we'll seek some shelter." He was only half joking. (He had checked to make sure the actual path of the tornado in question was far south and east of us. So I appreciated his casual manner...as well as his general irritation at the institution's rather shoddy weather warning system. Plus, I didn't want to postpone the interview and have to get all geared up and freaked out all over again at a later date.) They have two more interviews on Monday, then they will regroup and review, and call back people for second interviews...if they feel it is necessary. I hope it is not. The reaction of the committee members seemed warm, pleased and ge...

People, I need all the positive thoughts you can muster. If I were in Louisiana, I'd look up my local voudon priestess to get myself a gris-gris -- one of those mojo charms with supernatural powers to bring good luck. Or I could just cross my fingers. Cross myself. Find out who else is applying for this job and put a hex on them or otherwise somehow sabotage them. I gotta get the job. I just gotta gotta. Call center work is not for me. If I needed someone to bellow (or, in many cases south of the Mason-Dixon line, "beller" or, alternatively, "bellyache") in my ear about how their ex-spouse (or employer or insurance company or child or state of residence or federal government or, once today, me personally) is a money-grubbing, two-timing, no good Goddamn lying sack o' poo... Well, let's just say I don't need the heartburn. Think of me at 3:30 p.m. Central Daylight Time tomorrow. Cross whatever you got. Send positive vibes. Don't step on cracks or ...

"Hi, this is Amy. How may I help you?" And oh, you can only imagine the response... I was offered a new temp assignment late last week, after the one I had been doing (to refresh your memory: remove staple, tape receipts, make copies, talk to no one, wish to slide toothpicks into my eye sockets from sheer boredom) ran out of work for me to do. I guess I worked so fast and furious and fabulously, I worked myself right out of employment. Never fear, the HR company I've been helping needed a warm body in the call center. I get to answer inbound calls from employees of companies that are auditing health insurance policies to discover whether the employees' dependents are still eligible for coverage. It's a little tougher than it sounds, in that I know of nearly NO families with a cut-and-dried, perfect scenario. Divorces, child support, alimony, adoptions, stepkids, he-said she-said, paperwork mistakes, college kids needing coverage, common law marriages. Good graciou...

I did something today that I, as a mother who wants to be loved by her son in future years, swore I would never do. I bought clippers and cut Henry's hair. A friend of mine said that she cut her son's hair and gave the following advice: as long as you use the guards, it's foolproof. You cannot screw it up. Famous last words. Actually, the haircut turned out OK. Looking at it while he was in the bath afterwards, I noticed a couple spots that were a little longer than their corresponding spots on the other side of his head. And his little sideburns weren't quite even. But it was the process that turned into a nightmare of near catastrophic proportions. Mistake #1: I didn't cover him in any sort of cape. So all his little and not-so-little hairs (wispy, babyfine and scratchy like a million straight razors, if you fell victim to his blood-curdling shrieks) went all over him, under his shirt, down his shorts, up his nose, in his ears, piercing his eyeballs, embedding the...

The nitwit who is responsible for the current issue of Outside magazine should immediately be fired. Not for the choice of featured model. For that, I'd give the person a serious prize, like a year's supply of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups or at least a month of free massages from --Insert Your Favorite Day Spa Here--. But in his or her infinite LACK of wisdom, this person chose to run the cover image without color. Who in God's name thought it was a good idea to put Anderson "Wouldja just look at his gal'durn dreamy blue eyes" Cooper in a black-and-white photograph?! What a travesty. Edited to add: Now that I look at the cover photo more, I'd like to know, "Was it really necessary to use the photo in which he looks royally constipated?"

All Tim wanted to know this morning was: Are we under a tsunami warning? This, after a 5.2 magnitude (or 5.4, depending on who to believe) earthquake jolted the Midwest, from St. Louis to Sioux City. We slept through it. Or, rather, we didn't feel a thing. Henry woke up at 4 a.m. for some unknown reason (do you suppose it's like when dogs know a tornado's going to hit?) and I think, technically, we were all awake at the time of the seismic activity. Perhaps we were too cranky and sleep deprived to notice. But I'd ask my St. Louisan friends and family out there to let us know...did things shake? Did your structures crumble? Did you stand in a door jamb or run night-naked into the middle of the street to avoid the rubble crashing around you? From what little I've read this morning, this hit was a minor one, as far as damage and potential death. Which is good. I'm just waiting for the aftershocks. Or was this the precursor to The Big One? What an interesting way to...

For anyone who cares, I've put a few new articles up on my shameless self-promotion venue, er, Web site. They're the fruit of some of my latest freelance labor. The rest of the site is pretty much exactly the same as when I first put it up -- except I had to change Henry's age in my bio section. So much for the immediacy of the Internet. Last time I put anything on that site, H was still in Pampers. If you don't have the site addy, e-mail me and I'll give it to you. Not that I don't trust those in the Blogosphere. But I don't trust those in the Blogosphere. Why add and update now, you ask? Two words: JOB INTERVIEW! I have an interview a week from Friday for a real-life, full-time, editorial position. Not saying anything more, for fear of completely jinxing myself. I must say, the call from the potential employer could not have come at a better time. I'm not sure how long I can continue to remove staples, tape receipts to pieces of paper, and make copies....

Not that it means anything, but the mentally challenged woman from the local social service agency hired by the company I'm working for...is doing the same job tasks I'm doing. Not that it means anything.

Several people have wondered why, in the name of all that is sacred, would I give up my mind-blowingly enviable life of great wealth and fame in the freelance writing world to do temp work. Well, despite what you might think, the freelance opportunities aren't exactly hurtling at me with great speed and frequency. I blame Bush and his in-the-toilet economy, for one thing. Then there's the fact that our esteemed pit of bureaucracy, known as the University, somehow decided that there might be some sort of conflict of interest with Tim working there and me offering my writing services to various campus departments (that have absolutely nothing at all to do with Tim's office, I'd point out). Because of some wacky state law, all of my work with the University was put on a freeze until May or June when the Board of Regents reviews my situation. Seeing as how about 75 percent of my freelancing comes from the UI, I was presented with a bit of a problem. Enter, the administrativ...

How long has it been since original, first-broadcast programming aired on the major networks? That writers' strike went on for months. Yes, there was an endless parade of reality programming, but I'm talking the good stuff. Specifically, THE OFFICE. I swear, Ryan was still a Temp the last time I watched. Oh, how I was looking forward to this evening. A new episode! On at 8 p.m., right as the kid would be going to bed! The joy I get from those precious 30 minutes each Thursday (I'm sure it's technically 22 minutes, what with commercials, but who's counting) could be considered -- a la MasterCard -- priceless. And then a giant line of tornadic thunderstorms parked itself right over us, and we were treated to several hours of weather coverage. Even after the tornado warnings expired -- the magical rule the stations adopt for when to get their butts off the air -- they wouldn't sign off. Trained spotters insisted they saw funnels near the airport; the National Weath...

Henry: What's an expert? Us: A person who knows a lot about something. Henry: I'm an expert. I know a lot about this house. Us: What do you know? Henry: The kitchen is dirty.

The only thing worse than eight hours in a car with a whiny kid who's watching DVDs is eight hours in a car with a whiny kid and a DVD player that doesn't work. That's what I was faced with on Wednesday morning, as we prepared to embark on our trek to the land of Tornadoes and Toto and Grandma Dorothy. I plugged the DVD cord into the car socket (that strange little hole in the dashboard once known as a cigarette lighter). Nothing happened. Gasp. Wheeze. Shriek. I fiddled and twisted and plugged and unplugged it any number of times. Still, nothing happened. We checked to see whether we had a player malfunction, by plugging it into the Avalon. Lights and sirens, bells and whistles, holy technology Batman! We had diagnosed the problem. Sort of. I thought for a moment about unpacking my Civic and repacking in the other car, but I decided against it because I didn't want to spend the extra gas money, I wasn't thrilled about driving hundreds of miles alone with a kid in ...

Eight-plus hours in a car. The only adult. Accompanied by a 4-year-old boy and a 2-year-old dog, eight pouches of The Incredibles fruit snacks, portable DVD player with at least 20 hours worth of animated movies and 22-oz of my favorite organic coffee. Feel for me. Pray for me. Take pity on me. The one saving grace is knowing that, at the end of the journey, I can usher my kid (and the dog, for that matter) into the capable, loving arms of the grandparents, eat homecooked food that I didn't have to prepare, and crawl into bed early with a new trashy romance. Taking a vacation to Kansas isn't exactly the ideal destination for everyone. But it sounds like heaven to me. (Minus those eight-plus hours in the car.)