Vacation in Place

I canceled my vacation. Why? Let them pay me for it. I wasn't going to go anywhere anyway, so I'll just vacation in place. I've informed all the people that I work with that I'm o-u-t and fat chance getting me to help with anything. Instead I've given them the webform address to file their own orders, the customer service numbers and email address. If I'm so darn expendable, they can start making due without me now.

Oh, that sounded bitter. I'm really not. I spoke with my boss Walter today. He said that his boss is really thrown for a loop about getting canned. She's the one that was so willing to throw us to the wolves, but it's not so funny when it happens to her. His counterpart was also let go; she cried in his office. Cried? Really? Over a phone company job?

I guess I might have been that upset too, about ten years ago when I gave a shit. In the intervening time I've learned not to invest in my career. Seriously, it doesn't pay.

One of the folks on my team went overboard learning all the new products, pricing tools, services, etc. I didn't even try. I had enough going on with the stuff I knew, I called myself the "Keeper of the Old Knowledge." At the end of the day, we're both just as unemployed, and I didn't waste any time or brain cells trying to learn a bunch of new stuff.

I'm networking like crazy. It helps that I have no pride and I'll take pretty much anything. I'm aiming for Executive/Admin assistant jobs. I can use all my skills, but again, no harming my brain cells.

I've applied for jobs at Delta, Coke, Home Depot, Lockheed, the Federal Government, Atlanta Public Schools, Kaiser, and pretty much every hospital in a 10 mile radius. They're posting jobs, but I don't think they'll be doing much hiring until after the holidays. Of course this is making me paranoid crazy. I just think that I should be getting some calls, but no. Crickets.

I called the outplacement firm that's part of my separation benefits. They can't talk to me until after seven days. There's a seven day revocation period. Uh. Okay. I'm not revoking anything. I sure hope they don't.

I'm still processing the whole thing. I think that once I get a new job, that I'll actually get that, "I've won the lottery" feeling that I know I should be feeling.