My journey through Graduate School to earn a Masters of Art in Education. I was on track to become a teacher, but now everything has changed, and I'm on the job hunt with a Bachelor's in Liberal Arts and a Master's in Education with no teaching certificate.

 
I work at the check out desk of a community college library. The desk is arranged (pause)with (pause) a chair (pause, pause, pause) so I end up (pause, pause)having to sit down when I work with the computer. Besides running around the back to get course reserves, I have to check out laptops, which are about twelve paces away from the computer station. Every time I pause (pause) I have to stop this to help a student. (pause) It's the (pause)constant (pause) standing and sitting that wears me out. If I could work at a standing station, life would be easier. Students have several tactics to keeping me popping up and down.
One, they wait until I sit down before they ask me for anything. If I see a student standing just a few yards away, I know that they're hunting for a laptop, so when I return to my station from returning a laptop I dont' sit down. I wait. He waits. I stand there for fifteen seconds, he's just staring off into the distance, and finally, I give up, and sit down.
"Can I have a laptop?"
posted by Josh English at 2/28/2006 10:49:00 AM

 
My new jobis quite exciting: lots of new things to learn, lots of fires to put out, and of course, people. I work in a library, so naturally there is some end user education called for in the job. Some folk just don't know how to use a library. That's fine. Some people call up and ask "Do you have journals for notes?" and then get a bit touchy when you don't know exactly what they are talking about. Thank God for my years in the tech support trenches. I know how to get people to tell me what they don't know. But my favorite part is the door. We want people to flow into thelibrary through one set of doors, but not be able to leave through that set because the exit is around the circulation desk. Therefore, patrons have to push the door open. People pull on the door, then when it doesn't open give me a pathetic "how do I get in?" look. Push, people, push.
Tonight we also learned how much hell it can be to run a library with no computer system. Talk about a headache so big it has 'decapitation' written all over it.
posted by Josh English at 10/20/2005 06:07:00 PM

 
It's done. Fini. Kaput. Through months of scouring the classified ads, the local employment office's job board, having experts look at my resume, and just plain begging, I have a job. I almost went so far as to apply at my last full time employer, knowing full well what kind of abuse I would have to suffer (10 hours shifts, less than 45 minutes a day of breaks, three traffic jams a day both ways). But what it comes down to is this: A friend of mine works at a library at a community college and they needed part time help. I needed a part time job. It worked out. I start tomorrow.

I do have to work a four hour shift on Saturdays, but my time for writing is free, and I'm surrounded by books. What could be bad about this job? It's a forty minute drive to work, about 20 miles on backroads (probably an hour on the freeways and 25 miles). That's the only disadvantage. I have time to return to my writing workshop (two hours away) when I want to go. Life is, for a small temporary moment, good.
posted by Josh English at 10/12/2005 10:48:00 AM

 
One of the nightmare situations I fear is that having a job will force me to give up everything else in my life. No time for my wife, no time for the choir, friends, my writing, nothing.
Today I went to a car lot because they were advertising for a lot attendant. Ok, I'm overqualified on an exponential scale, but I want to write, which means I should be ok with taking a job that doesn't require much thinkng. They were loathe to hire me, but asked me to talk to another person down the road at a related car lot.
Their offer: 10-12 hours a day, six days a week. No time for my wife, choir, writing, nothing. I turned them down. This will probaby bite me on the ass, but I want a job, not a life. Is that too much to ask?
posted by Josh English at 9/06/2005 02:03:00 PM

 
It's been what, six months or something, four, maybe, since I've talked about the job hunt. It isn't going well. My wife lost her job, intereviews are scarce, and she has a temporary sub job. Time for me to boost the process. I sent six resumes off last week. There are a bunch more in Sunday's paper, and one has already gone out. Unfortunately, I forgot to change the job I was writing about in the cover letter. So much for arguing that I can pay attention to details.
I need to talk with a few people about listing them as references. Right now I only have one person whom I can list, and I'm not sure he'll be willing to be a reference in the future.
There's a car lot up the street looking for a lot attendant. If it doesn't require sales, I might look into it. Sure, I'm over educated to drive cars for a living, but my two degrees are pretty worthless right now anyway.
posted by Josh English at 9/05/2005 02:35:00 PM

 
My wife got fired this week. I still haven't found a job, but I haven't been looking as hard as I should. Fortunately, her contract states that she'll recieve paychecks until August, and should have some unused sick leave coming to her. There's a good chance one of us will find a job before then, so we'll be a double income family again.
There is a long and complicated bitch session about why she's not going back to work next year. One day I'll have the strength to go through it.
posted by Josh English at 5/13/2005 10:49:00 AM

 
It's been different, I'll say that. I'm only working a few hours a day, so it's not a lot of hours, but it's better pay than I expected. WHen push comes to shove, I think I'll net about 70 dollars a week.

Monday was training and meeting students for the first time. Some students are happy to work, and other students are resistant. I can understand, some want the extra help, and some don't want to be there because they don't care. Back in grad school it was hard to find a good answer to the totally unresponsive student. I ran into the same problem Monday.

Wednesday it was easier. There were just enough students to keep all of the tutors and we each had one student. The student I sat with knew what to do and just got to work. He had difficulty with a few styles of problems, but he got through most of them. The word problems were all tricky, unfortuantely. Each one of them had misleading information, and one of the answers on the answer sheet was simply missing.
posted by Josh English at 1/06/2005 08:18:00 AM

 
Tacky Title. Sorry. I got a job! It's a part time instructor position with an after school tutoring company. I'll be working in a local high school that has failed to make adequately yearly progress according to No Child Left Behind. I'll still have time to write, and I'll be able to make it to my writing workshop.

It's not much in pay or hours, but hopefully enough to pay for my writing habit and maybe buy my wife a few well earned gifts.
posted by Josh English at 12/31/2004 01:44:00 PM

 
I just sent a resume to a local book publisher who needs part time technical help. Job requires HTML, CSS, Excel, Access, SQL, ASP and VBScript. What I don't know natively I can learn easily.

I saw a couple of other positions advertised today but I'm going to wait until later to explore them. I have to get a few wrenches out of my computer's monkey works.
posted by Josh English at 11/14/2004 05:11:00 PM

 
I talked to Stephanie this weekend. I have decided to make the serious attempt to sell my fiction. The decision requires that I go to Eugene, about two hours away, to a workshop that has been the home to several successful writers, such as Jay Lake, Jerry and Kathy Oltion, and others.

Since this will be a huge expense in gas and time, Stephanie has asked that I find a part time job somewhere to help pay for this and kick in some extra money for the bills. I have agreed to do this. If I see an opportunity for a great job as a technology specialist I will still apply, but I will first go get a job to support my career.
posted by Josh English at 10/18/2004 02:29:00 PM