transmothra - signs of the collapse

complete social paralysis... too much work, not enough free time... tired of long, late hours... inability to call it quits in City of No Jobs... stuck in a rut, working that hamster-wheel, endlessly, endlessly... no let-up... need to create stifled by need to pay bills... reality sets in... all my potential wasted... drained, powerless... weakening... my resolve is a sinking ship... overwhelmed by commitment to carry on somehow... need to let go, let it all go... whatever happened to the Dream? ...it's too late to turn back now, my next 35 years will be similarly wasted in either swimming back to the starting shore, or swimming to the other side, where awaits, what?, a long walk back to the starting point to do it all over again... or, just drown in the middle... not the right time to take a risk, to gamble on what has always, always proven to be miserable failure in the past...

my job is crushing my soul and sapping my will to live. and it doesn't get any better in this awful city i used to love.

i need enough time and money to go back to college so i can somehow manage to get out of this rut with enough time and money to go back to college so i can somehow manage to get out of this rut with enough time and money to go back to college so i can somehow manage to get out of this rut...

i could create my way to freedom, if only i had the freedom to create.

Holly's incredibly sick, and i'm starting to lean in that direction myself.

Lisa's last day at work was yesterday. i will never see her face again for the rest of my life, and this gives me a very bittersweet feeling. Bitter, because, y'know, and sweet, because, y'know: it'll just be so much nicer and fresher to be in a space that doesn't contain her foul airs. So long! And that's that. I feel like the book is finally closed, the Bookmark That Wouldn't Go Away having finally gone away.

Been researching beat machines. I think i might like MadTracker, but what's i'd really like is something physical, with buttons and knobs. I really need something versatile. It's hard to believe, after all these years, that my old TR-707 still has the balls to rock, has independent outputs for 8 instruments, MIDI, and can do odd time signatures, while nothing else i've been playing with in the virtual domain can do any of those things. Unfortunately, i'm limited to the otherwise strong samples that came with it, and only 3 levels of dynamics. I need space for a drum kit, but i just don't have that luxury.

I still hate work. I just noticed on my stats that i've been outperforming everyone else this week. By a long shot. Including the blowhards who think they're "Bob"'s gift of SLACK. And unlike many of them, i'm not getting replies from customers that start off with "Did you even read my email?"

I've been working 50 hour weeks for ~8 months now, with about 3 weeks break (40-44 hours).

When anyone complains, the standard mantra of "business needs" is repeatedly chanted at us until we go away. Our HR department has completely forgotten what the 'H' stands for. When you see them about anything, they act as if their own mantra is "when you take advantage of your benefits, you take advantage of your company".

I also recently found out that my yearly $200 donation to the United Way for various charities was not spread out to help AIDS or breast cancer charities, but was all given to Hospice instead. A worthy charity, but i wanted to spread it out a little bit. They don't care.

It's completely burning me out. I'm exhausted all the time, and on my days off, i never get anything done anymore. My off hours are spent vegetatively reading the news online.

I've been getting fat again, and my mood has been crappy, so i've decided to start taking SAM-e again (mood), and Stacker3 XPLC (metabolism).

Good news: Lisa is moving away in like a few days.

Let's say you have a web portfolio of some web sites that you built.

And let's say you've found a few errors that you didn't catch in 2002.

Maybe even throw in a little obsolete code, which wasn't actually obsolete at the time.

...Is is ethical to clean it up? Is it ethical to present something that, for all intents and purposes, looks and functions almost exactly the same as it did back then, yet has been tweaked to fix small errors?

In other words: is it okay for me to fix my mistakes?

Anybody out there want to critique my online résumé? If so, i would be greatly appreciative!

(yes, the links to my portfolio are not active yet - those will be archived sites)

i was out with a sore throat this week and Holly's got pleurisy and severe chest/back pain and maybe a fever too. had to call out sick for her and for myself on behalf of her on Thor's Day.

i know i'll get in trouble for doing that. but i just don't care. i spent all of my loyalty points for that company. i've applied at a few other places; i'm sure to get one or more offers. i just can't keep living at that stupid place and talking to those fluff-headed customers any longer. i swear to fuck, every day i visualize my empty body hanging from the balcony. it's taking too much from me to keep this crap up. i need change. i need a new job, more time to create, and more space to create in. i won't even go into the old "standing by while my sweet old Grandpa dies" bit. i can't even get myself over there to witness it most of the time.

my life is stifling me.

all i want is Holly, and Speck, and a fuckload of cash (that'll take care of the rest of my problems). that's all i want.

Wanna know why i want to quit my job? ( Or how i could, potentially if not actually likely, be sued for labor fraud? )

Anybody know of any local businesses needing a non-fuckwit?

i work for a major lingerie retailer that you've heard of. i work in Internet Services. i take phone calls, and e-mails, and very occasionally answer the TDD phone. (i have nothing to do with their actual website.)

today, i received the following e-mail:



i located the account. we are supposed to note the account with the request. because there is no account-level notation function in our green-on-black mainframe system, we just have to hope there's an order and note the most recent one.

she had three orders. the final one was dated to something like July 8th, 2005. it was a backordered 2-piece lime green swimsuit. i did not look at the size - not for any particular reason, it just didn't occur to me. she would likely not have received it until sometime up to the 22nd. or rather, it would not have arrived until then.

i sat there, staring into the screen, past the green pixellated Lucida Console fonts that spelled out the question: did she get to wear it at least once? did she see it at all? did it even arrive before her death? i knew that the chances were pretty good that she had died before it had even gotten across state lines. something sank, deep inside of me; i was deeply moved by this event which was so small to me yet so gigantic to her family. a longing to touch her cheek, to see what she looked like, to tell her that it would all be okay somehow. i wanted to console her, to forgive her post facto grief. i felt such sadness for that dead ex-customer then.

life is pretty fucking precious when you realize how thin of a string our mere existence swings by; how lucky we all are to be here and be aware in the first place. and how easily and how permanently it can be shattered for all of eternity.

my "human-level response" was excellent on that one. i thanked the mother for her e-mail (as always), told her that it saddened us to hear of it, and asked her to please accept our sincere and humble condolences for her tragic loss. something along those lines.

i'd never meant anything like that in a business e-mail before.