It’s probably American tourists. Half our country seems to be vacationing on your side of the pond this summer. You have my condolences.
American tourist, arriving at Fawlty Towers:
Took five hours from London. Couldn’t find the freeway, had to take a little back street called the M5.
Basil Fawlty:
Well, I’m sorry if it wasn’t wide enough for you. A lot of the English cars have steering wheels.
American tourist:
They do, do they? You wouldn’t think there was room for them inside.
Just getting confused about which side of the road to drive on.
So I was chatting with the psychologist about the potential for ADHD in my son (I have ADHD and I swear to Og I often feel like I’m parenting myself.) I don’t think she gave the most helpful response, but she did say that a typical child his age should be able to focus on a preferred task for 10-15 minutes.
This amused me, because I have a child who will sit for hours and hours and do the same thing over and over unless you actively stop him. But also, that is me.
In the rants department, our 17-year anniversary was rained upon today, and it was a gross, cold rain. So we didn’t get to go to the state park and the aquarium like we planned. Oh and we tried to eat at a restaurant we hadn’t been to in quite some time, and they were serving a buffet style brunch when my poor husband just wanted a bison burger (he’s allergic to beef.) So we left that place and went to another place, which was mediocre. We decided to go to a different aquarium at a giant mall, and I hate malls, so it was about what you would expect. They charged us $25 apiece for their shitty aquarium which we got through in about 30 minutes.
The day turned around when we decided to see a bomb-ass movie, Across the Spiderverse which was so good my husband kept leaning over and whispering, “How is this so good?” A+ for that movie and I didn’t even mind the giant cliffhanger.
So we managed to do something fun. Now, we slay together.
I recommend the book Hunters In A Farmers World by (IIRC) Thom Hartman. It explores ADHD as an adaptive mutation which has some benefits besides some drawbacks. I loaned my copy to my sister’s second husband (his son had ADHD as do I). He never returned it. They’re divorced now. Bastard.
Ok, two turn downs for employment. I think my age was a factor.
Two more to try this week.
I don’t want to hear about in until you’ve used the flashlight on your phone to look for your phone.
Keep your chin up! Wishing you well.
Sounds interesting. I’ll look into it.
Interviewed at a pizza place at 2. He sounded like he wanted to hire me. Said I’d hear from his boss. Just got an e mail saying theyre no longer looking to fill the position. Something weird is going on!
Hang in there. I got one that is providing just enough. It’s a tiny company and I’m having to 1099 it, but I’ve got a job now and am grateful every day. Nothing like walking away from a thirty some year career for a tiny office job. Grateful to the business owner every day.
So I got something to relate.
I was working at a shitty job. And by shitty, I mean, my department had gone from a group of 6 people to a group of 2 really quickly. I took on the job of a lot of people in their absence and worked my ass off to keep everything from falling apart, and that was amidst FBI investigations, political turmoil, and people actively trying to get me to quit. Finally I had had enough, and started putting myself out there to try to find something else, and I found what sounded like a great job at a place just minutes away from my house. I had a videoconference with the boss who loved me, and I was actually offered the job (verbally). I quit my crappy job, and was just waiting on a start date and my offer letter from the company’s HR.
It took a couple of weeks of me checking with them every once in a while (I didn’t want to pester them but come on, I was unemployed when I was told they were hiring me). They kept saying they were trying to work out the details. Then finally, I was told that the entire plant I was going to support was closing. And they didn’t have any other openings at the time.
On a positive note, I didn’t take it personally. After all, dozens of people were losing their jobs. But… Talk about stringing me along.
I didn’t go back to my job, I kept looking, stayed unemployed, maxed out my credit cards, took on a temp job for 7 months (originally 6 months but they extended my contract) where they said that it was a temp-to-hire job and it was basically a formality to be a temp (until they finally said there was no budget to hire me full time and let me go, another attempt to string me along).
Then I took another job making far less than I was used to making, in fact I even warned them that it wasn’t very much and I would only take the job out of desperation and didn’t expect to stay very long, and would probably leave soon, so they probably shouldn’t hire me. (Seriously, I told them flat-out, you should think twice about hiring me for that pay, they countered that I would love it there and want to stay regardless of the pay.) Turns out, no, it was not a good place to work, it was a small-ish family-run company where everyone had to walk on eggshells constantly to not get on a boss’s bad side or risk being fired.
After two months there, I was asked to interview for an awesome job making more money than I ever had, working for the government where I’d actually get a pension, have great benefits, and do what I love with tons of job security. I knew I had no shot but I interviewed anyway. Got hired, and this will be my ninth year there.
Life is crazy and you never know what the fuck is going to happen with your career.
Is it possible a reference you’re using is not a good reference?
Years ago I had an employee that was constantly messing up things at work. I tried correcting her, but she just kept making the same mistakes, and just rolling her eyes in response to my correction.
Eventually I lost my cool and told her she really needed to get her shit together. She walked out, quitting with no notice. I had to work extra to make up for her loss, but it worked out well for me.
Then, I started getting calls from places she was applying to. I’d laugh and tell them she quit without notice and did a poor job overall. She was not eligible for rehire.
For weeks I’d get a call or two a day! Each time I was brutal. Eventually the calls stopped. I feel bad for whoever hired her.
I didnt give references. Oh well, weird things happen. I have 2 interviews this morn.
One time, I lost my wallet at the grocery store because my toddler son took it out of my purse and put it in someone else’s cart when I wasn’t looking. That extremely kind person turned it in without taking anything.
I’ve searched for my glasses, that I need to see, that were on my face… I’m 34. I wonder sometimes.
Our psychologist had us wait for a while, until our daughter was about 7, to evaluate for ADHD, because she didn’t think she could tease out what was ADHD and what was just her developmental delays. However, at 7, our daughter also got a diagnosis for ADHD. I was a bit angry that it took that long because the medication has been SO HELPFUL for her.
I joined a facebook group for people losing weight and lifting weight for motivation and accountability. I really like a lot of the posts and thought it was a great community. They started talking about a 14 day challenge. I didn’t join but was cheering other people on. Turns out the 14 day challenge includes going on a 1000 calorie diet or less. Welp, guess I’m leaving this group. That’s some dangerous shit right there. I want to lose weight, not develop an eating disorder.
Wait, why can’t people quit with no notice? They are fired without notice. That seems like an unfair double standard.
Well, I’ve never fired anybody, and two weeks notice is a standard thing.
I have done the same thing at about your age. I’m 64 now and not (obviously) senile yet. So don’t be too concerned.
Ultimately “looking for my glasses” is really caused by “I’m not seeing as well as I’m used to right now”. Which can have causes from bad lighting to fatigue to … wait for it … dirty glasses. So even when you do find them on your face a few minutes later that doesn’t mean your quest is done. Now you need to find the cause of not seeing as well as your normal.
I don’t think I’ve ever looked for my glasses while wearing them, but that doesn’t mean I’m immune to glasses-related oddities. I’ve sometimes looked for them when not wearing them, which is normal except for the times that I couldn’t find them because I absent-mindedly set them down in some odd location. I once found them, after a diligent search, on top of a box in the basement. Also, I tend not to wear my glasses around the house, so I’ve occasionally departed in my car without them, which is contrary to what my license requires. My ideal glasses would not only be ping-able, like a cell phone, but could be summoned to come to me over long distances, like a faithful dog.
And the “something weird” is that it’s almost impossible for a job-hunter to know what’s going on with the job-providers.
I’ve been on both sides. And I finally realized that time passes differently for each side; you need a job soon, the business needs to fill a spot eventually…
Or maybe not…
And in the meantime, someone internally might get promoted, or asked to take on some/most of the responsibilities, or a higher-up says “Let’s wait on filling that position.”
Do NOT take it personally! You’re emotionally invested in this. The company is not.
You might think they’re trying to figure you out and finding a fault that makes you un-hireable. Naaah, they’re too busy. Hiring someone is just one of a hundred fires they have to put out this month, and they don’t even have time to think about who’s applied.
Given that, you’re lucky you even got an email!
I ran into a woman who’d interviewed me TWO YEARS before, who I’d never heard back from, and she said “Hang in there, we’re still trying to get that position into our budget!”
